re: Royal and Wise - by Eric Mitchell

captainsmistress — Sat, 27 Jul 2013 02:09:16 GMT

She needs to face male horses and run competitively against them, and frankly, defeat them to be a serious contender for HOY. I think the bar is set too high for her; when she fires, she is amazing, when she is flat...well...

re: Royal and Wise - by Eric Mitchell

Pedigree Ann — Wed, 24 Jul 2013 15:06:54 GMT

Winning three BC Distaffs in a row is an 'accomplishment' only if your mare is too lacking in talent to test her against open company. I hate that Americans have been sold the idea that females ought not run against males because it will 'hurt' them somehow, Marketing Mix and her ilk notwithstanding. We would get more competitive and larger fields at all levels if we cut down on the number restricted to females only and have the mares run with their sex allowance in open races, as was done in the past.

Azeri won Horse of the Year without facing open company because there was no dominating open company horse that year. Same applies to years when 2yos won the title.

But this year, we have several open company horses with championship-type records thus far, so Royal Delta would have to beat some of them as well to win the Horse of the Year title. They would all have to collapse to nothing for her get the title without doing so.

P.S. Wise Dan isn't going in the Classic. He is 6 years old and if he could handle 10f in a competitive field, he would have done so by now. Fully mature horses his age don't usually suddenly develop new distance or surface proclivities the way a young horse might.