Cherry picking times – a look back at the San Carlos
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| American Anthem and St Joe Bay vie gallantly in San Carlos Stakes 2018. |
[June23, 2018 - Santa Anita Racetrack - Arcadia, Calif.] - The mysterious hand again descended. Here it was, the 80th running of the San Carlos Stakes, and as sure as the sun rises in the East, and sets in the West, uncertainty would come into play, before the final furlong of thief’s 7 furlong effort on dirt was done.Why would one say that? After all, the Bob Baffert-trained American Anthem, the winner, was a morning line favorite of 9-5, and the post time odds were .90 on $1. It was Race 11 going off past 8pm eastern time.
One would say that because the second place horse was a major surprise. St. Joe Bay morning lined at 12-1 and broke from the gate at about 42-1Darned if he led almost the whole way, and even after being headed, came back mightily, losing by less than a head (whether it was a nose, a head, or a half a head was later a matter of controversy among YouTube punters). The exacta paid $35.90, nice but not super, suggesting more than a few bettors thought to couple Anthem with St Joe. Baffert credited Hall of Fame rider Mike Smith for winning this one.
Let’s take a general look at some of the field, and more closely at St Joe Bay.
The class of the field is American Anthem, with $600 k in earnings, a Grade 2 and a Grade 3.Also under Bafferet’s tutelage is Dabster, a $1 million purchase, but one who’s run sporadically, and not at the graded level successfully. The rest (excluding St Joe) were stepping up, and had run against each other somewhat.
The formful horses with recency included Touching Rainbows (with the hot jock Prat aboard) and Stone Hands, who’d won the recent claimed alluded to below, had won last 3 infact. This was the second of the season for American Anthem.
The speed in the race seems to be American Anthem (who seemed capable of a 100 Breyer) and touching Rainbow, which at run near that in his first of two this year. An outcome of 4-6 seemed the most likely.
Considering St Joe Bay ran so ably today, he stands as a prime example of Backclass. It had been awhile between drinks, and he came to the race out of an OC where he was claimed from the Peter Miller barn for $62k by the John Sadler barn. In his career he had booked $500k, had won a Grade 2 and a Grade 3 – had just not been the same since a trip in 2017 to Dubai. He’d never won at the 7f distance. He’d achieved 100+ Beyers when he was good, but not since prior to Dubai.
The pace takes varied. But it did seem St Joe could lead, Touching Rainbow could be there, as well as El Hurerfano, and that American Anthem could do whatever he wanted.
In this stakes, Racetrack Romeo tried a new heuristic – viewing the workouts through a Beyersian lens – that is a rule of thumb out of Andrew Beyers “Picking Winners.” He sets out good times for different distances, while others suggest considering the spacing of workouts too. This told Romeo that American Anthem was in good form and Dabster too, tho only the former seemed to convert that projected form to success on the track today. The only bit that stood out in retrospect – in horse racing the call retrospection “cherry picking” – on St. Joe’s workouts was that Miller had him progress from 3 to 4 to 5 to 3 furlongs in workout sequence, while Sherifs had him 5 and then 3 furlongs. Causation or correlation?
Race Recapitulation - St Joe went to the front, setting fast early fractions of 22 and 1, 44 and 2, and 1:09. America Anthem dueled outside St Joe Bay for most of the way, taking a short lead in the stretch. The final time was 1:22. Beyer for the exciting race came in at 105.
Fin - 4 -2-5
Horse Greedy (ridden by Steward Elliot) came on late as anticipated, trailing the leaders by 1 and three-quarters L. Touching Rainbows, Stone Hands and Dabster, who - according to our analysis had about as much chance to come on as Greely - all weakend.
The runners
1-Top of the Game
2-St. Joe Bay
3-El Huerfano
4-American Anthem
5-Horse Greedy
6-Touching Rainbows
7-Stone Hands
8-Dabster
The picks here were 4 over 5,6,7.8 and 6 over 4,5,7,8. Racetrack Romeo called the winner, and so did the Santa Anita chorus. R. Had for of the horses in the 8 horse field but couldn’t get the exacta. He overlooked the back class, did not sense the return to form. He looked into the uncertainty around St Joe Bay, who he liked as a horse, but did not see the future of the horse in the exacta. The race was so very close – St Joe nearly topped Baffert’s good looker.
Also in the news, old fave Vyjack retires at 8
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