Sorry,thought 3200,don't know why.
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I've watched the replay a few times now. My eyes keep getting drawn back to Christen Me. Looked in second gear and was holding off ITMQ in full flight. This guy could be anything.
The way I see ITMQ is this. His greatest advantage is his sheer athletcism and beautiful balance, so he can hit top speed on the bend at GP. Normal horses can't do that. They need to cruise around the bend, get to the top of the straight, balance up and then sprint. By this stage at GP ITMQ is mid sprint while the rest are just getting started. He can give them a start and round them up. He's a wonderful horse, he has changed what "normal" is at GP. The great ones rewrite the script like he has.
However, at Menangle every horse has the opportunity to get in a good 350m sprint and even out to 500m at the point of the turn as that bend is so long and sweeping. The swoopers lose their advantage there. He won't be able to give the field a big start (I have him 1x6 on settling) and will need to do work mid race to be in a position to strike. Can he sprint, settle, and sprint again? I don't know, I can't recall him doing that before (if someone can tell me where to see a replay of him doing it please let me know) and plenty have been burned when he has gone forward early only to find nothing when it matters. There are too many ifs with him for me to take anything like $3.00-$3.20 on offer. For me it is Carribean Blaster. He has the ideal draw and he has proved at the top level this season how tough and brilliant he can be, whichever is required at the time. He is very underrated in my opinion.
Delete post.
Washakie in the same category as Smoken Up,and I don't mean retired - you misinterpreted. Glad you used Washakie as an example because it does prove that times don't mean a great deal.
As Gary Hall Snr said, when they sent Washakie to Queensland,'' he was an inferior horse to ITMQ.''
Apologies in advance teecee! I just don't understand!! What am I missing?
Rod, please show me where I'm misinterpreting.
In post 25 you said:
"Another point, note how fast W.A. horses are, over at Menangle, I'm Victorius 1:52.7, MMM 1:52.2 after 3 wide in the first 300 and both unextended. "
I made the point that that is not fast at all. I used a list of times that included Smoken Up as an example.
You came back with an irrelevant comment about Smoken Up.
So I took Smoken Up out of my example and used Washakie.
Now you say:
"Washakie in the same category as Smoken Up,and I don't mean retired - you misinterpreted."
Washakie in same category as Smoken Up? Which category? The 2 fastest horses ever around Menangle category?
You also said:
"Glad you used Washakie as an example because it does prove that times don't mean a great deal."
But they did in post #25 ??
[QUOTE=G-Mac;26022]
The way I see ITMQ is this. His greatest advantage is his sheer athletcism and beautiful balance, so he can hit top speed on the bend at GP. Normal horses can't do that. They need to cruise around the bend, get to the top of the straight, balance up and then sprint. By this stage at GP ITMQ is mid sprint while the rest are just getting started. He can give them a start and round them up. He's a wonderful horse, he has changed what "normal" is at GP. The great ones rewrite the script like he has.
Glen, his dominance at GP puts me in mind of another great 'horses for courses champ' Chief De Beers who had 51 starts and won 20 of them. Every single win was at Doomben...
ITMQ brilliant wind-ups and sprints around those corners at GP were breath taking. That long straight the other day in the trial was a different story.
So, you ITMQ analysts out there, was the Menangle straight too long for him today? He was hitting the line hard after a sub 55 last 800. Speed is speed, on any size track, around bends or on straights. He showed speed in the trial onTuesday, speed on Thursday and speed today. He was simply faster than than all the others. I think sometimes these things get over-analysed.
Dont want to argue with you either Rod. Its too hard to work out what arguing about.
Horse went super today. Awesome. Beat that field easy and driven absolutely perfectly.
A great days racing and new facilities at Menangle fantastic. Going to be the best when all finished. Considering all the rain (was still raining here at 6am this morning)
conditions were almost perfect when we got there.
Great job HRNSW.