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Because thoroughbred race horses are thoroughly bred, you might think that they would be getting faster at least as fast as human runners have been.
But that hasn’t been obvious.
For example, all three of Secretariat’s 1973 records in the American Triple Crown races for 3-year-olds still stand. (Originally, Secretariat was not credited with the Preakness record but a review of the videotape in 2012 showed that the original timing was faulty).
In contrast, in men’s track, the oldest current record is Kevin Young’s 400 m hurdle time at the 1992 Olympics. In women’s track, quite a few records go back to the 1980s before stronger drug testing was imposed after the 1988 Olympics, but no women’s running records are as old as Secretariat’s marks.
It’s been widely stated that thoroughbreds aren’t getting faster.
In the English-speaking world, thoroughbreds have been bred relatively methodically for several centuries. Shakespeare, for example, used the word “race” to mean both a breed (e.g., “a noble race of kings”) and a competition of running speed. The obvious overlap was the nationwide goal of developing a race of racehorses.
So it is possible that most of the potential has been wrung out of them already.
However, a 2015 study of British racehorses from 1850 onward came to the conclusion that there has been a post-Secretariat surge in speed, especially at shorter distances:
Racehorses are getting faster
Patrick Sharman, Alastair J. Wilson
Published 24 June 2015 .DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2015.0310Abstract
Previous studies have concluded that thoroughbred racehorse speed is improving very slowly, if at all, despite heritable variation for performance and putatively intensive selective breeding. This has led to the suggestion that racehorses have reached a selection limit. However, previous studies have been limited, focusing only on the winning times of a few elite races run over middle and long distances, and failing to account for potentially confounding factors. Using a much larger dataset covering the full range of race distances and accounting for variation in factors such as ground softness, we show that improvement is, in fact, ongoing for the population as a whole, but driven largely by increasing speed in sprint races. In contrast, speed over middle and long distances, at least at the elite level, appears to be reaching an asymptote. Whether this reflects a selection limit to speed over middle and long distances or a shift in breeding practices to target sprint performances remains to be determined.
They found a plateau from 1910 into the 1970s, but a resurgence of improvement in recent decades.
Here’s a graph showing that records have been following recently for very short distances, but less so for long distances:
The records for the short distances have largely been set in the 21st century, which is less true for longer distances.
One possible reason for the enhancement in sprinting over endurance since the 1970s is the huge genealogical influence of Northern Dancer, winner of 1964 Kentucky Derby and Preakness (but not the longer Belmont). He set the Kentucky Derby mark that Secretariat broke, and Northern Dancer’s 2:00.0 flat has only been bested once since Secretariat, by Monarchos in 2001. Northern Dancer was a small, fast horse who retired to become the leading sire of the past 60 years.
When Roger Bannister broke the 4 minute mile in 1954, after a long stretch from 1945 without a new world record, it led to a rapid burst of better times. In the Kentucky Derby, Northern Dancer reached the 2 minute barrier in 1964 and Secretariat broke it in 1973, but then nothing much happened.
How much is record breaking in human running a social construct? Running is a fairly marginal sport. In between Olympics, the main way to get your name on the TV sports report is to break a world record. For example, Sir Dr. Roger Bannister, who is now 88, has enjoyed a more kick-ass life for what he did back in May 1954 than if he’s run 4:00.1. (A guy I knew in the marketing research business was at the Oxford track that day as a 12 year old spectator and could recount P.A. announcer Norris “Guinness Book of World Records” McWhirter’s famous announcement: “… in a time which, subject to ratification, is a track record, an English native record, a United Kingdom record, a European record, in a time of three minutes…”)
Jockeys, on the other hand, are seldom incentivized to care about breaking records. Horses don’t care about breaking records. They do, however, appear to care about beating the other horses.
That raises the question of whether Secretariat, who, in the most famous moment in American racing history, won the Belmont by 31 lengths (I was playing in a baseball game that ground to a halt while everybody listened to the race on the radio) and setting a record of 2:24 , cared about running fast for the sake of running fast.
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Horses in general are getting faster.
It is sort of like the chariot races of ancient Rome - you picked a color and screamed your approval. But of course the winning Dot was determined in the control room. Yet the crown at the A's stadium didn't seem to care. The important elements seemed to be the presence of the crowd not the characteristics of the racers. So after we have outlawed boxing and football. Maybe we will similarly outlaw horse racing. The evidence is that it won't matter. People will still gather and root for anything that races - even electronic dots.Replies: @ScarletNumber
why didn’t you mention horse doping? when did it start? is it getting better? or did it get better than tail off bc evading the tests became more important?
Maybe horses are smart enough to know that they don’t have to outrun a 40-yr-old record. They only have to outrun the other horses in today’s race.
Don’t want to take anything away from the great ‘Secretariat’ but just maybe he had a better vet than other racehorses in 1973. Winning a race by 20 plus lengths is rather unusual.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secretariat_(horse)#Death
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phar_Lap
A huge heart can be a disadvantage if you don’t inherit the rest of the infrastructure to support it.
