Shocking

[Dave C]

Shocking won the G1, 2 mile Melbourne Cup coming off 4 days rest after winning a 1 9/16 miles G3 race and his 6th race since the middle of September. His pedigree is very American.

Nobody in NA would consider this type of a schedule appropriate for even a bottom claimer never mind a top class horse. That leaves 2 possibilities: our surfaces are extremely hazardous to our horses or our training techniques are extremely hazardous to our horses.

[dublino]

Surface i.e. DIRT and your training methods i.e. the SYRINGE

[Mahubah]

More the latter than the former. We had a pretty fair number of good horses turning in 12-20 starts a year before the medication rules started loosening up.

[Dave C]

One of the reasons the medication rules started loosening up was because of a declining number of starts per year. The medication was supposed to help stop that decline but depending on how you crunch the numbers has either had no effect on the decline or made it worse. I am of the opinion that the toll taken on a horse by lasix makes it all but impossible to run back on a quick turn around, but that does not explain the declining number of starts before lasix became common.

If dirt racing is the problem, why were horses 70-80 years ago able to make more starts? Why then aren't turf horses able to run more races if the problem is the surface? Or poly horses?

If the problem is the training techniques, didn't the old masters not pass the knowledge on? Many of the top trainers learned their craft by starting out with one of the top trainers of by gone days.

If the problem were genetics, why were American TB genetics so prolific in the pedigrees of the Melbourne Cup entrants? Shocking was not the only horse running back on short rest or the only horse with strong US TB influence.

So many questions, hopefully someone can offer some answers.

[doublete]

I'll just add that I learned from a guy that won 4 races in I think 5 days with the same horse. Now it was New England, but he's the reason that they changed the rule to disallow such things.

I've won a race with a cheap claimer on 4 days rest. And I have horses that consistently run every 10-14 days. In fact, have many that can run on much less rest. Had one last year that I ran a ridiculous number of times on the turf at Colonial in their short meet.

Reasons? I don't know. I use lasix, I run on bute. My horses don't have many soundness problems. I exercise ride them myself. Don't know how they hold up. But I also don't have really good horses.
No amount of medication in the WORLD can make a horse do what Shocking did. He is just able to do it on his own.

[Mike]

One must wonder about training methods today IMHO. There is more urgency than there was 30/40 years ago. Everyone expects things early today. There is zero patience!! This is not about the U.S. Its about everywhere. In our part of the world NZ trainers are generally more patient than Australian. Mark Kavanagh is obviously an exception. He does it too often to be a fluke.

Good 2yo trainers, for example, usually have many in work and have high attrition rates.

[Cryptic Ninja]

NZ trainers are generally more patient simply because their stock need time.
NZ Breds are not renown for 2yr olds.

As for Mark Kavanagh, he and his clients don't buy $1-2m yearlings so he is
not on any kind of pressure to run them early to recuperate their purchase price.

[Bunty Lawless]

Shocking won the G1, 2 mile Melbourne Cup coming off 4 days rest after winning a 1 9/16 miles G3 race and his 6th race since the middle of September. His pedigree is very American.

Nobody in NA would consider this type of a schedule appropriate for even a bottom claimer never mind a top class horse. That leaves 2 possibilities: our surfaces are extremely hazardous to our horses or our training techniques are extremely hazardous to our horses.

Each horse is an individual. We have very few trainers on any continent that know how to train a horse consistently to its individual needs, let alone with the ability to see a soundness warning sign, before it is too late.

Trainers depend more on the vet than real horseman skills, IMO. Most of them cannot even tell when the farrier has done a good or a bad job. I could go on and on but heck, who has the time anymore?

[Mike]

All Australian trainers are under pressure from owners to start their horses early. Mark is under those same pressures but resists them.

NZ trainers are generally more patient because the pressure from owners is not there in the same way as Australia. You are correct that NZ horses generally need more time, but there have been good 2yo trainers in NZ too. Colin Jillings, Bill Sanders and Trevor McKee spring to mind.

[kimberley mine]

I think you can best say that this is a well-trained, dead fit, SOUND animal who has been excellently managed.

His owner uses him to muster cattle, implying he's trainable and rideable as well as fast.

[vineyridge]

Question from a total ignoramus

How long have we in the US been keeping race horses stalled for 23 hours a day, day in and day out, with very little true conditioning exercise? How many US racers get sent to the farm for turn out for half the year these days? For that matter, with the constant use of Lasix unlike racing in the rest of the world, maybe our horses just can't run on quick turnarounds.

If that isn't how most American horses are handled these days, forgive my misconceptions.

How does training in Australia and NZ compare to that model?

I've read far too many accounts of heat racing and horses running literally back to back a hundred years ago or more to believe that it wasn't possible even in America long ago. What changed?

[griff]

No in-breeding or line-breeding to Mr Prospector but he is 5S X 6S X 6D X 5D to Native Dancer.

griff

[Mike]

Question from a total ignoramus

How long have we in the US been keeping race horses stalled for 23 hours a day, day in and day out, with very little true conditioning exercise? How many US racers get sent to the farm for turn out for half the year these days? For that matter, with the constant use of Lasix unlike racing in the rest of the world, maybe our horses just can't run on quick turnarounds.

If that isn't how most American horses are handled these days, forgive my misconceptions.

How does training in Australia and NZ compare to that model?

The norm down under is that horses are spelled regularly. Not everyone does that though. Most would have 6/8 week (at a time) spells in Australia and possibly 8/12 weeks in NZ on average. 6 weeks is hardly a spell but many do that in Aus.

In Australia, generally horses are worked in the morning and given a pick or walk either by hand or on the walker in the afternoon. In NZ a horse can spend a lot of its daytime in small grass yards.

[wallinga]

His owner uses him to muster cattle, implying he's trainable and rideable as well as fast.

that was the beaten favourite Alcopop, coming off a 3 and a half week break, ran sixth.

Look at all the Almahmoud and hail to reason in shocking's pedigree, and he's an entire!

[wilf]

When I was a strapper at Bart Cumming's stable in beautiful Adelaide South Australia Mark Kavanagh was a teenager and lived next door to the stables in Glenelg. His mother used to cook meals for all the staff that lived in the barn area,including me. Last I heard Mark was riding over hurdles but obviously in the time since he has shown that he has the talent to run a business and an eye for a young horse. In Australia they breeze horses on Tuesday and thursday and 2 minute lick on Saturdays ,that's how the training is set up over there. In the afternoon it is common for the help to come back at 2pm to ride one horse and lead another down to the beach or the river or the pool and swim them. These animals are fit and lean ,bone and muscle and when they go sore they are not drugged up and dropped into claiming races for the next guy to worry about until they are fried,they have a "spell", or a 'lay up". There are no claiming races ,if you have a horse that cannot win a race at the city tracks then you try the provincial tracks ,then the country tracks ,then the bush tracks. Most small towns have a racetrack and it might run once a month ,otherwise you ship to wherever. I race at the B tracks here in America and here at Mountaineer the trainers are not handed anything on a plate. The track is half empty but you cannot get a stall for some reason however that may be a good thing as there are many training facilities nearby where horses can swim and use equicisers and they seem to thrive that way. Lastly horses in Australia do not have to run over the frozen surfaces of the American winter racing circuit, a practice that certainly shortens a horses career in my view. I first trained on a beach 7 miles long in New South Wales and some times after a long disappointing night of frreezzing my ass off getting nothing but wet and dirty I have to admit my mind does stray a little!