The Oaks 2012

I don't think it's overplayed at all, it's an enormous factor. The 2 big races last year bear this out - look at how both St Nick and Pour Moi blatantly failed to handle the camber and then tell me it's not a huge factor.
 
davidjohnson said:
Is The Fugue overly big? Gosden has said recently that she's a nippy typethat he expects will handle the track, didn't see her in the paddock myself (was in the bar!) but she was described as close-coupled by the Timeform paddock man there.

I honestly think 3/1 is still a good price. For me she has the best form, will handle the track, and could improve the trip. Maybe has significant stamina questions to answer for me. Vow's Lingfield Oaks Trial form needs improving on more than the Musidora form, and Kissed, well it can't be good for her claims that the stable are all over Maybe. Wouldn't be surprised if Beckett's reverses the form with Vow. Kailani might be the danger, but only because I've not seen enough of her to work out the negatives!
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Spot on. I think she would still be value at 5/2 and maybe less. She has everything going for her, and I also agree about Kailani. Those 2 and Betterbetterbetter are the 3 I'd pick out. I can't see Maybe staying either, and don't understand the confidence behind her (though see her drifting like a barge tomorrow).
 
Hamm said:
I don't think it's overplayed at all, it's an enormous factor. The 2 big races last year bear this out - look at how both St Nick and Pour Moi blatantly failed to handle the camber and then tell me it's not a huge factor.
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Yeah, and where did those two horses finish? :D

As Mellish says in that video, the best horses usually win at Epsom regardless of it's quirks.

The track beats horses at Goodwood just as much as Epsom.
 
Hamm said:
Spot on. I think she would still be value at 5/2 and maybe less. She has everything going for her, and I also agree about Kailani. Those 2 and Betterbetterbetter are the 3 I'd pick out. I can't see Maybe staying either, and don't understand the confidence behind her (though see her drifting like a barge tomorrow).
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Three bets for me which echo this:

The Fugue to beat Maybe in a match bet
Kailani EW
Betterbetterbetter EW
 
Gamla Stan said:
Yeah, and where did those two horses finish? :D

As Mellish says in that video, the best horses usually win at Epsom regardless of it's quirks.

The track beats horses at Goodwood just as much as Epsom.
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Goodwood, yes, but for different reasons. The track isn't quite as undulating, but horses often end up unlucky in running.

Usually, but not always. Those 2 horses were miles clear of those they beat, but both only won their races 50 yards from the line because they blatantly failed to handle the track. Whether they won or not is irrelevant, the track impeded them. That Mellish line is (for him unusually) a flippant throwaway line that doesn't really make sense (high level generalisation).
 
chroniclandlord said:
Until I went to Epsom three years ago I didn't appreciate just how pronounced the camber is. It has to be a factor.
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I was the same. Thought it was one of those bits of received wisdom that was never thought about critically and could be ignored. Then I went.
 
I don't think Kissed is going to get the ease they want - bit of rain due in the early hours of the morning but that's it unless the sprinklers get stuck.
 
Though I'd pull my weight in this thread and have spent the last 12 hours putting together some data in what's been a successful race for me every year and I'll be going in large on singles, eachways, trifecta's and doubles.

Previous Winners
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This years runners
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Correlations
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It's crystal clear to me Colin, but I haven't got enough time to explain it to you.....
 
davidjohnson said:
Really good piece here on youtube by Lydia Hislop on the test Epsom and the Derby day provides.
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Good stuff.

I don't necessarily buy this thing about the standards proving the "stiffness" of the track in Epsom, though. Surely they go slower down Tattenham hill and into Tattenham corner than they would at York or the Curragh precisely because they are going through a tricky downhill part of the track? In that sense, going off comparative standard times would misleading I would have thought.

When I went to Epsom what struck me was how steep the rise was over the first couple of furlongs; really doesn't come through on the telly. I think how fast they early goes a long way to determining how stiff a test it actually is.
 
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Well, in the absence of any strong fancies, I've taken a wee each-way stab at Devotion (66/1). She has a very decent time rating on her run in the Derrinstown Guineas trial race and looks sure to be much better at this trip.
 
trackside528 said:
Good stuff.

I don't necessarily buy this thing about the standards proving the "stiffness" of the track in Epsom, though. Surely they go slower down Tattenham hill and into Tattenham corner than they would at York or the Curragh precisely because they are going through a tricky downhill part of the track? In that sense, going off comparative standard times would misleading I would have thought.

When I went to Epsom what struck me was how steep the rise was over the first couple of furlongs; really doesn't come through on the telly. I think how fast they early goes a long way to determining how stiff a test it actually is.
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Surprised at Lydia's naivete on this aspect. Any bend or undulation serves to break up the pace, so bald times are hardly indicative of track stiffness.
Having said that, the Derby c/d is no cakewalk. I think it was Simon Rowlands who once timed the first half-mile as the stiffest of any 12f test in the country.
 
reet hard said:
Surprised at Lydia's naivete on this aspect. Any bend or undulation serves to break up the pace, so bald times are hardly indicative of track stiffness.
Having said that, the Derby c/d is no cakewalk. I think it was Simon Rowlands who once timed the first half-mile as the stiffest of any 12f test in the country.
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the first half mile is immense

the curragh is stiff..but that climb at epsom to the top bend is stiffer
 
The Oaks looks the more exciting of the two classics especially as it looks so open to the naked eye but I’ve selected these contenders who have produced trends & a current level of performance that sits within the required zones; Betterbetterbetter, Colima, Coquet, Kissed, Shirocco Star, The Fuge, Twirl, Was and Vow.