That's true. Without a vascular system to support it, a huge heart would be a congenital defect. Secretariat was a very healthy animal. He must have had a lot more oxygen going to his cells than much of the rest of the field.
My mother was bitten in the face by a horse that was a descendant of Northern Dancer. Her plastic surgeon called it “Northern Biter”.
But seriously, one of the more far-fetched explanations for plastic surgery that I've ever heard!Replies: @Dave Pinsen
Equine Tall Tales!
But seriously, one of the more far-fetched explanations for plastic surgery that I’ve ever heard!
A friend of mine got kicked by Secretariat while mucking out his stall at Arlington Park in Chicago in the summer of 1973. He was in the hospital for a week.
It’s only one degree of stupid away from the imbeciles who think they will be safe among brown bears. They’d all be trying to snuggle with cute little wolverines if they could find them.
OT: Must read. Princeton PhD makes positive case for colonialism. And then promptly apologizes.
Snippet:
Australia’s most famous horse is another descendant of Eclipse and had a similarly massive heart, which is preserved and in a museum.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phar_Lap
Sounds like N. Dancer was a real stud….
Are you talking about race horses or politics?
OT but notable … Noted ex-CIA agent tweets link to Unz Review … gets gang-attacked by establishment, ends up grovelling & apologising
Valerie Plame [Wilson], CIA agent famous in past decade re G W Bush White House scandals, pretend ‘investigation’ of Bush White House crimes by corrupt prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, the tiny Scooter Libby indictment & Bush pardon –
Valerie Plame had just tweeted a link to Phil Giraldi’s popular Unz article, “America’s Jews Are Driving America’s Wars”
Plame, who is Jewish herself, was immediately ravaged by her own ‘friends’ and allies … she briefly tried to defend her link to Unz, saying that Giraldi was “very provocative, but thoughtful … Many neocon hawks ARE Jewish,” Plame insisted … but in the end she folded, & Plame began tweeting a series of apologies claiming she didn’t read the article carefully … despite the crystal-clear article title
But the neo-con establishment does not forgive, & is excavating further ‘dirt’ on Plame … such as that she has *linked before to Philip Giraldi* … a serial Unz-linker, no less!
Story here on TheHill com, snidely disparaging Unz with double-quote contemptuous condescension
My feed is full of usually sane people doing their best SJW dance.Replies: @dcthrowback
Valerie Plame [Wilson], CIA agent famous in past decade re G W Bush White House scandals, pretend 'investigation' of Bush White House crimes by corrupt prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, the tiny Scooter Libby indictment & Bush pardon -
Valerie Plame had just tweeted a link to Phil Giraldi's popular Unz article, “America’s Jews Are Driving America’s Wars”
Plame, who is Jewish herself, was immediately ravaged by her own 'friends' and allies ... she briefly tried to defend her link to Unz, saying that Giraldi was "very provocative, but thoughtful ... Many neocon hawks ARE Jewish," Plame insisted ... but in the end she folded, & Plame began tweeting a series of apologies claiming she didn't read the article carefully ... despite the crystal-clear article title
But the neo-con establishment does not forgive, & is excavating further 'dirt' on Plame ... such as that she has *linked before to Philip Giraldi* ... a serial Unz-linker, no less!
Story here on TheHill com, snidely disparaging Unz with double-quote contemptuous condescensionReplies: @Anonymous, @Desiderius, @Harry Baldwin
You know what they say, so long as they spell your name right…
But seriously, one of the more far-fetched explanations for plastic surgery that I've ever heard!Replies: @Dave Pinsen
A lot of plastic surgery is repair work from accidents, diseases, and surgeries to treat both.
Valerie Plame [Wilson], CIA agent famous in past decade re G W Bush White House scandals, pretend 'investigation' of Bush White House crimes by corrupt prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, the tiny Scooter Libby indictment & Bush pardon -
Valerie Plame had just tweeted a link to Phil Giraldi's popular Unz article, “America’s Jews Are Driving America’s Wars”
Plame, who is Jewish herself, was immediately ravaged by her own 'friends' and allies ... she briefly tried to defend her link to Unz, saying that Giraldi was "very provocative, but thoughtful ... Many neocon hawks ARE Jewish," Plame insisted ... but in the end she folded, & Plame began tweeting a series of apologies claiming she didn't read the article carefully ... despite the crystal-clear article title
But the neo-con establishment does not forgive, & is excavating further 'dirt' on Plame ... such as that she has *linked before to Philip Giraldi* ... a serial Unz-linker, no less!
Story here on TheHill com, snidely disparaging Unz with double-quote contemptuous condescensionReplies: @Anonymous, @Desiderius, @Harry Baldwin
This cements my decision to drop twitter.
My feed is full of usually sane people doing their best SJW dance.
They’re dangerous animals. My mother’s horses usually get their stalls mucked out while they’re out in a paddock. But you still have to go in the stall with them to bring them back in, feed them, water them, etc.
