Originally Posted by
Messenger
Guys
Pt .1 If there is no sprint lane do you want to put your horse in the sit posn (other than if you are driving for luck) so it is a posn that drivers on good things avoided in the past
Pt. 2 If there is no sprint lane a good driver on a leader can use his skill to keep the horse on his back locked up or at least contribute to it (death horse of course relevant). We are now talking about real skill not the amount that a monkey would need to sit on the leader and use the sprint lane
Pt. 3 You are missing my point - the horse on the leaders back is given a Golden ticket ie after enjoying a cheap run he/she is guaranteed a run in the straight often after doing nothing but getting the right barrier draw. In the old days the 1x1 was considered a great spot to lob but the advent of sending horses 3w early (I reckon the Mannings perfected it) negated this. So the only positions with a sure fire run in the str are the Leader (who has to earn the lead and is vulnerable to attack - answer your point about banning leaders Brenno?), the Death horse who has to work, the 3W horse who has to work even harder, the swooper who has to come wide and from a fair way back, and the Sit horse who only has to keep up with the leader while getting a nice drag along and is then asked to make up about 4m to win
I have been a cyclist Ash and the 'maybe you were beaten by a better horse' argument really discounts the value of the cover/sit behind position (why track sprint cycling events are run over more than one heat with the pair of riders taking it in turns to have to lead out) The only way to know who was the better horse is to run both the 2 scenarios which we know cannot happen (for a start we are not talking about match racing) Don't you think if I owned Mindarie I might being thinking for the rest of my life about how the sprint lane cost me THE DREAM. It is the fact that it is the only free loading position in the run that GUARANTEES you a shot at the dream that I object to. Sure horses will be unlucky more often when there is no sprint lane BUT the better horse and driver is what it is going to take to win most of the time and I am fine with that
Brenno do you really think that Barynya could have put on the brakes to come 3w around Nike and got up? A big ask