Good horses with bad trainers...

[cpo]

After the win of Easy Terms today it is likely she is going to go up to a rating of around 100. She was probably value for a little more than the winning margin as she was stuck behind horses at one point in the home straight. Now I am not saying Rod Millman is a bad trainer but what the hell must he have been doing with this horse? He had her for 12 races and could not win a race with her and now she has switched yards and has won 6 races from 8 and has gone from a rating of 60 to almost 100. I know horses get better with age and there are other factors that could have brought about the improvement but it just made me think about how many potentially very good horses are out there but are with bad trainers. This is probably a daft subject to start a new thread for but I didn't know where else to ask the question.

[fintron]

Re: Good horses with bad trainers... I was thinking this same question the other day when seeing the performance of Mandaean and Flag Officer at York. How can you ruin horses so quickly?

[mowgli77]

Re: Good horses with bad trainers...

I was thinking this same question the other day when seeing the performance of Mandaean and Flag Officer at York. How can you ruin horses so quickly?

Saeed Bin Suroor - the man that turns gold into coal. Surely just a matter of time before he gets fired. Godolphin used to be a force in group races, now they are experts at ruining good horses, many from Andre Fabre.

[BillyHills]

Re: Good horses with bad trainers... Easy Terms is the flat equivalent to Hunt Ball over the jumps, it is quite amazing how horses improve so much when you think how many of the beasts run to their own level year after year. When i used to own greyhounds they reckon they were the most consistent animals alive, 14 races, 6 dogs in each race and all run to within a second and a half of each other over 500yds in one night, amazing creatures. I suppose in the main horses are similar, the speed experts can probably tell me that all sprints at Wolver or Lingfield are run to a similar time? Some do improve for a change of scenery though!

[erhaab1965]

Re: Good horses with bad trainers... I don't believe there are bad trainers , maybe trainers with poor facilities and poor horses. I believe all trainers can get horses to win suitable targets if they want to no matter how many horses they train. Even Peter Grayson is probably a decent trainer ,given the right circumstances. I can't really comment about Easy Terms as i don't have a clue about horses/training but I'm sure the reason for his improvement is not because his previous trainer cannot train. Even though I say all trainers know their job I know plenty of trainers take the pi-ss out of punters /owners. For example some trainers ensure the rate of improvement takes place over a few seasons opting to win a race or 2 followed by a few poor runs , then the same the following season. An example is a small trainer called George Margarson in Newmarket. I recall about 12 years ago Pricewise ( Mel Collier ) tipping a horse of his called Atavus for a handicap off a rating in the 80's. The horse couldn't win off that mark and went on to lose a few more races in the process going down in the ratings. The following year he was so well handicaped the horse won the Bunbury Cup ( heritage h'cap) and the Tote International ( very very big prize money race ) , the horse went on to be a regular pattern horse over the next few years. To me the trainer took the pi-ss. How can a horse not win off 80 odd yet win the Tote International / Hungerford stakes a year or 2 later ? He took the pi=ss a few years later with a horse called Young Mick who again at his best was a pattern horse. The horse in his early days was under trained till it went down to a rating in the 50s , then suddenly he mops up plenty of races/prizemoney. In one season he goes from 50 odd to winning a Gr3 !! If these horses were trained by SB Suroor they would have been group performers at 3 , no handbraking whatsoever. I have never liked G Margarson since , you never know whether he intends to win with his horses or not. I'm sure we can all name many many bent trainers between us . ( G Margerson is bent in my opinion only ) As for jockeys thats a different story , there are top jockeys and there are poor jockeys.

[Haystacks]

Re: Good horses with bad trainers...

An example is a small trainer called George Margarson in Newmarket. I recall about 12 years ago Pricewise ( Mel Collier ) tipping a horse of his called Atavus for a handicap off a rating in the 80's. The horse couldn't win off that mark and went on to lose a few more races in the process going down in the ratings. The following year he was so well handicaped the horse won the Bunbury Cup ( heritage h'cap) and the Tote International ( very very big prize money race ) , the horse went on to be a regular pattern horse over the next few years. To me the trainer took the pi-ss. How can a horse not win off 80 odd yet win the Tote International / Hungerford stakes a year or 2 later ? He took the pi=ss a few years later with a horse called Young Mick who again at his best was a pattern horse. The horse in his early days was under trained till it went down to a rating in the 50s , then suddenly he mops up plenty of races/prizemoney. In one season he goes from 50 odd to winning a Gr3 !! If these horses were trained by SB Suroor they would have been group performers at 3 , no handbraking whatsoever.

