Rebel Rerun

   Well, I think the race went pretty much the way I thought it would. When there's a quality horse with a ton of speed and nobody to run with him it's almost a foregone conclusion.
   I had four of my pedigree horses in there which was reduced to three after ALTERNATION was scratched. I think, as I said before, that contrary to what most would believe, THE FACTOR is a really nicely bred horse. Whether he can get the derby distance is another question but as I mentioned in the previous post, as long as they can harness his speed he looks like he can run all day and that's what his breeding suggests to me.
   I was really disappointed in the ride that ARCHARCHARCH got in this race. Two races back, in the Smarty Jones, he chased a hot pace and faded to fourth and CALEB'S POSSE won it. In his next race he laid off the pace and won the Southwest. In the Rebel he broke fast and then was sitting third and after 3/8s the jock got antsy and tried to make a very premature move. He moved up abreast of SARATOGA RED and then was taken back a little before making another bid coming into the stretch. He lost second by a neck to the POSSE again. ARCH is a horse that can give a big run if unhurried early, even though he does have some tactical speed. ARCH needs a new jock or Court has got to learn how to ride him. I still think he has distance ability and is game as hell.
   My other horse was J W BLUE and he was really compromised by a few factors. He had a bad post for a closer on a speed favoring track and he got off slow to boot. This was his third time that he entered a race off a layoff. In the two previous times he ran terrible and came back in his next race with huge improvement to win. He came into this race with nothing but three 4f works, nothing serious though. One thing I noted in the chart was that BLUE was the only horse in the race that didn't lose ground in the stretch. I'm looking for a BIG move forward from him next time, especially if in a race that sets up right. I love his pedigree and BLUE is a serious race horse.
   Alternation suffered a slight cut from his antics in the gate so should be able to wheel right back into another race. I would hope they would send him to the LA Derby but there are a couple other races that he could enter. He has no graded earnings so he may only get one shot to make it to the derby.
   If most of this field have eyes on the million dollar Arkansas Derby they may run into THE FACTOR again and if no speed horses show up it might be the same story as the Rebel.
   I'll be looking at the LA Derby next.
Backstretch