Maybe you just can’t run them into the ground or give them certain peds anymore. They’re certainly now expanding into full on genetic testing the last few years.
Two potential approaches are possible with selective breeding. One is just a blind process selecting just the “fastest” or whatever the single variable is. The other is taking an animal that is as close to perfect as possible and then breeding with other animals to fix the flaws (i.e. the trait you want matches the flawed trait), knowing that even the best have areas for improvement.
#whitepeople #pathologicalaltruism
As announcer Chic Anderson said that day “He is moving like a tremendous machine.” Hand-ridden to a record that will remain forever.
Steve,
David Brooks on Sam Francis:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/22/opinion/business-war-trump.html
Dangerously non-unsympathetic.
I like to look at the Kentucky Derby for speed comparisons over time. The race is watched by millions so there’s less chance of it being rigged in some way. Also there is a huge incentive to not just win it but also break 2:00, beat Secretariat’s time, train a horse to run the Derby etc. American Pharaoh won in 2015 at 2:03, that’s a typical time for the Derby since about 1910. Old Rosebud ran 2:03.4 in 1914. War Admiral 2:03.2 in 1937. So I’m not sure thoroughbreds are getting any faster. There may just be improving incentives for getting faster in these shorter distance races.
My feed is full of usually sane people doing their best SJW dance.Replies: @dcthrowback
then obviously you’re following the wrong people
Hence cancelling twitter.
I don’t know if they’re getting faster but it does seem that they’re getting more fragile, bred to have lighter bone and easily-broken legs.
“He is like a tremendous machine” is one of those announcer lines that just perfectly captures the moment. I was a little kid and I still remember everyone repeating that line. It’s like Al Michaels saying “Do you believe in miracles.”
David Brooks on Sam Francis:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/22/opinion/business-war-trump.html
Dangerously non-unsympathetic.Replies: @DJohn1, @Barnard
Yes. Unusual for Brooks. A balanced assessment followed by the necessary CYA.
So is HBD now Horse Bio-Diversity?
I grew up around horse breeders, owners, and racers. Not Derby level by any means but nevertheless done for profit. Every one of them spent time in the penalty box with at least a couple “banned for life” for fixing races. There is SO much opportunity for shenanigans in horse racing with various doping schemes, jockeys holding back their horses, doping competitors’ horses, collusion among owners, etc. And at the top of the “sport” an important question is whether the passions of the super-rich (ie Bill Gates buying a street with every house on it in Wellington to indulge his daughter’s pony passion) has shifted focus from racing to prancing or cutting or whatever. A guy with Gates’ money or the Johnson heiress (who was recently seen kicking her horse) can have a big spillover effect on how breeders and trainers focus their energies.
A better analysis that removes some of the human factors may be dog racing. You still have the doping issues, but nobody is riding the greyhounds and no billionaires’ kids are getting their panties in a twist over who gets the best dogs.
Look, we've talked about the advisability of the "woke" WM to tune out sportsball...how much more so the seedy remnants of what used to be one of the biggest sports in America? If you want to bet on something, fine...but bet on something where you can accurately calculate the mathematical odds (cards and dice). Not on a dumb animal where anything can happen.Replies: @prosa123
Are you talking about racehorses or nice white ladies?
Indeed.
Hence cancelling twitter.
Sorry for your friend, but I confess to much amusement whenever the city kid or SJW types have a rude awakening to the power of a 1500# animal. Every farm boy knows not to mess around the back end of a horse (or donkey or mule) and avoid the front if the animal comes off it’s front hooves. I’ve seen so many idiots trying to give sugar cubes to horses improperly (ie not on an open palm) that the kick injuries are completely unsurprising. There is also a big difference between a very high strung thoroughbred and a draft horse in temperament.
It’s only one degree of stupid away from the imbeciles who think they will be safe among brown bears. They’d all be trying to snuggle with cute little wolverines if they could find them.
David Brooks on Sam Francis:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/22/opinion/business-war-trump.html
Dangerously non-unsympathetic.Replies: @DJohn1, @Barnard
I took paragraphs like this as more of a warning to the establishment that they need to be prepared to crush the next populist after Trump.
Brooks made sure everyone knows thinking this is still considered beyond the pale. I would love to hear the reasons we should believe our civilization can be successfully transferred to a different people complete with examples.
That's a huge risk.
Horse racing is often tactical like human distance racing. Mo Farah has several Olympic golds, but has never set a world record. He has a tremendously fast finish and almost always outsprints his opponents over the last lap.
In horse racing, there are a few horses that are known as frontrunners, that prefer to just go to the head of the field and run as fast as possible, so are more likely to set records assuming good track and weather conditions. Presumably this has something to do with innate behavior of groups of horses galloping together, dominance, etc.
The majority of top horses and big race winners run with the field and then come with a ‘wet sail’ over the last furlong or two to get their noses in front at the winning post. Obviously this tactic depends a lot more on the jockey than the horse, though the horse still has to have the ability to accelerate when the whip is applied.
