Don't Look Amateurish By Falling Into The 4YO vs 3YO Trap

[zippyneedsawin]

Originally Posted by Bold Brooklynite

I posted this message on another thread ... but I also feel it's worthy of a thread of its own ...

People ... people ... people ...

... please don't fall into the amateurish trap of comparing performances by 4YOS to performances by 3YOS.

All these folks who use the great races of Spectacular Bid or Seattle Slew or Dr. Fager as yardsticks for comparisons to Secretariat or Bernardini ... are falling into that silly trap.

None of those three great horses did anything extraordinary as 3YOS ... all of their mindblowing races came as 4YOS.

The 3YO Bernardini is every bit as good ... or in fact much better ... than the 3YO Spectacular Bid, Seattle Slew, or Dr. Fager.

The 3YO Secretariat blew the wheels off any horse of any age. Only the evil doings of worldwide socialism prevented us from seeing even more sensational performances from him as a 4YO.

Please ... don't make fools of yourselves by posting such nonsense again.

could you please go further in depth about how the 'evil doings of worldwide socialism' played a role in Secretariat's racing career?

Originally Posted by zippyneedsawin

could you please go further in depth about how the 'evil doings of worldwide socialism' played a role in Secretariat's racing career?

I've explained this countless times ... but if you missed it ...

Secretariat's owner ... C.T. Chenery ... died over the winter between Secretariat's 2YO and 3YO years. In 1973 ... there were still pre-Reagan, onerous socialist death taxes ... which the Chenery estate had to pay.

The only way they could raise enough cash to pay the taxes was to syndicate Secretariat for stud. The family ... headed by Penny Chenery (Tweedy) ... wanted to race Secretariat as a 4YO ... but the breeding investors would only fork up if Secretariat were retired after his 3YO campaign.

Secretariat was syndicated for a then-record $6 million ... BEFORE he raced as a 3YO. After his spectacular 3YO performances ... he could have been syndicated for $40 million.

So ... the socialist death taxes screwed the Chenery family out of over $30 million dollars ... and screwed all of us out of seeing Secretariat race as a 4YO.

It's 33 years later ... and I'm still seething over this. Another spectacularly stupid failure of socialism.

[sham]

BB, you are correct sir and here are the stats from my data base of 110 or so champion racehorses going back to 1900.

Avg imp 3yo vs 2yo - 14 lengths (projected to 10fl)
Avg imp 4&up vs 3yo - 4 lengths (projected to 10fl)

About 70% of horses that went on to race as older horses improved their average running times. About half of the 30% that did not improve had injury related issues. In summary, there is a 70%-85% chance that a horse will improve as a 4yo by an average of 4 lengths as compared to his 3yo season. Here is the data on the specific horses you mentioned (4yo vs 3yo seasons):

Slew - improved 4 lengths (projected to 10fl)
Bid - improved 6.8 lengths (projected to 10fl)
Fager - improved 5.6 lengths (projected to 10fl)