It's the surface, stupid
We should have seen it coming on the Breeders' Cup undercard. Polytrack horses swept the top three spots in the opener and then ran second and third in the day's second warm-up stakes.
Then, here came the championship events. An unthinkable turf horse won the Juvenile Fillies as Polytrack horses finished third and fourth. Those damned Polytrack horses then ran 1-2-3 in the Juvenile, sweeping the trifecta and ruining the entire winter's hopes for a Kentucky Derby champion we could all embrace.
Yep, then along came the Sprint, and there rolled a Californian with a major advantage.
Flip the program page, and four of the top six spots in the Ladies' Classic (formerly Distaff) went to Polytrack horses as well.
And, mercy me, how can you explain six of the top eight spots in our beloved Breeders' Cup DIRT Classic going to Californians, Europeans and Polytrack horses?
Those good-for-nothing *#E$#@#! synthetic surfaces.
Oh, wait a minute. My mistake. I was looking at the wrong charts.
Those results were from the 2006 Breeders' Cup, not 2008, and happened to be the last time a fast dirt track hosted the Breeders' Cup. Don't believe me, do you? Look 'em up yourselves. We're talking God's gorgeous Churchill Downs dirt here, not some re-fabricated disco shag rug at Santa Anita.
The truth of the matter is that the Californians, Europeans, turf horses and synthetic track horses absolutely dominated the 2006 Breeders' Cup main track races, much in the same manner they did in 2008. If everyone is going to get their panties in a wad over how skewed last year's results were in a one-year sample, then we should never wish for another Breeders' Cup on a fast dirt track again either.
During the 2006 Breeders' Cup, the only all-weather surfaces in play as potential prep locales were Keeneland and Turfway Park. In 2006, a total of 22 horses came off the Polytrack to compete in the then-five dirt races on the BC card (Juvenile, Juvenile Fillies, Sprint, Distaff and Classic).
By 2008, synthetic tracks became part of the late summer/early fall landscape not only in Kentucky, but also at Arlington, Woodbine and throughout all Southern California race meetings. The pool of eligible contenders coming off all-weather track preps ballooned. But you might be surprised to know that number only increased to 32 horses competing in those same five races in 2008, even when the events were held on a synthetic track.
If anyone wants to promote how great the racing was in 2007 at Monmouth and how representative it was of a fair track, how quickly you forget the outcries to actually postpone the event and run it on a day when it would give all contenders a fair chance. The weather and track were that bad.
The average win margin that Jersey day on the main track in championship races was more than 3-1/2 lengths. As anyone who handicaps on a daily basis knows, sloppy tracks create many horses that misfire and multiple misnomers on the stat sheet.
Yes, how quickly our copy-cat society forgets. Remember that in the fall of 2006, after Keeneland installed Polytrack and its alumni had so much Breeders' Cup success, that everyone thought it was a masterful way to prepare your horses. The next spring, scads of Kentucky Derby contenders trained late into Derby Week in Lexington, including Todd Pletcher and Doug O'Neill's posses, thinking they had the edge over those peons on dirt at Churchill Downs. After those horses ran up the track, the magic was lost.
It doesn't take much for the bubble to burst in a game surrounded by speculation on how and where to act next. After all, it took only a singular effort from Barbaro to dismantle long-held opinions on how much time horses really might need between big races. Sheikh Albadou's 1991 Sprint win caused a massive influx of European sprinters immediately thereafter. Longshot Ibn Bey's 1990 Classic runner-up revitalized the dormant late-1980s interest from overseas, and built to a culmination of multiple European starters each year until Arcangues kicked the door down in 1993 at Santa Anita on that old dirt surface.
As someone who has studied the Polytrack racing at Keeneland and Del Mar with a fine-tooth statistical comb, I'll admit that there's no doubt some horses just don't fire over the surfaces. Some simply don't care for them, and won't put out their best efforts. It frustrates me as a handicapper sometimes. But that's no different than Skip Away loathing the dirt surface at Churchill Downs in his career, or Sky Beauty not being able to pick up her hooves outside of New York, or Lava Man outside of California.
The remarkable sprinter Lost In The Fog struggled mightily over the "Big Sandy" beach at Belmont Park in 2005. Did anyone suggest never having another Breeders' Cup at Belmont when locally prepped horses ran 1-2-3 in that Sprint as Lost In The Fog ran seventh as the biggest Sprint favorite in 14 years, not to mention that locally trained horses won six of the eight championship races?
Of course not. That's insanity to suggest.
And it's equally insane for people -- owners, trainers, jockeys, administrators, fans and handicappers alike -- to continue hurling emotional arguments against the Breeders' Cup being held on a synthetic track with such a limited pool of information to digest.
You do realize that the next New York-based horse to win a Breeders' Cup main track race at Santa Anita will be the first to do so since Scotty Schulhofer's Smile in the 1986 Sprint, don't you? The all-time Santa Anita Breeders' Cup scorecard on dirt remains: Californians 12 vs. single wins for the New Yorkers (Smile), Kentuckians (Cajun Beat) and French (Arcangues).
Two wins by New Yorkers this year would double the three-year output from Santa Anita's dirt championships, beyond a shadow of doubt showing a statistical certainty that New Yorkers are twice as potent on a California synthetic track than on traditional dirt.
Remember, small sample sizes make for seriously dangerous declarations.
But, you're right. It's only about the synthetic surface.
Jeremy Plonk has been an ESPN.com contributor since 2000 and is the managing partner of the handicapping website Horseplayerpro.com. You can E-mail Jeremy about this topic or anything racing-related at Jeremy@Horseplayerpro.com.
