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Let’s discuss pace figures as a means to handicapping the contenders for this year’s Kentucky Derby…

Over the last few months, I’ve capped a lot of races. There has been no better tool to improved handicapping and greater profits than pace handicapping.  Analyzing pace figures and scenarios have helped me identify:

• How many horses want the lead
• Who is the speed of the speed
• Lone speed (always dangerous)
• How fast the pace will be and what the overall race set up will be (favors speed or closer)

 

Since I have been working with pace figures, I have discovered that there is a correlation or relationship between pace and class. We will use this premise as a playable angle for this year’s derby.

First, some background to put everything in context.

One of the best handicapping angles I’ve discovered is the ‘class dropper with the best pace figures’. These horses are almost virtual locks to win, regardless of where they have been finishing at the higher class level and their final speed figures.  A real life analogy would be a runner on the varsity track team who is the worst miler on his high school team.  He expends 85% of his energy trying to keep pace with these fast runners and in the last quarter mile he has nothing left in his tank (because he expended it earlier in race) and finishes the race in last place, tiring badly near the finish. Now, assume the kid wants to build his confidence back up, and so he decides to race against the 8^th grade track team.  The pace of the 8^th grade track race is substantially less taxing and slower.  The high school kid is pretty much jogging for the first half of the race and yet he is right in the middle of the pack. He’s only used 30% of his energy reserves in the early stages (because he is a bigger and stronger athlete and has greater lung capacity and tolerance built up). Then with a quarter mile to go, and most of his energy still intact, the high school kid turns on the burners and sprints the last quarter mile leaving the 8^th grade punks in his wake to win by 50 yards. Same runner, two different class scenarios, and two different results. The reason: because the pace of each of the races was vastly different.  Same premise in horse racing. When the horse drops in class, he doesn’t have to expend the same level of energy in the early part of the race and has a lot of gas in the tank for the stretch drive and typically, will easily defeat the lower class/quality animals.

Obviously, the derby is the pinnacle of racing and represents the ultimate class test (no class droppers here) so how do we apply the pace/class principle for the derby?  Well, I did a handicapping experiment to see if the opposite was true – that being, if class jumpers with low pace figures could step up and win at the next level of competition.  It really started with trying to understand why maiden winners (who won impressively) were getting trounced the first time they faced winners (often going off as the favorite). It should be noted that maiden graduates facing winners for the first time represents one of the highest class jumps in all of horse racing.  The experiment yielded the following conclusions:

• Maiden winners who earned a low pace figure (65 or below) lost about 90% of the time when facing winners for the first time
• Often, these horses went off as the favorite
• Not only did the horse lose, but often they didn’t even finish in the money
• If the horse broke his maiden on the lead (with a low pace figure) he was twice as likely not to win first time facing winners
• If the horse’s first race was in allowance conditions, he needed to have a very strong pace figure to succeed in his race
• If a horse had a low pace figure and had an off the pace running style in maiden win, the only legitimate chance he had to win at next level  was a complete pace melt down by the front runners (especially in allowance conditions)

 

Going back to the track example, this data makes even more sense. Think about the 8^th grader who destroys his classmates on his own team but when he tries to take on the varsity high school milers (big class jump), he has to expend most of his energy trying to keep up with these kids in the early stages of the race (pace is much faster at high school level) and therefore, has nothing left for the last quarter mile and is trounced.

 I have looked at other class jumping scenarios –– and there does appear to a relationship between pace figures and success at the higher class – though not to the degree as the maiden win/ 1^st time vs. winners jump (pending more analysis). For the most part, I would say that there is definitely a correlation between pace and class. Essentially, horses that have high pace figures have a greater likelihood of success at the next class level (all other things equal and excluding synthetics and turf racing). Horses with weak pace numbers are an automatic play against when they are making a significant jump in class. This has become one of my most powerful angles in beating false favorites in non-winners of two lifetime races.

Since the derby represents the ultimate class test for 3yo’s, and this pace/class angle could be in-play, I thought it would be a good idea to research this angle further to see if there is material out there that confirms or contradicts it. I was able to find two sources that talk about pace as it relates to the Kentucky Derby.  Here is a summary of the findings:

From Turfpedia.com:

Regarding 3yo’s:

“Whenever three-year-old claiming horses take a significant climb in class, as from $25,000 to $50,000 claiming, and from any claiming race to a nonwinners allowance field, demand the pace figures be competitive. A faster, more severely contested pace typically accompanies a major class rise, and many of the horses cannot withstand the heat”.

