When last we visited, we asked a bonus question relating to the front end action on Sunday, 4/18. On this card, there was only ONE race which immediately grabs my eye in terms of the speed story. Which race was it, and which horse(s) should be followed out of that race?
Well, I am pleased to say that scores and scores of people came back to me with the obvious answer: Race 7 and everyone came up with the same horse to watch - the obvious one from that race - MO GUMBO. To his credit, MO raced back at Freehold, went off at modest odds and finished 2nd. But the key here is that there were other horses too, whose efforts where not as obvious, who should have also been watched out of that race. They were on our GOLD CLUB spot list, and they represented some outstanding value when they raced back.
To start of this week, and prepare for tomorrow's issue on closers, let's take a closer look at the chart of this race from Sunday, 4/18, to see who these were:
M ,19990418,5,07 THE MEADOWLANDS RACE DATE: 04/18/1999
RACE: 07 TYPE: EARLY BETTING CLASS: nw7500L6cd GAIT: PACE
EVENT:
PURSE: 11,000 TRACK COND: FAST TIME: 0:27.2 - 0:55.2 - 1:25.1 - 1:54.1
-- TIME --
HORSE NAME POST 1/4 1/2 3/4 STRETCH FINISH ACTUAL LQ ODDS
HOUSTON HANOVER 5 7 7p 8p 8/6 1/HD 1:54.1 28.1 *140
MO' GUMBO 1 3 1 1 1/1Q 2/HD 1:54.1 29 460
ARMBRO ROADRUNNER 4 4 4 2p 3/1Q 3/NK 1:54.1 29 5770
HOUSE OF FUN 3 6 6p 6p 4/1H 4/NK 1:54.1 28.2 510
LAUNCH CODE 8 1p 3 5 5/3 5/1Q 1:54.2 28.3 810
IRON GAVEL 6 8 9p 9pp 9/7 6/2 1:54.3 28.3 860
FAHRVERGNUGEN 7 9 8 7 7/5 7/2Q 1:54.3 28.3 1620
CLAUDIUS Q 2 5 5 4p 6/4 8/2H 1:54.3 29 1210
VAY IS MERE 10 2p 2 3 2/1Q 9/3T 1:55.0 29.2 1130
STAR LANTERN 9 10 10 10 10/9 10/9H 1:56.0 29.3 13970
DRIVERS: M. LACHANCE, D. DUBE, D.S. MILLER, R.S. SILVERMAN,
L.R. OUELLETTE, J.D. CAMPBELL, J.G. MOISEYEV, J.M. MEITTINIS,
R.D. PIERCE, R.W. SCHNITTKER
As a number of you noticed - the fractions in the first half of this race were very fast relatively speaking, and this stood out - going out in 55.2 and coming home in 58.4 - that's a heck of a difference and stands out to almost anyone who looks at charts at all.
And everyone emailed me and yelled "MO GUMBO ... MO GUMBO ...MO GUMBO"---but what about 2 other horses in here who were also a major force in shaping the pace of this race? What about LAUNCH CODE who was parked to the 1/4 by MO GUMBO ... looks like he was shuffled and might not have had room, only getting beat a little more than a length after that. And what about VAY IS MERE who left from the 10 hole at 11-1, was parked behind LAUNCH CODE, went on with it and then yielded to MO GUMBO before the half? He did manage to stagger around and hang in there for quite a while. When I see races like this, no matter how bad the horse fades, I write his name down ... I jot it down. Might not be worth a bet, might be worth a bet, might be worth following up on, who knows. Then you have to grab the program for this race, and understand whether this race, even with the stretch fade, represented an improvement for a horse such as VAY IS MERE, which it did.
An another interesting followup to our first charting seqment on overview and the speed story--- in our last daily followup we highlighted BALL HOP as one to watch after seeing how that one's chart line did not reflect the amount of pre-stretch energy which she apparently used.
But alas, for those followers, including myself, who went to the track last week to bet BALL HOP, we were disappointed. What seemed like a perfect pocket trip turned into a disaster, as she had absolutely nothing and faded to 4th. My initial reaction was - "How bad was this horse?" and "What a RAT!"
However, as we look at the charts for that evening, race 10 on April 23, I saw a familiar pattern - off all the races on that night, this race was by far .. BY FAR.. the most front-end laden fraction-wise. In fact, let's have a quick look at it:
M ,19990423,6,10 THE MEADOWLANDS RACE DATE: 04/23/1999
RACE: 10 TYPE: LATE BETTING CLASS: M20000CL GAIT: PACE
EVENT:
PURSE: 14,500 TRACK COND: GOOD TIME: 0:27.0 - 0:55.0 - 1:24.1 - 1:53.1
-- TIME --
HORSE NAME POST 1/4 1/2 3/4 STRETCH FINISH ACTUAL LQ ODDS
KENTUCKY BELLA 7 3 3 3 3/3Q 1/1 1:53.1 28.2 480
CIRQUE 4 2p 1 1 1/1T 2/1 1:53.2 29.1 *330
SUNANDER 3 6 6 5 4/5H 3/1T 1:53.3 28.2 570
BALL HOP 8 1 2 2 2/1T 4/2 1:53.3 29.1 450
LEGAL BELLE 5 7 7 6 5/5H 5/2H 1:53.3 28 1730
DELTA SOMER 2 5 5 4 6/6 6/4Q 1:54.0 29 400
TOWNSHIP TIFFY 10 10 10 9 8/15 7/9T 1:55.1 28.2 7200
ARMBRO PHENOM 6 8 8 8 7/14 8/11T 1:55.3 29.2 4570
MACKS TABLE 1 4 4 7 9/17 9/22 1:57.3 31.3 480
RULER OF MEN 9 9 9 X10X 10/DIS 10/35 2:00.1 33 4890
DRIVERS: J.D. CAMPBELL, M.J. KESMODEL, J.G. MOISEYEV, L.R. OUELLETTE,
C.R. MANZI, D.S. MILLER, W.A. O'DONNELL, R.D. PIERCE, M.J. SORENTINO,
M. LACHANCE
CIRQUE and BALL HOP were the major players here in terms of effective usage in the first half of this race, and in terms of making the pace. So, what at first may have appeared to be a dull effort by BALL HOP may in fact have been excuseable - after all, she was used hardest and most effectively in the fastest part of this race, which was the fasted first half of the evening.
Off of this race, CIRQUE raced back and --- ready for this ---- was an impressive wire to wire winner, and returned over $18 to win! Now here's the kicker. BALL HOP was NOT in last week off of this race? Could the horse have maybe been sick? Who knows? Food for thought, but these 2 events - the review of the chart afterword and the subsequent no-entry seem to cast the effort of BALL HOP in a different light - certainly different than my opinion about half way through the stretch when it was obvious that this pocket trip was getting her nowhere!