In 1973 doping was easier. The 80’s & 90’s saw big crackdowns on doping.
Secretariat’s length of stride was 25 feet; so was Man O’ War’s.
Valerie Plame [Wilson], CIA agent famous in past decade re G W Bush White House scandals, pretend 'investigation' of Bush White House crimes by corrupt prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, the tiny Scooter Libby indictment & Bush pardon -
Valerie Plame had just tweeted a link to Phil Giraldi's popular Unz article, “America’s Jews Are Driving America’s Wars”
Plame, who is Jewish herself, was immediately ravaged by her own 'friends' and allies ... she briefly tried to defend her link to Unz, saying that Giraldi was "very provocative, but thoughtful ... Many neocon hawks ARE Jewish," Plame insisted ... but in the end she folded, & Plame began tweeting a series of apologies claiming she didn't read the article carefully ... despite the crystal-clear article title
But the neo-con establishment does not forgive, & is excavating further 'dirt' on Plame ... such as that she has *linked before to Philip Giraldi* ... a serial Unz-linker, no less!
Story here on TheHill com, snidely disparaging Unz with double-quote contemptuous condescensionReplies: @Anonymous, @Desiderius, @Harry Baldwin
Trying to interpret those scare quotes, I get, “There is no ‘mainstream media,’ therefore there can be no ‘alternative.’” Otherwise it makes no sense to me to put quotes around “alternative.” It’s impossible to be an alternative to something?
The scare quotes just mean fuck you.Replies: @Desiderius
There’s no interpretation based on logic.
The scare quotes just mean fuck you.
Yes, they are. I don’t know all that many people who ride, but two friends of mine were killed by horses.
https://www.ruralweekly.com.au/news/horses-more-dangerous-than-riding-motorbikes/3121858/Replies: @Cortes
Look at the sizes of horse and people populations competing over time.
World people population grows rapidly. Due to the 1986 Olympics decision to allow professionals, the percentage of people trying to compete has grown too. To support this assertion compare the record times of Soviet bloc athletes (who were de facto pro) to Western athletes in the 1980 to 2000 period; the latter should show more improvement.
How has the population of horses competing changed? Does it too grow exponentially? The numbers may in fact be hampered by selective (in)breeding.
This opens an interesting possibility. It’s conceivable that a population bred purely for a single trait is worse at producing standout individuals with that trait vs a population bred at random (to be more precise, as in the case of humans, not bred for speed only, but assortatively bred according to a host of desirable traits). Yet, if you’re a horse breeder, your best chance of getting a champion horse is to get your prize filly seeded by Secretariat’s line. This would be a tragedy of the commons.
And also an important point about horses, any breed, people are breeding for heart, and hoping for talent. Horses are more like people than other animals. Some have talent and no heart, some will kill themselves for you but can't outrun me. When talent and heart both show up, then you have a horse.
Oh, horses.
I was expecting Jamaicans and/or Kenyans.
Wow, how did that article even make it past the reviewing process? How has Gilley himself survived so long, as the article seems not out of line with his standing reputation — http://remezcla.com/culture/bruce-gilley-colonization. Sounds like he’s told more than a few SJW characters at his college to, basically, f off. And in Portland yet!
I wish he’d been the master of that Yale College dorm, during the Haloween costume crisis a few years back.
Sad to say, I’m old enough to remember when you could have a civil discussion about colonialism, in academe.
Things come to a head.
It took me by surprise. I'm not used to reading mainstream material that just makes a hard-hitting anti-PC case right out of the gate [my contribution to the horse-racing topic, heh]. Unfortunately, the author would probably have been better taking a more apologetic tone. As it stands, his case is too powerfully argued for its own good.Replies: @res
As a teenager, I worked with race horses every summer. I would like to have a horse now, but time prevents me from having one…oh well, maybe when I am 70.
It is absolutely true that Thoroughbreds have sort of plateaued. Or, maybe it is a question of reaching peak performance as species ( they are just not going to be as fast as a cheetah). Secretariat, and a few others, were just those top runners that appear like comets…but you all know that.
However, the drug use and putting too many, barely, 2-year-olds on tracks too early was a BIG mistake in the 90’s and early 2000’s, and likely, made everyone re-think how to train a winner. Nothing worse than an audience seeing a young horse shatter its leg in front of you at the races. So, owners have scaled-back pushing young horses onto tracks. After all, all thoroughbreds are expensive….and insurance is a bitch with animals (colic knocks out Thoroughbreds easily).
