On the road again, back to California for the Breeders Cup, Del Mar, and the winter.
After experiencing a 4 out of 5 troubled trip on the way back to Lexington, Kentucky, we settled down and we have enjoyed a fine Keeneland, we have a library full of works and adding more for the Churchill Downs meet, starting Sunday with the ALL-2yo card.
I will be at Del Mar this next weekend prepping for the Breeders Cup.
My trip back to California will hopefully get off with good break from the gate this morning and get a forward position heading to Tulsa, our first stop.
I'm looking forward to check out Tulsa, as I am a big fan of the Tulsa King TV show with Sylvester Stallone.
I am planning to stop in New Mexico and a definite In-Out burger visit in Phoenix.
Trip is everything, no need to be between two semis or stuck behind a tiring, slow pacesetter. We going to look for a quick tempo and make our move three wide into the stretch.
Horseplayers look for trouble in trips, I look for comfortabilty, and the boys and I travel in style, a F 150 Raptor with super cab, the boys have their own palatial estate behind me.
The Raptor is a great way to travel, roomy, and with all the bells and whistles, a Grade 1 horse for sure with the corresponding horsepower.
The Raptor is extremely maneuverable, even has a cruise control that adjusts to speed of cars around you, like a Grade 1 or smart racehorse.
You can tell the dummies on the track, they constantly get in trouble, run up on heels, act up in the gate consistently, but that's who players watching trips gravitate to, the visual makes you believe if there was 'room' its a different story in the result.
Some horses are not raptors and will never be raptors. The reason they didn't get thru, is either they didn't have the horsepower, or two didn't have the desire, most of the time both.
"If he hadn't got stopped, he would have won'', and if 'Toads had hip pockets they would carry a gun to shoot snakes' just saying.
A horse moving comfortably four wide is in a much better position than the horse going inside, or between horses, but in this forked up way of looking at things in this industry we tend to credit the horse going four-wide because of ground loss and diminish the effort of horses inside or between semi trucks.
The 4 wide trip is easy on a horse as he has no kickback, nor traffic, he or she is in the clear, much better than being stuck behind trucks on a wet day kicking back water making your windshield wipers work harder.
We make zero sense the way we see things, or interpret situations:
"if he hand only gotten thru, had nowhere to go...." but if you watch the head on, a mac truck could have gone thru that hole, the horse simply refused to go thru or didn't have the ability to do so.
We want to see something that reflects our narrative. We, as a society, believe something first and then try to find reasons to keep believing.
I believe i am going to have a clean trip, stay out of the kickback and make it to California with plenty left.
