Horse Racing should retroactively grade races
The graded stakes committee fights a double-edged sword when they release their updates each year.
Blame, who won the Clark Handicap one week ago, is now a grade two winner. His victory in the race and those who competed against him (along with those who ran in years past) were catalysts to making the race a grade one for 2010. Unfortunately for Blame, he only receives credit for a grade two despite it being a grade one race.
It is part slippery-slope and part circular logic (as Jay Hovdey wrote earlier this week). Then a race like the Go For Wand, with a pretty stellar line-up of recent winners (Ashado, Azeri among others) gets downgraded. It makes you scratch your head a bit, doesn’t it?
I think the system needs to evolve to honor races retroactively. The only variable lost in such a process is the ability to promote an upcoming race using its grade. I would argue, however, that races are not made or broken by their grade. Would the West Virginia Derby have garnered more attention this year if it were a grade one? No, because Mine That Bird was the story. The argument could be made it would have attracted a better horse or two, but that’s subjective and hard to truthfully determine.
Creative marketers could use this to their advantage by promoting how many straight years their race has been a grade one, or whether it’s one of the fastest growing races on the calendar etc.
Additional benefits include post-race commentary and debate. Imagine eliminating the question of whether or not Zenyatta defeated the best Classic field in history? Or whether Mine That Bird was good, or he just beat a suspect group? How good was the Haskell field versus the Travers field? Food for thought…
A better system could also revolutionize how horses are promoted for stud and in the sales ring. What sounds more compelling: “Grade one winner Pyro” or “Pyro: Winner of the 2nd best Forego Handicap of all time?”
For some reason, breeders and consignors have never really used speed figures as a marketing tool when it comes to horses. My best guess would be the questionable value of figures on the turf and synthetic surfaces. A retroactively applied graded stakes system would eliminate those shortcomings rather quickly.
And it would also eliminate the head-scratching which seems to happen every year.
» And now for a good laugh… The Thoroughbred Times quote of the day is a good one…
“Me? Retire? What for? I can’t play golf.” -New York-based trainer Frank “Pancho” Martin, who celebrated his 84th birthday on Thursday.
Pretty clever (and this is coming from a golfer).
Travis
Trying to make the grade
12/05/09 10:03 am
Interesting idea… the Arkansas Derby taking so long to be grade one is a joke!