Regarding 3yo stakes race:

“As developing horses, three-year-olds are vastly dissimilar from their older counterparts. As three-year-olds progress from the allowances and minor stakes to listed and graded stakes, they will go as far as natural abilities take them. Three-year-olds that suffer a pace weakness cannot proceed successfully to the graded races at the local track, or to the classics of spring and summer, or to the championship races against older stakes horses during fall.

Three-year-olds can record dazzling final times when the early pace has been soft. Others can crush fields of overnight horses early, posting dazzling pace figures, before cruising to an unexceptional final time. But only the best of any generation can deliver dazzling pace figures and speed figures in combination. Therefore, a combination of speed and pace figures among the three-year-olds is optimal and often necessary”.

http://turfpedia.com/methods/speed/horse.html

From James Quinn’s Best of Thoroughbred Handicapping:

“ 3 year olds need to have a good pace rating in order to effectively compete in the spring classic races”.

Quinn pretty much echo’s Turfpedia’s sentiment in his discussion about the Kentucky Derby.  

To me, this validates that the pace/class angle is legitimate as it relates to the derby, and so it makes sense to look at the pace figs of this year’s derby contenders, Note, I don’t have the figs from the most recent preps because the DRF PP’s don’t have them listed, so I will assess based on the runners previous races.  We’ll look at only the last 3 races and exclude turf races:

Best Pace Figures:

American Lion – 84, 115, 106

Awesome Act  – 105

Super Saver – 112, 112, 86

Discreetly Mine – 107, 106, 84

Conveyance – 106, 73, 110

Sydney’s Candy – 87, 106, 98

Worst Pace Figures:

Looking at Lucky – 71, 71, 69 (note he ran a 104 and 108 in 2 of his races before that)

Noble’s Promise – 76, 71, 81

Dublin – 75, 77, 79

So what does it all mean? It’s no surprise that the horses with the best pace figs are speed horses.  They want the early lead. The problem is that this year’s derby is packed with speed, so logic would say that it would have to set it up for a horse that is a proven closer.  While it is possible that one of the speed horses noted above will wire the field, the problem becomes identifying the one most likely to do it.  The other end of the spectrum is also possible – a blazing pace and anyone on or near the lead will be cooked, setting it up for a stone cold closer (remember the 2005 derby fluke Giacomo? He only won because all the other horses were staggering home and he was the last horse standing at the wire – note, he never won another race after the derby, proving it was a fluke).  While it is possible another stagger-fest will happen, predicting one to happen is not practical given that they only happen about once in every 10 derby’s. So, here is how I would break down the running style scenarios:

-10% chance a front runner steals the race (war emblem style all by himself, with easy pace). Most likely horse to do it would be Sydney’s Candy, but he will be 2^nd choice in wagering. Note, if Rule comes out of the race I would bump up the % on this happening to 20%. Rule is the speed of the speed but is not bred for the distance. Under the speed angle, a long shot that could wire the field is Discreetly Mine, a pletcher trained horse who attended to a fast pace in the La Derby.

-10% chance the race completely falls apart (Giacomo stagger fest) – Predict the winner by picking a non speed horse’s name out of a hat.

-80% chance the pace is fast and will set it up for stalker, mid-pack or closer.  Using the pace theory outlined above, the only two horses that fit the pace/class standards and running profile (Stalker / closer) are Awesome Act and Super Saver.

Awesome Act ran a great race in the Gotham, but the field may have been a little suspect. He got a good pace fig, good speed fig, and won while closing from off the pace. He raced mainly on turf before that so it’s tough to gauge his true pace ability on just one figure. He flopped in the Wood against Eskendereya but that may have been because he lost a shoe at the gate, and the jockey was trying to get him to rate behind a slow pace (had a strangle hold on him).

Super Saver changed tactics last time in the Arkansas Derby, as he rated just off the pace. This is an encouraging sign of what his strategy may be in the derby (lay just behind frontrunners and try to get first jump on the closers). He has the best pace profile of all derby contenders.

Under the derby pace/class angle, box these two in the exacta, with win bets on both.

The wild cards in this pace analysis are noted below. These horses cannot be evaluated due to a majority of their races were run on the turf.

Interactif

Dean’s Kitten

Paddy O Prado

Setsuko – synthetic but may not get in on earnings

Pleasant Prince – not in at moment