But you are correct about all horses wanting to beat other horses. The best, scariest, wildest rides I have ever been on (fell off numerous times in first ride) were in the Cotswolds in the rain (a 2-day ride; thank god for the pub breaks), and with Mormon teenagers in the Utah wilderness. It was scary but exhilarating because both unremarkable, and smallish horses I rode, wanted to be the fastest! With the Mormons, the teenage leader, would not allow my horse to go beyond his lead horse…he used barrel racing techniques to get his horse to block-butt mine (we were on narrow, high, backcountry trails). He kept telling me, “don’t worry, I won’t let him get past me because he will throw you the moment he gets a chance.” My husband asked me how I liked my solo ride with the teenagers, and I was still catching my breath….but it was the best ride, ever. Even a huge mule deer jumped over our trail, seconds before possible crash.
butt-block (horses are very good at that), not block-butt, in my post!
Interesting take on the topic. Thanks.
I had not known about the retiming. Here is a NYT article with some more details: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/20/sports/secretariat-awarded-preakness-record-39-years-later.html
The Dirt Records image above is very small (even opened in another tab). If you have a larger version or the original source (not found in image search) please link.
Has anyone tried looking at average horse race speeds over time? That seems like a better approach to evaluate the overall genetic pool. The oldest historical data is probably not available, but the interesting question would be how much the average has moved since Secretariat. That might help us estimate just how much of a sport (in SD terms) Secretariat was and what the chances are of a present day repeat.
The two explanations I see for Secretariat are:
– He was a 6 or 7 SD sport which we are unlikely to see again even given improvement: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/68%E2%80%9395%E2%80%9399.7_rule
– Something special happened in his training (etc.) not since replicated with a similarly genetically able horse.
Or a combination of those of course.
Any other ideas?
On a related topic:
Here is a GWAS for horse racing traits: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1365-2052.2010.02095.x/abstract
A genome-wide association study for racing performances in Thoroughbreds clarifies a candidate region near the MSTN gene
I wonder how many race horses have been both genotyped and timed in races. If they have a large enough sample then using compressed sensing to “solve” for the additive heritability could make for potent genetic engineering opportunities. Is a DNA sample from Secretariat available?
Nautilus is good for detailed semi-popular articles on technical topics: http://nautil.us/issue/39/sport/can-science-breed-the-next-secretariat-rp
The scare quotes just mean fuck you.Replies: @Desiderius
That is true. They are also a reference to the supposedly damning appeal to alternative facts by Conway after the inaugural.
Off-topic,
An SJW fever dream:
http://birthmoviesdeath.com/2017/09/22/cold-hell-review-the-butcher-and-the-kickboxer
And yet now he cowers.
Things come to a head.
I posted this on twitter and facebook a few months back. It is quite an awesome display of sheer domination: Secretariat winning the 1973 Belmont Stakes.
Wasn’t there a time when Margaret Thatcher (not yet prime minister) gave a great impassioned speech in the House of Commons and one of the newspapers said “If she were a horse she would have been tested for steroids?” Steroids must have made inroads into human sports by that time, but apparently in mid-1970s Britain they were still mostly associated with horses.
Eclipse was descended from the Godolphin Arabian, immortalized in Marguerite Henry’s award-winning children’s book King of the Wind. A marvelous book, highly recommended for any curious child (of any age!).
There’s an inverse correlation between stamina and precociousness, the Derby is for young three-year-olds, as a result most Kentucky Derby contenders today not bred to get to classic distances. Given the centrality of the Derby to American dirt racing this has a big effect on American dirt racing as a whole.
Monarchos’ time in 2001 was aided by a ridiculous pace and a really fast track (it rained a bit then the track was sealed).
Basically, nobody cares about records in horse racing, right?Replies: @dr kill, @C. Van Carter, @Lagertha
OT: Steve, any thoughts on the Valerie Plame brouhaha and/or the most recent David Brooks column on Sam Francis?
OT: Harvard gets eaten by their own beast.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-09-22/get-out-james-comey-you%E2%80%99re-not-our-homey-comey-mercilessly-heckled-howard-university
Of course. The change is that he actually quoted it instead of lobbing the usual vague calumnies.
That’s a huge risk.
I saw somewhere that Secretariat had a heart that was basically twice the size of the average.
Certainly the importation of Northern Dancer has led to the almost total domination of European flat racing by Irish breeder(s) and trainer(s). He completely reinvigorated somewhat jaded bloodlines.
However, “the flat”, for all the billions, can in no way compare to the excitement and thrills of National Hunt.
I grew up around horse breeders, owners, and racers. Not Derby level by any means but nevertheless done for profit. Every one of them spent time in the penalty box with at least a couple “banned for life” for fixing races. There is SO much opportunity for shenanigans in horse racing with various doping schemes, jockeys holding back their horses, doping competitors’ horses, collusion among owners, etc. And at the top of the “sport” an important question is whether the passions of the super-rich (ie Bill Gates buying a street with every house on it in Wellington to indulge his daughter’s pony passion) has shifted focus from racing to prancing or cutting or whatever. A guy with Gates’ money or the Johnson heiress (who was recently seen kicking her horse) can have a big spillover effect on how breeders and trainers focus their energies.
