Underrating Baaeed because Sir Busker was maybe a bit too close is a mistake. He broke the best horse that's what matters.
I don't think that's what's happening, though.
Let's say they went too fast up front. It looks for all the world like they did. Let's say that favoured Sir Busker out the back and that he ran his race. Remember, I was backing him in races like the Queen Anne and Lockinge as a value outsider because I have a rating for him that would put him in the mix for places in such races and it looks like he has improved for stepping up to ten furlongs. A bit late in the day, but there you go. It happens...
I reckon it's fair to say that he and the Dubai horse have pretty much run to their best form. Mishriff has beaten them a few lengths but his best form is some way better than that, so we can conclude that he ran below form. The reason for that is almost certainly because he didn't use his energy efficiently by chasing, to an extent, the pace.
Baaeed has come from a little way off the pace, picked up the leaders on the bit and been asked to put the race to bed and win eased off a bit. Putting a figure on it isn't about rating Baaeed. It's simply putting a figure on the
performance, not the horse. We've no idea how much better than the performance he really is.
And that's a wee bit of a pity. It was fairly easy to rate Brigadier Gerard and Mill Reef because they were regularly ridden out to the line in true run races, beating good G1 horses by huge margins. It's so much more difficult when they only do what they have to.
Frankel had a succession of 'wow' performances that were genuinely measurable.
I suspect the sectionals will give Mishriff a big upgrade. They'll probably give Baaeed one too, maybe not as big, but he had plenty in reserve on top of that, at least to these eyes.
So I certainly wouldn't be using the performance of Sir B to under-rate Baaeed.
