Showing posts with label Shirreffs. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Shirreffs. Show all posts

  • Did Eblouissante offer value in her debut?

    POSTED Nov 20, 2012 By Unknown
    At the racetrack, value and not always beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Or, as my college newspaper editor, Robert Levine, used to say, "One man's gold is another's gonorrhea."

    Benoit & Associates photo
    Indeed, trying to scratch that itch with a "sure thing" at 7-to-5 can burn you, but passing on easy winners at what appear to be overlaid odds after the fact smarts, too, and the debut of Zenyatta's half sister, Eblouissante, on Friday at Hollywood Park offered the perfect backdrop of this handicapping conundrum.

    The base question is, what is the lowest odds at which a horse can truly offer value? Did Frankel offer value when 2-to-5 in the 2011 Queen Anne Stakes? I thought so and made a prime win bet on him. Would I have played at 1-to-5, though? Definitely not, and I know plenty of people who wouldn't have bet Spectacular Bid at 2-to-5 to win the 1980 Woodward.

     Eblouissante was far more generous in her debut, paying off at 7-to-5 in a race I thought she was even money to win while prepared to take 6-to-5. Of course, that "generous" modifier is my opinion, since plenty of pre- & post-race chatter involved calling her overbet.

    When I first looked at the race my impression was that trainer John Shirreffs would have her in peak form for an unraced late-season three-year-old filly. The BRIS Speed Rating par for the race was 89, a number only one other starter had come close to. Given Eblouissante's family's history and the string of workouts I was confident she could run atleast par.

     The final piece of the puzzle, though, was reading Andy Harrington's workout notes in his National Turf Clocker Report, which is available daily ($9.95) via Brisnet.com for Southern California tracks.
     
    EBLOUISSANTE Nov 11 HOL 5 :59.1H M FT    B+      
    Jet black powerfully built sort tracked a barnmate was asked some on the turn drawing away late while on own in 35.2, 59.3. Clearly has run, clearly fit (has turned in 45 drills since last year in preparation for debut). Think she can run as far as they card 'em. Was in blinkers; Blanc up. Like her sis she appears to have a mellow disposition.---Grade: B+
    EBLOUISSANTE Nov 5 HOL 6 1:15.1H M FT    B+      
    In blinkers; grand looker made a good run at barnmate Odeon and galloped out quite well while not asked in 38.1, 103.1, 115.0 out around the bend in 127.4. Not overly handy but can run forever.---Grade: B+
    EBLOUISSANTE Oct 19 HOL 6 1:14H M FT    B+      
    Corey up; noticeably caught hold midstretch running away from barnmate Cotton Belle finishing 3 clear in 37.3, 113.4. Much substance here.---Grade: B+
    As you can read, Andy liked what he saw, and these notes gave me the confidence to bet my opinion that Shirreffs had this one ready to roll and that a par effort for the class was likely. As it turned out, she bettered par by a few points with a 93 BRIS Speed Rating when winning easily by 4 1/2 lengths.


    The 7-to-5 price seemed more than fair both before and after the race, but some disagreed even after this tour de force, citing that her price was suppressed because of her family. I don't disagree that Eblouissante would have been a higher price if she weren't Zenyatta's half sister and/or hadn't been written about for the past year and a half, but I do disagree that the extra money because of that automatically makes her an underlay.

    Assessing her chances to win the race at 50% had nothing to do with knowing that there'd be a lot more casual money bet on her. Obviously I knew that was in play and a big reason I was so surprised at the 4-to-1 morning line, but just because she may have been 2-to-1 without the Zenyatta connection doesn't mean she didn't offer value at 7-to-5 if I thought she'd win 50% of the time.

    All this discussion is not to say that every favorite who wins by daylight is a good bet, but knowing Eblouissante would take casual money didn't automatically make her a bad bet either.

  • Can Eblouissante save racing? What about my bankroll?

    POSTED Nov 12, 2012 By Unknown
    Racing may not need stars or a Triple Crown winner, but it definitely needs Eblouissante to win race 4on Friday at Hollywood Park (free PPs).

    OK, that's a bit dramatic, but considering she is Zenyatta's half sister (Brisnet.com pedigree) and already has her own Facebook, Tumblr, and Youtube video (see below for more), it's not a stretch to imagine this one being able to move the dial with a 20-length win and world record performance on Friday.

    And as a fan of horse racing I'd like to see her do that, but as a horse player, I have to wonder if there is an opportunity to make some money here if she loses.

    It's a similar lament to betting on the Belmont Stakes with a Triple Crown on the line when fans "cheer for history but bet against it."

    It happens in maiden races, too, though. When Barbaro's full brother Nicanor debuted on January 31, 2009, at Gulfstream Park, he was the 13-to-5 second choice in a field of 12. Who knows what his price would have been without the Barbaro connection [same breeding (Dynaformer-La Ville Rouge), owner-breeder (Roy & Gretchen Jackson), trainer (Michael Matz), and jockey (Edgar Prado)], but I'm comfortable saying he'd have been more than 13-to-5 considering the race included future graded stakes winner Warrior's Reward (1st at 30.5-to-1), Allrightsreserved (2nd), favored Dubinsky (4th), Il Postino (6th), and Big Flirt (8th).

