JC / Railbird

Del Mar Archive

Del Mar’s Polytrack Era Begins

– Slowly. Race two was the first run over the new surface and the fractions for the six furlong affair were :22.68, :47.09, and 1:00.29, with a final fraction of :13.66. But the surface seemed to play fair through the afternoon. Pressers and stalkers did just fine, closers didn’t dominate. Watching from 3,000 miles away, the track looked firm, the kickback minimal, and only a few horses appeared uncertain about what was under their feet. “They’re gripping it, but it’s a lot different from anything they’ve ever been on,” jockey Richard Migliore told DRF after the second race. “It’s going to take some time for some of them to get used to it.” Migliore also warned handicappers that the surface was “tiring” and “You’re going to want a horse that makes one run. You don’t want a horse that’s going to be fighting you.”
– Trainer Richard Mandella won the day’s third, the two-year-old maiden special Bob Baffert’s Maimonides was scratched from, with 9-1 first time starter Kanan Dume, who tracked early speed Good Man Dan into the stretch, then held off even-money favorite Coast Guard to win by a neck. Look for all three to come back. Kanan Dume is by Malibu Moon, out of the late turf stakes-winning mare Trishdye, euthanized for complications following his birth.
– The unbeaten filly Fleetheart returns on Saturday, when she’ll try turf and stakes company for the first time in the Osunitas Handicap. Fleetheart is a half-sister to turf stakes winner Guardianofthegate, as pointed out in this earlier post, and she’s proven herself a tough, tactical runner in all four of her career starts.

Posted in Del Mar on July 18, 2007

Handicapping Polytrack

Del Mar opens Wednesday with a new Polytrack surface and reduced banking on the turns (DRF+) and cautious handicappers will watch intently the meet’s first days (North County Times) to see how the synthetic track plays. Almost certainly, the surface will evince qualities noted on other synthetics: It’ll be fairer, kinder to closers, crueler to speed. For those wondering how to handle this strange new world in which speed doesn’t always rule, Del Mar offers a James Quinn piece on Polytrack handicapping (PDF). I’m no Quinn, but here’s what I’ve noticed about synthetic surfaces:

– Fewer races are won wire-to-wire (handicapper Mike Maloney offers some interesting numbers about this in the Handicappers Expo panel on synthetics, now on DVD), but legitimate speed retains an advantage, especially in sprints. In one small test of Hollywood results I did, 26 of 262 starters in 36 races (all on the main track, all non-maidens) could be classified as “Early,” meaning their average position at first call was on the lead or less than one length off the lead. Of those, 10 won. That 28% win rate is 11% less than a similar sample from the previous year, but still a powerful number.

The key though is determining what’s legitimate speed — synthetics expose cheap speed for what it is, allowing horses coming from off the pace or far back to run their races. We call this “favoring” closers only because speed horses and speed-biased dirt tracks have become so dominant. We’re seeing a shift to a world of truer pace. Handicap through that lens on synthetics, rather than that of bias, and you’ll be rewarded.

– Class matters on synthetics. Horses must fit, and must be fit enough for, the level at which they’re starting. Horses running back to the same class level or dropping a bit run better than their odds, and this is especially true when going turf to synthetic.

– Pedigrees can offer clues to how horses will handle synthetic surfaces. For a long time, I paid little attention to breeding. Synthetics changed that, as it became apparent that the surface wasn’t turf or dirt and that there are sires whose offspring perform well specifically on the surfaces. Arlington Park handicapper Joe Kristufek has identified several sires with exceptional success on synthetic tracks: Belong To Me, Chester House, Chief Seattle, Honour and Glory, Skip Away, and Slew City Slew. In Excess, Lit de Justice, and Tribal Rule have also sired multiple synthetic surface winners.

Related: Hollywood’s first spring-summer meeting on Cushion Track ended a huge success: Handle broke records, attendance was up, and even field size increased, the track announced. Del Mar officials must be hoping they can report similar triumphs come September.

Contrary opinion: John Mucciolo probably won’t be playing Del Mar: “I have had enough! Average animals taking home the trophies in our biggest events, ridiculous results from day-to-day, top horses failing to produce on synthetic ovals, when will the madness stop?”

Posted in Del Mar, Synthetic Surfaces on July 17, 2007