Preakness Marathon Update
 

Derby finishers and their best mile time before Derby and IN THE Derby ranked numerically in far right column. Orange highlight for those who made the most progress from prior to race. some large improvements here.

Looking forward to 9.5 furlong (still a marathon) Preakness:

Preakness entrants with post position numbers by running style:

Yellow hilites are Derby race info

Orange = races from mile distance or other than grade 1 or grade 2. These horses have either not faced Gr 1/2 company or did not duplicate lower class form. I am eliminating all of these from win;

Lite green = positional gains or gains in lengths back

Purple = positional losses

My view:
All the pace setters are cheap, may vie vs each other and will not be there at end;

I like goldencents as best presser, but he too could get caught up in the early duel; but at least he has credentials in top graded company to keep going;

I think Oxbow gets first run on Orb and may be good enough to win; he got within a half a length at mile call in the derby and faded. His 6-5-2 running style should help him here;

Orb, shown as both presser and closer because in the ultra fast Feb race at GP he ran closer to the hot pace and still closed resolutely; no need to say that he can close well if he must come from back of pack;

Will Take Charge and Mylute should close well; WTC was rallying with Orb in Derby but found traffic just as Orb passed him and did not finish well.

I will box Goldencents, Orb and Oxbow for my exacta and add a few good closers if I bet larger exotics.

GL to all,

Clarifying column headings missing from last:

Hello Bill Lyster:

Great work..hope you cashed on Oxbow..

After Normandy Invasion scratched, Oxbow was closest to the hot pace of the Derby up until the mile marker..

Thanks Marathon Man...:)

Cashed on Oxbow and the Special/Derby double that paid $100 for a $2 bet x 3.

Tough two days betting mosting pick threes when available, had 17/25 races played but 2nd day pick threes and a couple of nice win prices carried the day.

Nice job, Bill.

I have but one comment.
You said OXBOW's 6-5-2 running style should help him. Is that REALLY his running style? Take a closer look.

Attachment 34324

Notice in lines 2,3 and 4 he was breaking from the 10 post. It is not always easy for an early horse to make the lead from that post position. It largely depends on the style of the horses breaking inside of him.
In the last line he encountered an 'off' track for the first time, so we don't know how that played into his performance. What we do know is, some horse went out on a suicide mission, and as you mentioned, this horse did well to be close to the lead after a mile before fading. This is another sign of an early horse trying to make or keep up with the leader and when not being able to do so, fades coming down the stretch. The situation was all different for him today.

Again, nice job.

Point taken and understood. My only explanation is that, in the case of this analysis - i.e. Derby and Preakness looks - I went further than the info shown in the PPs.

I used the position and call info from the charts which included info from the first quarter of the previous races. By doing this it showed me the horse would not necessarily break near the lead but was willing to pass horses to get near it. (The info above is from a manual spread sheet I created from charts for each contenders races this year.) Of course in this race he broke on top and got better - unexpected, but REAL nice nonetheless.)

FTL, thanks for drawing together the post info and integrating it into a total picture of this horse. Sure has been on the outside a lot for so few races...

The other thing that the charts showed that the PPs did not was that Oxbow actually got within 1/2 length at the mile call in the Derby and was second when he did so. Reading only the chart it looks like he only gets within 3.5 lengths

Bill,

Reading the above, I feel compelled to bring something to your attention, lest you get yourself in trouble.

PP's show the total number of lengths the horse is BEHIND the leader.

The charts show just the number of lengths a horse is IN FRONT of the horse behind it.

Here is the chart and the 'PP' lines from the derby.
First the chart.

This is where you see OXBOW being within one half length of the leader at the second call. ACTUALLY, it is one half length in front of the horse running in the third position at this point in the race.

Attachment 34326

Now the PP's.

Attachment 34327

You can take the PP's from any horse that ran in the derby and match it up to this. You will find that these match.

Here is an example.
At the second call Verrazano was in third position.
Palace Malice was in front by 3.5 lengths at that point.
Oxbow was in front of Verrazano by .5 lengths.
If you compare this to the PP's, you will see that Verrazano was 4 lengths behind at this point in the race. You can follow this examp[le for each horse in the race.

Hope this helps.

FTL..

Great point on the distinction of the actual lengths behind/in front. This board is blessed to have your tutelage and expertise.

Many thanks....




Orb fans.....

Orb just bounced in the Preakness especially after only two weeks past the major effort in the Derby. Orb couldn't even closed on that slow pace set by Gary Stevens on Oxbow. Some sharp sheets players were calling for a bounce before the Preakness against a heavy backstop of Triple Crown crusaders/fanatics.

What do you mean by the sentence quoted above? It is actually harder to close in on a slow early pace than a fast early pace. The early pace set up comparing the Ky Derby and Preakness were vastly different. I don't think he "bounced". Nobody thought he was a world beater prior to the Ky Derby. On that day, he obviously loved the slop and had a fast early pace to close into. The Preakness was set up very different. Orb losing was not a shocker except to those that do not seriously consider pace and track condition in their analysis.

Jim