A better analysis that removes some of the human factors may be dog racing. You still have the doping issues, but nobody is riding the greyhounds and no billionaires’ kids are getting their panties in a twist over who gets the best dogs.Replies: @The Man From K Street, @dr kill
Just so. Horse racing is, and always has been, as crooked as the horse’s hind leg. Looking for hard scientific HBD-relevant data in such a mob-infested, opaque business is worse than useless.
Look, we’ve talked about the advisability of the “woke” WM to tune out sportsball…how much more so the seedy remnants of what used to be one of the biggest sports in America? If you want to bet on something, fine…but bet on something where you can accurately calculate the mathematical odds (cards and dice). Not on a dumb animal where anything can happen.
A huge heart can be a disadvantage if you don’t inherit the rest of the infrastructure to support it.
That’s true. Without a vascular system to support it, a huge heart would be a congenital defect. Secretariat was a very healthy animal. He must have had a lot more oxygen going to his cells than much of the rest of the field.
If all thoroughbreds become equally good, the races will FINALLY be decided by the skill of the jockey’s nurture. Or maybe his weight.
The Arab theory of perfect balance in racehorses explained.
Compares Phar Lap’s conformation to the perfectly balanced champions Bernborough and Ajax.
http://pharlap.com.au/facts-figures/phar-lap-measures/
Back around 1986 I knew a guy who got kicked by a cow. Next time around he brained it with an iron bar across its forehead. Yes, stupid cow did feel and react to this iron bar and walked around dazed for a while.
About that time I mucked out stalls into my pick up truck for a friends organic garden. No animals were around in the barn. They are stupid and dangerous as the day is long. My bet is I have shoveled more animal shit than any other poster here
More dangerous than motorcycles. And by a long shot. Think of all those nineteenth century novels, people were forever getting killed/injured riding.
https://www.ruralweekly.com.au/news/horses-more-dangerous-than-riding-motorbikes/3121858/
Scary creatures.Replies: @Jim Don Bob
Look, we've talked about the advisability of the "woke" WM to tune out sportsball...how much more so the seedy remnants of what used to be one of the biggest sports in America? If you want to bet on something, fine...but bet on something where you can accurately calculate the mathematical odds (cards and dice). Not on a dumb animal where anything can happen.Replies: @prosa123
Going to the track can be very inexpensive entertainment. Admission is often as little as five dollars, much cheaper than just about any other sporting event, and because there are usually ten races on a card you can budget out your betting without burning through your money at a dizzying pace like in a casino.
It has long been rumored in the racing community that Secretariat received steroids when he was a yearling, which would also have something to do with his somewhat disappointing performance as a sire….As to track records, most racetracks have been made less deep and therefore faster in the last 40 years. In fact, the inbreeding of the Bold Ruler line has resulted in a shortage of horses who are sprinters and can’t run much past a mile.
https://www.ruralweekly.com.au/news/horses-more-dangerous-than-riding-motorbikes/3121858/Replies: @Cortes
When our daughter was about 11/12 I was delegated to pick her up from the stables where she practised and saw the death of a horse put into the wrong position in a beginners amble when the horse in front kicked back at the victim and broke its windpipe.
Scary creatures.
Monarchos' time in 2001 was aided by a ridiculous pace and a really fast track (it rained a bit then the track was sealed).Replies: @Steve Sailer
Do horse races ever have “rabbits” the way some friends of Roger Bannister were employed to set a fast pace and then drop off the lead?
Basically, nobody cares about records in horse racing, right?
No one cares about speed records. Time only counts in prison.
I grew up around horse breeders, owners, and racers. Not Derby level by any means but nevertheless done for profit. Every one of them spent time in the penalty box with at least a couple “banned for life” for fixing races. There is SO much opportunity for shenanigans in horse racing with various doping schemes, jockeys holding back their horses, doping competitors’ horses, collusion among owners, etc. And at the top of the “sport” an important question is whether the passions of the super-rich (ie Bill Gates buying a street with every house on it in Wellington to indulge his daughter’s pony passion) has shifted focus from racing to prancing or cutting or whatever. A guy with Gates’ money or the Johnson heiress (who was recently seen kicking her horse) can have a big spillover effect on how breeders and trainers focus their energies.
A better analysis that removes some of the human factors may be dog racing. You still have the doping issues, but nobody is riding the greyhounds and no billionaires’ kids are getting their panties in a twist over who gets the best dogs.Replies: @The Man From K Street, @dr kill
There’s no place in the world like Wellington, even if you can only afford Loxahatchee.
With regard to Gates, I wonder if his exposure to Horse Bio-Diversity led to his epiphany about population numbers being the greatest problem in Africa. I doubt old Bill had ever given a moments thought to breeding before visiting a horse farm. That’s the level of disconnect in our elites - they’re so cloistered from our natural world that any nonsense is believable to them.
