Trentham Racecourse

W

Warbler

At the Start
Joined
Jun 6, 2005
Messages
8,493
I am puzzled, by a 6F time put up by Sea Change of 1.06.66 on what was officially called Good ground :eek: Goodwood is fast and slightlyly downhill, yet last years Stewards was won in a time of 1.10.50 on Good to Firm by Zidane which equally standard. That's nearly 4 secs faster. The top rated sprinter in the world at the moment is Sacred Kingdom, yet on Good ground at Sha Tin, he could only cover the 6F's in 1.08.40. Even without legislating for a standing start, this horse has gone through the sections in an average of 11.1 secs, and in reality the final 5 would have been quicker still, (nearer to 10.75 secs). How has this happened?

1: The course is heavily downhill? I don't know, can anyone shed light on this?

2: The ground was firm and not good? Might have implications for tomorrow, but my limited research indicates that Trentham frequently throws up faster than normal times

3: The timing mechanism was broken? Doesn't seem likely. New Zealand isn't a backward country and Trentham is their premier track. They shoudl be capable of operating a stopwatch.

4: The advertised distance is wrong? Seems the most likely explanation to me?

5: The horse is bloody good? Well she's a multiple Gp1 winner at 6F's (4 wins from 5 tries) and the performance in question broke the NZ record, although what this really translates into is hard to qualify. Her next two performances saw her take on the bizarre trip of 9F's at Nad Al Sheba, where she finished 6th. The trip was wrong for her, but under the circumstances she's probably acquitted herself well given that the race has thrown up a whole host subsequent Gp1 winners, right down to 8th place.

I normally get quite excited when I pick up a time of this magnitude, but right now I'm looking for an explanation, as this is simply too fast
 
The race distances are given in metres, but at 6F's there's only a 7 metre discrepancy, which wouldn't equal the sort of differences involved. The times do look fast at a whole range of trips, which means they've got to be consistantly operating the timing mechanism wrongly every meeting, or consistantly marking the start position up incorrectly for every trip, at every meeting, and for a series of years. The fact that each race result carries information regarding the realignment of the rails in terms of the width involved, and the length that it was done for, does indicate that they take true race distances more seriously than we do, so a caviler approach to true distance run doesn't look to be consistent with the way they report things.

I'm coming to the conclusion that it must be a downhill track, and note that O'Cartier won an open handicap in 1.07.52, which is some 4.25L's slower than Sea Change. It might be that O'Cartier had faster ground? and Sea Change did break the country's 6F record, but it points to something being amiss. One for Gareth I suspect? he normally has a suggestion or two about how these things can happen

My local landlord comes from Wellington, I might try sneaking round there at 12 tomorrow and see what he can tell me about Trentham, but I'm seriosuly struggling to believe it can be a flat track now.

Incidentally, did anyone notice that the kiwi's seemingly have a "girls day" :laughing: I assume its the antipodian antedote to the numerous 'ladies days' that infest UK courses
 
This is the horse I think that can cause a major upset at Ascot tonight.

She has won 7 Group 1 races in New Zealand, and yes does hold the national record in New Zealand for 1200 metres. I think the race was the Captain Cook (don't quote me on this one), when she led from start to finish and just breezed at the top of the straight. No whip or anything she just won in a hand canter.

New Zealand is not usually known for producing a good sprinter, but in this horse they have not only a good sprinter, but one that can race up to a mile and still be brilliant. She has also won a Group 3 race in Australia over 7f.

She ran well in Dubai, and was probably not suited by both the distance and pace.

My only concern tonight is the straight course, which she has never raced down.

I will try and find the You Tube postings from another forum, in which a friend of mine who is a Kiwi posts.
 
Also remembering that 6f in the metric system is 1200 metres whereas if it is properly calculated, its 1207 metres exactly.
 
1207.008 if you wanna be really precise :)

I've always worked under the belief that 1km was exactly 5/8 of a mile, therefore 5f equalled 1000m, therefore 6f equalled 1200m.

Seven metres discrepancy for every 6f seems quite a lot.
 
I've noticed a couple of times GA that you've mentioned her and that she may have a good chance today - I'm really looking forward to seeing her and I really do hope she runs well.
 
She's a popular horse in her native homeland of New Zealand, where she is the reigning Horse of the Year. I have always liked "Poppy" (the horse's stable name) and think for the size she is she has a heart of gold.