     Given that Eblouissante has had 45 published workouts the past 17 months, including 8 in the past two months, one handicapping report that will be indispensable in determining how to play the race is Andy Harrington's National Turf Clocker Report.

    If Harrington has liked what he's seen in the morning ("B+" grades or better) then she is certainly the most likely winner of this group considering only one horse has run better than par (89) and all of the synthetic figures are in the lower 80s.

    Even if she is the most likely winner, though, it's difficult to envision her offering any value in the win pool, but that's where multi-race wagering can help. I'm not sure how many Zenyatta fans (the kind of fans that would bet her half sister blindly) bet, but my sense is that the ones that do stick to the following wagers: Win, WPS, show, exacta, double, and trifecta with a heavy lean toward the straight wagers.

    Put another way, I don't think they dabble in Pick 3s, Pick 4s, and Pick 5s--bets where the wise guys & gals are more likely to hang out. If I truly like Eblouissante then I'd look to single her in the multi-race wagers. She's the fourth leg of the $.50 Pick 5, third leg of the $.50 Pick 4, and is involved in three different Pick 3s. I'd then be open to hedging against her in the win pool if other key contenders floated up because of sentimental money on the Zenyatta kin.

    If I don't like Eblouissante then I'd probably eschew the multi-race wagers altogether and still focus on the win pool because I'd anticipate her take money. The double pool in races 3-4 also merits attention A) for potential overlays, and B) to gauge how much money Eblouissante might take in race 4.

    And maybe it'll turn out that there's no opportunity, and that's OK, too. The presence of a superstar's half sister is reason enough to watch, and the conversation that is sure to happen on Twitter will make it all the more fun.

  • The greatest maiden race ever

    POSTED Mar 8, 2012 By Unknown
    As the racing world and Zenyatta fans anxiously await news of the Horse of the Year's first delivery, it is impossible to suppress memories of her brilliant career, which I consider to be the greatest by any older female in the history of Western Hemisphere racing.

    That such a career happened to coincide with the greatest campaign by a three-year-old filly in the history of the American Turf was both exhilarating and spoiling for horse racing fans. Both Rachel Alexandra and Zenyatta were once-in-a-generation horses. I might see a few more of their ilk before I die, but the chance that they're around at the same time is unlikely.

    That leads to a common lament of fans of both horses: Rachel Alexandra and Zenyatta never faced each other on the racetrack. Will their foals?

    About 31%-32% of each foal crop races as two-year-olds. I'm willing to round up and call it an even third given the success of the broodmares in question. If each foal has a 2-to-1 chance of racing as a two-year-old then there is an 8-to-1 chance that both would race, which isn't too bad.

    Granted, Zenyatta did not debut until the fall of her three-year-old season, and Bernardini was relatively late to the races as well, but both came out running, and Bernardini's offspring have done well as two-year-olds (e.g. Stay Thirsty, To Honor & Serve). The sire of Rachel Alexandra's colt, Curlin, is similar to Bernardini in that he, too, debuted as a three-year-old before going on to win the Preakness and three-year-old male championship (Curlin also added Horse of the Year honors with a 2007 Breeders' Cup Classic victory, a race that eluded Bernardini the previous year when he was second to eventual Horse of the Year Invasor).

    What anyone would really want, though, is for the two foals to run against each other--or at the very least to be good enough that there would be an opportunity for them to run against each other.

    The Wynn Las Vegas race book got some good publicity by offering 60-to-1 that Rachel Alexandra's colt would start in the 2015 Kentucky Derby, and I expect that the casino will offer a similar prop when the sex of Zenyatta's foal is known. If it's a colt, and Avello sets a similar 60-to-1 line on his chances to make the Derby starting gate, then the odds both get in is 3,720-to-1.

    But why wait to see how good they are(n't)?

    Assuming that the Moss's will place Zenyatta's kin in the care of John Shirreffs and the Rachel Alexandra colt will be with Steve Asmussen for Stonestreet, it's not inconceivable that both foals will eventually find themselves stabled in Southern California. Santa Anita Park should begin planning for a maiden race on December 26, 2014, that would carry a $1-million purse if both foals show up.

    It isn't completely out of line with the owners' ways of thinking. Jerry Moss has said before that maiden races should be worth $100,000 to give owners a better chance to recoup the cost of racing horses more quickly, and the late Jess Jackson made similar points about the value of overnight races.

    The publicity surrounding either horse making it to the races would be immense, but it would be nothing compared to if they were able to do what their mothers didn't by racing against each other.

    Obviously a lot can happen between now and then. If Zenyatta has a filly then a maiden race is the best chance for the two foals to race, anyway. Either could be two-year-old phenoms and win at Del Mar or Saratoga, and either could need more time and not start until their three-year-old seasons as both their sires did.

    Still, such a maiden race would allow any track to cash in on the mares' star power. Remember when Sam Houston offered a big purse to try to lure a RA-Zen matchup? Why not throw the money out there now to generate excitement? I chose Santa Anita because of the calendar and proximity to trainers, but Sunland would be just as fun.