What Can We Learn?

I many ways the BC Juvenile seems like a final exam, but it is really more like the 6 week exam in a college course, the Triple Crown is the midterm, and next years Classic is the final.

What can we learn from each horse?

1. Jackie’s Warrior is a model horse. Owner Kirk Robison let Asmussen pick him out of the Keeneland September yearling sale for a modest 4.5x the stud fee. With all the other million dollar horses, a fairly small time pizza shop operator got a great horse for $95,000. Mr. Robison is a great guy, and everyone should check out his interview with TDN. His story should encourage everyone interested in the game. The mare was the ultimate hard knocker at Penn National winning 19 of 54 races. The broodmare sire’s claim to fame was a 3rd in the Oklahoma Derby. The nick was an A because this is roughly the breeding of Cloud Computing. With all the fancy guys buying horses from very unaccomplished mares, it is good to see the counter example. This is a horse everyone should study. By this time next year he could just be another solid sprinter, or he could be one of the most important horses in the last 10 years. His size and precocity makes him an ideal sire.
2. Essential Quality is just another piece of the Godolphin assembly line. Mom was a well bred horse that only became a sprinter. She won just 2 of 13 races, but was second 8 times in minor ungraded stakes races. The cross of Tapit with a Storm Cat mare is about as uncreative as possible, but it does seem to work. Just a maiden race is September after 12 relatively slow works (only one 47.2, with 11 much slower), and then straight to a Grade 1 where he got the lead in 48.4 and cruised home. Tapit certainly qualifies him as a classic contender next year, but he could just be a maiden winner that found a weak field trying two turns for the first time. In many ways this horse is a model for becoming the second choice in a two million dollar stake race off just two races. Just think about exactly what this horse is. His maiden win was just a 69 Beyer at 6 furlongs, that is nice, but not great by any measure. His 88 Beyer in the Futurity is again nice, but not spectacular, and earned off a slow pace might mean very little. However, if the runs a 95 Beyer here, and a 100 Beyer in the Florida Derby next Spring, he might be the favorite in the Derby next year. If you can afford the $200,000 hit for Tapit, anything is possible.
3. Reinvestment Risk is a perfect model for paying up at a training sale. Seth Klarman is a brilliant investor that bought our investment research for over 15 years. Every time he buys a new stock I take notice. He is a famous value investor. He was not a value investor when he paid 28x the stud fee for this son of the modestly obscure Upstart. He worked a quick 20.4 at Ocala is March https://www.obssales.com/marresults/2020/ but 20 people paid more. The mare never ran faster than a 75 Beyer is 15 career tries, and ended up as a $15,000 claimer at Parx. The dam had produced just one small time winner, but the work at Ocala was good enough. Now Seth has the third choice is a 2 million dollar race, off a fast work . This horse is also a great example of paying attention to obscure first year sires and horses that work 2f at the sales. Maybe two turns is what this horse wants.
4. Sitting On Go just might win this race if everybody else goes too fast. The Albaugh family bought this horse as a weanling for $65,000, or almost 10x the modest stud fee of Brody’s Cause. Again the strategy was to pay up for a first year sire. The mare was by the precocious More Than Ready, but her only claim to fame was winning a sprint stake at Turf Paradise. This horse is here off just a slow win at Ellis Park, and picking up the pieces when 10 inexperienced 2 year olds went 45.2 in a flat mile at Churchill.
5. Likeable just might have the most long term promise of any horse in the field. He is a $350,000 son of Frosted (a Keeneland yearling buy), out of a Medaglia d’Oro mare. Once again the mare was just a sprinter who won her first race and then fizzled quickly. Frosted has had a tough year after so many people paid huge prices for his yearlings, but one good race could change all that. Mike Repole is known for Vitaminwater, Uncle Mo, and Vino Rosso, not a bad threesome.
6. Classier is a Bob Baffert maiden winner that might try to steal this on the front end. Starlight Partners, and a host of others, paid $775,000 (Keeneland September) for this son of Empire Maker. The mare was very slow and took 12 painful races to break her maiden at Gulfstream. This is a classic example of unproven mare theory that Starlight and others use. With just $33,000 in purse earnings, it shows that you don’t need much to enter this race. The top 6 choices in the BC Juvenile all had mares that never won a two turn race. Just stop and think about that. What should be learn?
7. King Fury is a $950,000 (Fasig-Tipton August) son of Curlin. The mare was the million dollar winner Taris, who was best at 7 furlongs. Three Chimney’s might have a future sire here if he an win a big race. There is a lot of potential here.
8. Next is a Silverton Hill homebred. The mare was a hard knocking Charlestown/Calder sprinter.
9. Rombauer is an interesting horse. I love the distance ability of Twirling Candy. The mare was an unraced daughter of distance orieinted Cowboy Cal. This could be a an interesting horse next year. The Fradkin family is just 6 for 53 lifetime, so you have to be cheering for the little guy.
10. Camp Hope is another expensive ($200,000 at Fasig-Tipton July) son of a $10,000 sire Summer Front. The mare was by Pulpit and retired winless in 5 tries. I am a Summer Front fan, so I will be watching

That is the top ten, combined their mares have one two turn win among them