There's really no point me writing up on who I think the winner will be as the results later will tell you the obvious but I'd like to go in on a little bit of value for The Oaks which tends to be a profitable avenue for me in recent years and this years contender is.

BETTERBETTERBETTER

Individual performance

With regards to Speed Ratings Aidan O’Brien’s filly improved 2.87% from first to second run then improved another 12.57% from second to third run accumulating an average of 7.72% which in relation to the profile of the average first, second and third runs of previous winners in relation to their speed ratings she’s -7.07% below in her first run, -7.31% below in her second run but +1.21% in her third run resulting in an obscene improvement.
The typical improvement before the Oaks is 6.08%, with a Speed Rating last time out of 93.27 a 6.07 increase would bring her up to 98.94 that’s 4.84% greater than the average winning Oaks rating of 94.36 and just 1.37% short of the upper bound.

The rate of improvement per race at each conceivable stage she’s 5.51% above average after her first run and just over 1 and ¼ times greater than the average for her second run at around 128%. When using the Standard Deviation of overall improvement of 3.71 we get a range of (4.01 & 11.43) previous Oaks winners who went into the race within this range last time out and pick up on Snow Fairy, Look Here and Ouija Board

Overall profile
The average Speed Rating for Betterbetterbetter is 84.68 which remains -4.90% below the average winning Speed Rating of 89.04, we know that there is around 3.71% improvement throughout the period towards the oaks so we can put her on 87.82.

The average Improvement for Betterbetterbetter is 7.72% which is 46.09% greater than the average Improvement shown by Oaks winning fillies in their profile. When using the STDV of 3.71 to get the average profile range she’s 1.96% below the upper bound.

Conclusion

We can conclude that Betterbetterbetter is improving at a slower rate than previous Oaks winners indicating a slight issue in regards to her maturation rate and potential class on the clock although the velocity of her improvement is outstanding ensuring that she's on the potential brink of exploding into something excellent and finds herself significantly related with the fastest winners of The Oaks in Look Here (101.42) & Ouija Board (100.12) which suggests that tomorrow could yield a new and improved horse.

Putting all the numbers to one side I mentioned how impressed with Betterbetterbetter on here when she run on debut at Leopardstown having seemingly never come out of first gear it was a perfect introduction for me and knew it was going to be a matter of time before the Oaks quotes started flooding in.

In the mean time I think she'd done what she's had to with wins at Dundalk and a narrow margin defeat at Chester although the ground and jockey could be attributed to that quite easily but it was pleasing to see her go around such a sharp track comfortably.

There's a piece on her breeding I've wrote on here so it might be worth fetching although on that side from memory I'm sure it's as illustrious as they come.

THE OAKS CONCLUSION

Having worked on finding a little bit of value at 33/1 it’s time to get down to analyzing the real stuff so let’s get started.

My first calculation is taking the latest Speed Rating to date and adjusting for 6.08% improvement in line with the average improvement of previous Oaks winners before running in the Oaks. The second calculation is taking the average Speed Rating on the horse’s profile and adjusting that figure for the percentage of natural improvement in the horses build up for the race and finally the third calculations involve taking the most recent level of improvement before finding the 6.08% average improvement of this figure and adding the resulting outcome onto the latest figure before using that new percentage to calculate from their average speed rating and combining the resulting figures in producing a potential rating.

These steps have been combined together to produce

98.17 The Fuge
96.98 Kissed
95.87 Betterbetterbetter
94.57 Maybe
94.32 Kaliani
93.19 Vow
92.19 Shirocco Star
91.41 Twirl
90.89 Devotion
90.53 Coquet
90.25 Was
87.85 Colima
86.35 Nayara
79.27 Toptempo

And beaten distances

WINNER The Fuge
1.8 Kissed
3.5 Betterbetterbetter
5.4 Maybe
5.8 Kaliani
7.5 Vow
9.0 Shirocco Star
10.1 Twirl
10.9 Devotion
11.5 Coquet
11.9 Was
15.5 Colima
17.7 Nayara
28.4 Toptempo



£975 Win - The Fuge (3/1 BET365)
£225 Each Way - BetterBetterBetter (20/1 BET365)
£50 Any Order Forecast (The Fuge, Betterbetterbetter, Maybe)
£50 Any Order Trifecta (The Fuge, Betterbetterbetter, Kissed, Maybe)
 
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Desert Orchid said:
Well, in the absence of any strong fancies, I've taken a wee each-way stab at Devotion (66/1). She has a very decent time rating on her run in the Derrinstown Guineas trial race and looks sure to be much better at this trip.
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Interesting pick, caught my eye making ground the last day at Leop, tenderly ridden. Bred to get the trip. Looks a good race though.
 
Maybe for me... On her 2 year old form, bred for this, stable confidence, already beaten some of these, top rated, pure whimsy and the fact I'm balls deep in her ante-post...:p
 
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