KEENELAND 2011 FALL MEET: First-Time-Starters on the Polytrack
by Matt Gardner on Oct 7, 2011 11:04 AM EDT
in Keeneland
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PrintWith the power of Excel/Access at my fingertips, and a wealth of Keeneland data to wade through, I thought I would look at first-time starters (specifically two-year-old FTS) and their performance at Keeneland since the conversion to Polytrack in the fall of 2006.
Since fall of 2006, there have been 236 races on the Polytrack for two-year-old horses, with a total of 2,580 runners to contest those races. 1,103 of those horses were first-time-starters (42.8%). Juvenile first-time-starters have a record of 1103-83-93-93 during that time frame, winning at a 35.2% clip.
A first-time-starter has gone off as the betting favorite 79 times in those 256 races, and won 38 of them (48.1%). The overall record for favorite first-time-starters is 79-38-11-7; if a FTS is the crowd choice, they seem to either win or miss the board entirely.
Something to think about with juvenile firsters that go off as the favorite on Poly: They represent 33.5% of all favorites, but only 14.8% of all winners (and only 4.3% of all Place horses and 2.5% of all Show horses). That's nothing earth-shattering (first-time-starters are volatile, unpredictable plays) but it re-enforces the notion that low odds on unknowns is a risky play. Sometimes the risk is rewarded, and sometimes it isn't.
Is there a time that a FTS is a slam dunk? Well, you could say that an "odds-on" FTS starter is almost a lock. There have been 13 juvenile first-time-starters to go off at odds of even money or less over the Polytrack since fall of 2006. Seven have won, three finished 2nd, one 3rd, one 4th, and one finished 6th (13-7-3-1).
Odds-on juvenile firsters represent 15.2% of all FTS favorites, and 18.4% of the winners (if my numbers are correct).
Looking at those 83 first-time-starter winners on the Polytrack with an eye on pedigree, here are the top 10 sires for those winners:
Top Ten Sires of Juvenile FTS winners on Polytrack at Keeneland:
| Sire | #Wins |
| SKY MESA | 4 |
| CITY ZIP | 3 |
| MR. GREELEY | 2 |
| GRAND SLAM | 2 |
| STORM CAT | 2 |
| FOREST WILDCAT | 2 |
| HENNESSY | 2 |
| TRIPPI | 2 |
| OFFLEE WILD | 2 |
| UNBRIDLED'S SONG | 2 |
| TALE OF THE CAT | 2 |
| SUCCESSFUL APPEAL | 2 |
| HOOK AND LADDER | 2 |
| GHOSTZAPPER | 2 |
Top 10 Sire of Sires of FTS Juvenile winners at Keeneland on the Poly::
| Sire of Sire | #Wins |
| STORM CAT | 11 |
| GONE WEST | 6 |
| PULPIT | 5 |
| WILD AGAIN | 4 |
| MR. PROSPECTOR | 4 |
| DANZIG | 4 |
| DIXIELAND BAND | 3 |
| CARSON CITY | 3 |
| EL PRADO | 3 |
| AWESOME AGAIN | 3 |
And finally, the top 10 Dam Sires of FTS Juvenile winners at Keeneland on the Poly:
| Broodmare Sire | #Wins |
| HOLY BULL | 3 |
| SPECTACULAR BID | 2 |
| STORM CAT | 2 |
| DEVIL'S BAG | 2 |
| CLEVER TRICK | 2 |
| MAJOR IMPACT | 2 |
| TABASCO CAT | 2 |
| SAINT BALLADO | 2 |
| INDIAN CHARLIE | 2 |
| MEADOWLAKE | 2 |
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Great info thanks.
Really wish Keeneland would go back to dirt. Their Derby and BC prep races are basically irrelevant now, too great of a track to basically be able to completely toss their winner out of Derby and BC consideration (excluded turf obviously).
Yoshimania is dead.
Yeah, unless the Polytrack company fails,
Keeneland will never go back to dirt (since they are partners with Poly).
I don’t think it’s made them completely irrelevant, but I think it absolutely has changed how we have to look at the results and what the winner has done before. If it’s a turf horse, yeah, they probably don’t stand much of a chance on dirt (although Animal Kingdom showed it can be done). But Hard Spun did quite well on Poly and was able to transfer his form to dirt pretty nicely. So I think it just requires a lot more scrutiny than before.
There were a lot of quirky results on the old dirt track, too. The importance of the Blue Grass has certainly lessened, I definitely agree with you on that. But the old dirt track kicked out winners like Sinister Minister who used a rail/speed bias to pop a huge Beyer and then never won another graded stakes race again in his career. He was as much of an irrelevant winner for the Derby as some of the Poly Blue Grass winners.
I’ve got a file around somewhere that looks at all the Breeders’ Cup races and what surface the WPS horses prepped on before running in the Breeders’ Cup. I need to find it and update it; it has some interesting data as to how horses do moving from synthetic to dirt, turf to dirt, dirt to turf, etc. since 2006.
"A bad day at the track is better than a good day at the office."
And Down The Stretch They Come | @PressThePace
by Matt Gardner on Oct 7, 2011 12:05 PM EDT up reply actions
Oh I had forgotten about the greatness of Sinister Minister
It has definitely always been a quirky surface and to your point, it isn’t irrelevant, you just have to look at what the horse was trying to get out of the race. In a lot of cases, I think some of the more astute trainers can use these Poly races as preps with no real desire to win. I think if you see them run a decent race and gain some ground or make a nice move on the poly that can often set them up for a nice run next time out on dirt. You are right on with Hard Spun, but Street Sense did the same thing too.
You just have to look a little deeper at these Keeneland races to make an informed decision.
Yoshimania is dead.
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