Wrong. Secretariat is widely known as a Broodmare Sire. Have a Seattle Slew colt breed your Secretariat mare if you want to have a valuable foal. This would only set you back 300k (AP Indy) at his peak. TBs need to live cover, so (wink wink) 50 years ago there were 40 mares to a stallion’s annual book. The American quest for profit eventually raised this number into the 80’s, and then they send them to the Southern Hemisphere to breed all winter as well. Since there are over 20k TB foals born every year in the States, 80 from an individual colt isn’t really the tragedy you infer.
And also an important point about horses, any breed, people are breeding for heart, and hoping for talent. Horses are more like people than other animals. Some have talent and no heart, some will kill themselves for you but can’t outrun me. When talent and heart both show up, then you have a horse.
True, you might have shoveled more shit than me, but I always use a pitchfork. Shovels don’t work unless you are cleaning the cement gutter behind a row of stanchioned dairy cows. Never in a horse box.
Basically, nobody cares about records in horse racing, right?Replies: @dr kill, @C. Van Carter, @Lagertha
A rabbit is rarely used in horse racing because each horse is an individual entry. You will see an entry once in a while ( 1 and 1A ) means that a trainer has two horses entered in the same race. As you might expect, an owner might get pretty excited if he felt his trainer was using his horse to set a pace for another owner.
No one cares about speed records. Time only counts in prison.
Pedantic correction: the title “sir” is attached to the first name. Sir Roger —> Dr. Sir Roger Bannister
Like the author of one of your favorite bedtime stories, General Sir John Hackett.
It always amazed me that although no one is dumb enough to bet on auto racing because drivers, they’ll bet on horse racing with a jockey or a sulky rider (whatever they call those guys) or a dog track with a rabbit controlled by a dopehead with a Variac.
Basically, nobody cares about records in horse racing, right?Replies: @dr kill, @C. Van Carter, @Lagertha
True rabbits are openly used in UK racing. In America and elsewhere you mostly find entries that are rabbit-ish, i.e. to ensure a pace for his closer a trainer will enter another horse that is only able to front-run.
In terms of raw wealth, PB is much higher. But since billionaires usually have many homes and seemingly all have a place somewhere in S Fla it’s a kinda pointless comparison. Those with daughters who have a pony fetish wind up in Wellington and most of those own breeding and/or training farms in the bluegrass of Kentucky or in Ocala.
With regard to Gates, I wonder if his exposure to Horse Bio-Diversity led to his epiphany about population numbers being the greatest problem in Africa. I doubt old Bill had ever given a moments thought to breeding before visiting a horse farm. That’s the level of disconnect in our elites – they’re so cloistered from our natural world that any nonsense is believable to them.
Maybe, but I’ve spread more shit. Ever spread manure from an unenclosed tractor? Hay baling was worse than shit duty though. A single day of baling will convince nearly anyone to avoid manual labor for life.
Agree, completely.
I am informed by a professor at the U of Pennsylvania Veterinary School that the limiting factor in thoroughbred horse speed today is lung capacity. There is simply no place in a horse for lungs to take up more space.
Basically, nobody cares about records in horse racing, right?Replies: @dr kill, @C. Van Carter, @Lagertha
Yeah, Steve, nobody cares about animals. Nobody cares about animals world-wide.
What’s that? They’re looking at Thoroughbred sprinting?
There’s a very popular breed for that:
American Quarter Horse:
“Racing speeds of quarter horses, thoroughbreds and Arabians”, Nielsen BD, Turner KK, Ventura BA, Woodward AD, O’Connor CI, Equine Vet J Suppl. 2006 Aug;(36):128-32:
Somewhat tangential, but someone did bring up Secretariat’s breeding history:
The best Triple Crown sire is generally acknowledged to be Seattle Slew. Affirmed comes in fourth, Secretariat fifth. All Triple Crown winners seem to do better at siring champion brood mares, rather than sires. (They all seem to have the large heart characteristic).
Interesting, if weird: Three TCs in the 30s,4 in the 40s, 3 in the 70s. The others came in 1919 and 2015.
I find the Affirmed/Alydar races and story far more interesting than Secretariat’s dominance. Affirmed was a great stud. Alydar, though, was a stupendous stud, who from what I can tell was far superior to most of the Triple Crown winners in that aspect. And then Alydar was murdered.
Thanks.Replies: @anon
Apparently they’re now claiming it wasn’t properly reviewed blah blah.
It took me by surprise. I’m not used to reading mainstream material that just makes a hard-hitting anti-PC case right out of the gate [my contribution to the horse-racing topic, heh]. Unfortunately, the author would probably have been better taking a more apologetic tone. As it stands, his case is too powerfully argued for its own good.
"I F*cking Love Science!" indeed.
The best Triple Crown sire is generally acknowledged to be Seattle Slew. Affirmed comes in fourth, Secretariat fifth. All Triple Crown winners seem to do better at siring champion brood mares, rather than sires. (They all seem to have the large heart characteristic).
Interesting, if weird: Three TCs in the 30s,4 in the 40s, 3 in the 70s. The others came in 1919 and 2015.
