Let's Talk About Stayers

re: Let's Talk About Stayers

PomDeTerre — Thu, 19 May 2011 02:29:32 GMT

PS to pedigree ann- why is it that u produce your amazing stats AFTER the race?

re: Let's Talk About Stayers

PomDeTerre — Thu, 19 May 2011 02:28:20 GMT

Pegigree Ann- anyone can get the same stats u tout out of a book, the internet or the drf. I'm a breeder/owner and i find your diatribe on ancestry obnoxious bordering on arrogant. Put the mare togethe with the stallion, make the most educated and responsible call u can as a breeder- and hope for the best foal possible. Reiterating past stats is inconsequential to the futuer.

re: Let's Talk About Stayers

Pedigree Ann — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 15:24:47 GMT

We finally have races for dirt stayers again, but we have lost many of the top races for classic distance horses. East of the Mississippi, there is now no 10f Grade 1 races for older horses before the JC Gold Cup in the fall. The older mares have more chances at the G1 level at 10f than the guys do! The NYRA is the biggest perpetrator of this farce, but Gulfstream, Monmouth, Meadowlands, and Suffolk have all 'dumbed down' their signature races for older horses to 9f, and in Maryland things are so mismanaged that they've given up as a major venue.

The lack of classic distance tests make stamina-limited horses like Quality Road into faux stars, doomed to failure when they go for the BC Classic in a full field. If the Gulfstream Park Hcp (at 10f) is now at a bad time vis-a-vis the World Cup, why not run it earlier, with the Donn at the start of the meet for a prep? Because breeders don't want their high-priced milers shown up as lacking? They can always blame travel or surface for failure in Dubai, after all.

re: Let's Talk About Stayers

Carlotta Cooper — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 14:55:29 GMT

It's a shame that stayers aren't appreciated more in the U.S. Instead, I just see shorter and shorter races carded for Thoroughbreds. Then people wonder why horses can't get the Derby distance, or start hitting a wall at 1 1/16. It seems like when we do have good stayers, if they are intact horses, they are just shipped off overseas when they retire. We never keep them here for breeding. So sad and so short-sighted.

re: Let's Talk About Stayers

Racingfan — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 02:06:37 GMT

I for one am very happy to see these "unofficial" Champion Stayer awards!!! I think it is a terrible thing that there is no such award included at the Eclipse ceremony.

re: Let's Talk About Stayers

sherpa — Wed, 27 Apr 2011 23:23:16 GMT

EW, I have visited your site regularly since a blog of yours was published here a year or so ago (Cloudy's Knight - my hero!), and I only wish there were enough distance races run so that you'd have to blog weekly! I don't know of any other horse-racing website that is devoted to the "Stayers" I love best of all.

Bourbon Bay is a worthy "unofficial" champion for 2010, though obviously not a match for most of those listed in prior years. This is what we are reduced to.

During Breeder's Cup season, I often read articles by turf-writers proposing that the Marathon should be abolished. Lord, save us and our few remaining stamina-breds from these fools whose attention-span is limited to < a mile. If I were sponsoring the BC, I'd make the Marathon the Main Event!

Thanks for leftcoastracing.com!