I know the Kiwi racefans are so proud of this mare. So either win, lose or draw they will still be happy to have had one race at the week of Royal Ascot.
 
Originally posted by Desert Orchid@Jun 21 2008, 06:23 AM
Seven metres discrepancy for every 6f seems quite a lot.
Click to expand...
Yes(ish) but if anything it adds to her claims, if she's run 1.06.66 over 1207 metres and not the 6F's advertised. In any event the 7 metre discrepancy wouldn't account for the 1.74 secs she's allegedly covered the same distance in quicker than Sacred Kingdom (even a human being can do that in less). If she's been running round a bend (as Grand Armee might be infering?) the performance is even more meritous.

If her best distance is 7F's then she might not necessarily be inconvenienced at Ascot where the 6F standard is 1.13.80, which is 7.2 secs slower than the 6F time recorded at Trentham. Even sprinters require a degree of stamina in order to fully see out 6F at full pelt, and this can only be exacerbated on a more demanding track like Ascot, where the standard is 3.4 secs slower than somewhere like Goodwood.

The draw wouldn't worry me too much, as I'm convinced the jockeys manufactured the bias of Tuesday and Wednesday with some rather 'dull' riding. Clearly some post mortem took place on Wednesday evening, as by Thursday different tactics were employed in the Britannia, and it has to be a possibility now (especially with a bit of rain) that the fresher ground that has been less chewed up is on the far side.

Still haven't decided what to do with this one, but will try a few other lines to get a sense of where Sea Change fits in the scheme of things
 
From watching the YouTube link that Luis provided in the Golden Jubilee thread, the only thing I can venture is that the 6f course seems to start on a spur which joins up quite acutely with the main track. Is it possible that they measure the 6f using a wide arc there and that horses can effectively cut the corner?

Also whilst it's hard to tell from the camera angle, I wouldn't be surprised if that spur was downhill all the way.
 
Heh - from the comments on YouTube:

The world record time for 1200m is at this course by a horse that no one has heard of. Any wonder they go so fast,its down hill for the first 700m then flattens out. Get the real quick horses on it and they'd be cracking 1.06 mark with the same tail wind
Click to expand...
 
On the same day (Jan 19th '08) 4 races were run over C&D, they got progressively quicker, which suggests that being the ninth race up she had the best of it.

1.10.46
1.08.91
1.08.75
1.06.66

The rail alignment is given as "true" (they'll specifiy how far they've been moved, and for what distance in some of the other results). The penetrometer reading is given as 2.5 "good". They must use a different scale as 4.6 and 5.4 are given as "heavy", where 2.9 and 2.5 again is described as "dead", 2.2 is also described as "good". I'm assuming it's a downhill track, but as you say the camera angle can easily distort these things. Visually it didn't look too different to Goodwood, and their 6F standard is 1.10.40, which means she's 3.8 secs faster than that. It's pretty well impossible to know what to make of it without a standard for Trentham though, but I believe it was a national record, although even that in context, is far from clear cut what it means.
 
Originally posted by Gareth Flynn@Jun 21 2008, 10:25 AM
Heh - from the comments on YouTube:

The world record time for 1200m is at this course by a horse that no one has heard of. Any wonder they go so fast,its down hill for the first 700m then flattens out. Get the real quick horses on it and they'd be cracking 1.06 mark with the same tail wind
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
That explains it, and was probably the conclusion I was coming to, and of course Wellington isn't exactly unknown for the stiffish breeze!!! The weather report for the race doesn't mention a strong wind, but these things are relative, a Kiwi might not regard the strength of the wind as being significant to the same level that we would if they've been brought up with it (there is a reason their rugby team are called the hurricanes). All of which leaves us trying to make sense of 1.06.66. If the top horses would beat it given ideal conditions and dip under 1.06.00, what is the extra 0.66 worth? Not really any clearer in my mind regarding the merit etc, but the explanation is at least helpful, and I suspect Paul Haigh has overstated things shrug::
 
Isn't the world record for 6f held on the turf track at Santa Anita Park in the USA? Wouldn't be surprised if it is, because that track does have a noted downhill slope right at the start.
 
I see the Racing Post has spotted the error. The time originally posted for this race worked out at about 9.45 sec/furlong.
 
Back
Top