I find the Affirmed/Alydar races and story far more interesting than Secretariat's dominance. Affirmed was a great stud. Alydar, though, was a stupendous stud, who from what I can tell was far superior to most of the Triple Crown winners in that aspect. And then Alydar was murdered.Replies: @res
Quite a story (long!): https://www.texasmonthly.com/articles/the-killing-of-alydar/
Thanks.
http://www.hbo.com/luck/episodes/index.html
I have done hay baling but I will not lie. It was just one day. It was those rectangular bales back in the day. Ever been inside a stinking toxic poultry house, working for a day or a few hours? I have. Egg laying chickens.
I have spread barn animal shit with a garden fork. Into a compost pile.
Never inside a factory poultry farm. Dairy cattle and horse stalls plus the odd sheep, goat, and donkey is enough for me..
Did you see the latest? Now the CAFO’s are too dangerous for our poor unskilled illegals:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/deaths-of-farmworkers-in-cow-manure-ponds-put-oversight-of-dairy-farms-into-question/2017/09/24/da4f1bae-8813-11e7-961d-2f373b3977ee_story.html?utm_term=.bed53f9bb0a2
So now we’ll have what? Instead of fruit rotting on the vines, headlines about shit stinking up the barns?Replies: @Clyde
It took me by surprise. I'm not used to reading mainstream material that just makes a hard-hitting anti-PC case right out of the gate [my contribution to the horse-racing topic, heh]. Unfortunately, the author would probably have been better taking a more apologetic tone. As it stands, his case is too powerfully argued for its own good.Replies: @res
It is depressing how the research funding and paper peer review processes are being used to enforce PC. I guess the Kommissars were asleep that time. I wonder if there have been consequences for the initial reviewers.
“I F*cking Love Science!” indeed.
Thanks.Replies: @anon
This was a major theme plot in the HBO series Luck.
http://www.hbo.com/luck/episodes/index.html
Drivers are the standardbred equivalent of jockeys
Scary creatures.Replies: @Jim Don Bob
A very popular teacher at my kids elementary school got thrown from her horse which then proceeded to step on her head killing her.
A single day of baling…
Agree, completely.
Racisthorses.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJSFlMCTXE8Replies: @Pat Boyle
A few years ago when I was interested in baseball, I went to the Oakland A’s games. To my amazement the crowd always got the most excited over “Dot racing” – not the game itself. If you don’t know, Dot Racing is a pseudo horse or foot race where everyone is encouraged to root for an electronically generated Dot which races in a circle on the stadium scoreboard against other colored Dots.
It is sort of like the chariot races of ancient Rome – you picked a color and screamed your approval. But of course the winning Dot was determined in the control room. Yet the crown at the A’s stadium didn’t seem to care. The important elements seemed to be the presence of the crowd not the characteristics of the racers. So after we have outlawed boxing and football. Maybe we will similarly outlaw horse racing. The evidence is that it won’t matter. People will still gather and root for anything that races – even electronic dots.
Of course I have used garden forks and pitchforks to deal with animal shit, to move it around. Shovels too. These days we get chipped wood from tree trimming/landscaping businesses to build up the soil. Trees/bushes/shrubs put through serious, industrial grade chippers……the end result is free where I live you just need to know the landscapers. And they will dump it off by your house.
It is sort of like the chariot races of ancient Rome - you picked a color and screamed your approval. But of course the winning Dot was determined in the control room. Yet the crown at the A's stadium didn't seem to care. The important elements seemed to be the presence of the crowd not the characteristics of the racers. So after we have outlawed boxing and football. Maybe we will similarly outlaw horse racing. The evidence is that it won't matter. People will still gather and root for anything that races - even electronic dots.Replies: @ScarletNumber
In Milwaukee they have sausages race against each other.
Yeah, those old rectangular bales. Not bad when completely dry, but horrible when first baled.
Never inside a factory poultry farm. Dairy cattle and horse stalls plus the odd sheep, goat, and donkey is enough for me..
Did you see the latest? Now the CAFO’s are too dangerous for our poor unskilled illegals:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/deaths-of-farmworkers-in-cow-manure-ponds-put-oversight-of-dairy-farms-into-question/2017/09/24/da4f1bae-8813-11e7-961d-2f373b3977ee_story.html?utm_term=.bed53f9bb0a2
So now we’ll have what? Instead of fruit rotting on the vines, headlines about shit stinking up the barns?
Never inside a factory poultry farm. Dairy cattle and horse stalls plus the odd sheep, goat, and donkey is enough for me..
Did you see the latest? Now the CAFO’s are too dangerous for our poor unskilled illegals:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/deaths-of-farmworkers-in-cow-manure-ponds-put-oversight-of-dairy-farms-into-question/2017/09/24/da4f1bae-8813-11e7-961d-2f373b3977ee_story.html?utm_term=.bed53f9bb0a2
So now we’ll have what? Instead of fruit rotting on the vines, headlines about shit stinking up the barns?Replies: @Clyde
Nice link. This Mexican jamoke got his shit test