It's about time to consider reforming the way our races are timed

[cmorioles]

There is another problem with run up. The start of the timing of the race is determined by how fast the first horse gets to the pole. At places like Santa Anita, with a football field of run-up, you might get a horse that has no chance break out 3 or 4 lengths in front of the field and start the clock, while all the others are lagging behind. The leader quits and loses by 50 lengths, but the other horses are basically penalized by his start.

To put it simply, horses are all given a final time, but we really don't know how far they ran to get that final time. It depends on the length of the run up and how far behind the horse was when the leader started the timing. It isn't much different than ground loss on turns, some horses run farther than other timing wise.

Another problem is tracks (like Gulfstream) that run the same distances with wildly varying run up, even on the same card. Luckily, that is pretty rare, but it happens.