Flatter: McPeek makes ‘weighty’ point, but there is a rebuttal

When Kenny McPeek sounded off on Twitter about unequal weight assignments in Kentucky Derby preps, some of the blowback was typical of social media.

“Spurious logic, sorry.”

“Did you not know the weight before you entered?”

“Guess you need to tell gullible owners (an) excuse.”

That was just a sample of many responses that otherwise came from accounts festooned with non-human avatars and plausibly made-up names.

For the uninitiated, McPeek got the conversation started with a Tweet that read, in part, “in a Kentucky Derby points race, shouldn’t the horses run at equal weights like the Triple Crown races? ... Points races should be equal weight, IMO.”

That may look like what he wrote after his colt Dash Attack finished seventh last weekend in the Rebel (G2) at Oaklawn. But it was not.

McPeek actually posted that Tweet on the morning of Feb. 5, before his horse Tiz the Bomb and the favorite Mo Donegal lost the Holy Bull (G3) to White Abarrio, who caught a four-pound break in the weight assignment.

The opinion was put before the Twittersphere about seven hours before the Holy Bull – and three weeks before the Rebel.

The key words there: “before” and “before.”

Claims that these were pre-emptory alibis from McPeek should be reserved for tunnel-vision cynics who might still grouse that Sham got some bad training or bad rides or bad hay before he ran into Secretariat. The rest of us can take this at face value.

What is indisputable is McPeek has been calling for some time to have equal weights for horses in any given Derby points prep. He makes a lot of sense, doesn’t he?

This is not like the argument to “play some defense” whenever the NFL overtime rule is brought up as being unfair to the team that loses the coin toss. If it were as simple as all that, then why doesn’t the team winning the toss ever choose to kick? Sure, “play some defense,” stop the other team, then get the ball back and simply kick a field goal. Alas, it does not work that way.

In horse racing, it seems much more straightforward, right? Put 122 or however many pounds on each colt, and then turn them loose.

Ah, but there are some variables to consider.

Bruno De Julio, the clocker and workout analyst who has written plenty about this subject, reminded his Twitter followers last weekend that not all 3-year-olds are created equal. Nor do they develop at the same rate.

“Maidens,” he said, “should get the lowest weight possible as the young horses are not fully developed and not as strong as multiple-raced individuals. If we keep weight off maidens and allow them to develop bones and get strong, we could really help trainers keep them sounder and have longer careers.”

As Victor Ryan pointed out in his story this week for Horse Racing Nation, the biggest final preps before the Derby will show a leveling of the weights. Sort of.

In North America’s 100-40-20-10 point races, each male horse in the Santa Anita Derby (G1) carries 124 pounds, the Blue Grass (G1) 123, the Wood Memorial (G2) 123, the Jeff Ruby Steaks (G3) 123, the Florida Derby (G1) 122 and the Louisiana Derby (G2) 122. The Arkansas Derby (G1) sets the baseline at 122 but gives non-stakes winners a four-pound break.

Horseplayers who ignore the potential six-pound difference between a horse coming out of Arkansas and another shipping from California do so at their own risk when they handicap the Kentucky Derby, where each colt or gelding carries 126 pounds.

But that is beside the point of common sense made by McPeek – and the convincing caveat posed by De Julio.

These are not the only variables on the Derby trail. What about the graduation of distances? How does a one-turn mile like the Gotham (G3) get thrown into the March mix when horses already have graduated from that sort of a race?

Applying McPeek’s argument to distance, maybe every prep in January should be a mile. Then add 110 yards in February, another 110 in March and April and then that 10th furlong in early May.

But again, apply what De Julio said. What about the slow-developing 3-year-old who might not be ready for that second turn or even that ninth furlong until the Ides of March?

And what about prep races at Golden Gate Fields and Turfway Park? Does it make any sense to let horses to use a synthetic track to qualify for a classic that is run on real, honest-to-goodness dirt? For that matter, how is it an overseas horse conceivably could be making his first start off the turf in America’s biggest race?

For some the beauty of the Derby trail is how many differences there are. Like ballparks to baseball (remember baseball?), no two preps are alike. How does anyone equate the nuances of the proving ground for California speed that is Santa Anita against a bone-chilling run in New York at Aqueduct? Or how about the short stretch at Gulfstream Park with the eternally long run home at Fair Grounds?

This is not to say McPeek’s wish for equal weights within a given prep race comes across as naïve or even disingenuous. Again, look at when he posted his Tweets. He was not red-boarding.

But one 3-year-old is not like the next one. This is not like the Next Gen cars that supposedly are all the same in NASCAR.

Maybe, then, we are stuck with these variable conditions on the Derby trail. And maybe, just maybe, the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority can get after this.

Yeah, right.