Can't agree at all with your example of Young Mick. If he was going to the trouble of hand-breaking the horse to get it well handicapped, then why on earth put it in a claimer (where broke maiden in Jan 2006)? He only managed to hold on to it that day because he got lucky in the ballot with a friendly claim.

[cpo]

Re: Good horses with bad trainers... Saeed Bin Suroor is a difficult one as he is clearly not a bad trainer as his record will suggest. He does seem to have a knack of ruining potentially very good horses that come to his yard form other yards. On the other hand I am sure there have been many examples of horses improving for switching to Godolphin. I can't name any off the top of my head but there will be plenty out there. I know they take on a lot of classy 2 year olds... maybe a lot of them just don't train on? I think both Godolphin trainers have been very slow to get their horses going this year. I know last year Zarooni clicked into gear in June so maybe that's when we will see the best of these horses. Still it doesn't excuse the performances of some of their horses this week at York. They have been absolutely rubbish...not just getting beat but finishing almost tailed off with some of them. OK maybe there aren't bad trainers but what about trainers that are not sure how to handle a good horse? I wonder how many group class horses we have missed out on seeing purely because they are with a trainer that is used to training bottom grade horses. Take Frankel for example... had he started off with a trainer that has never had a horse win above class 3 or 4 level, would he still be the same horse? Would we be talking about him being the best ever? Every trainer trains differently and there are some that train their horses in a way to get a good handicap mark and so on. Take Mark Prescott... we all know what he does with horses in stepping them up in trip all of a sudden and racking up a 4 or 5 race sequence with them. People on here though, can spot these things and its clear to see when he does this with horses. I very much doubt Rod Millman was biding his time with Easy Terms. Now why couldn't he get a win out of this horse? Erhaab your probably right that it's down to facilities and things like that and possibly not down to him being a bad trainer. Surely though, this horse should have been able to win a maiden or a poor handicap with him. I only use Rod Millman as I have used Easy Terms as my example but there must be so many potentially class horses out there stuck in poor stables and we will never get to see how good they are.

[Haystacks]

Re: Good horses with bad trainers... Incidentally, both Easy Terms and Young Mick were 4YOs when they began their winning streaks (both at middle distances). They both received opening marks in the low 70s after being placed over a mile (indicating that the handicapper felt they did have some ability, although they were probably overrated at that stage of their careers). They then dropped down the handicap by 13-17lbs over their next 10 runs. Maybe they weren't strong enough to win over middle distances until they were four years of age!?

[south_eastern_ram]

Re: Good horses with bad trainers... At the end of the day, nobody knows why animals do certain things, nobody knows for definite how a horses mind works. For all we know, Easy Terms didnt like the stable she was living in at Rod Millmans or the horse in the box next to her.

[erhaab1965]

Re: Good horses with bad trainers... Had Young Mick been trained by SB Suroor / H Cecil / Sir M Stoute ...etc theres no way the horse would have been rated in the 50s. Often with Godolphin if they don't reach their potential by the end of their 3YO career they are sent to the glue factory / passed on to secondary Godolphin trainers like M Tragoning/M Johnston / or sold to other trainers. With George Margarson he must have known it was a potential good one as a 2YO ( back in the 90s he won a Gr1 ( although only a 4 horse race and the horse was disqualified too ). He must have planned Young Micks improvement to start as a 4YO. This may be to extract a few years of training fees for the horse . Had he trained more Godolphin quality horses I'm sure he would have had a lot more horses going from 50 to 100+.

[mowgli77]

Re: Good horses with bad trainers... Godolphin used to take a lot of 2 year olds off Mark Johnston and then ready them for their classic campaign at 3. I'm not sure if this is still the case. I would find it interesting to see how differently trainers do actually train their horses. Some do work on their own, others work with a lead horse and then some trainers will run a few horses and teach one how to pass horses. Is it coincidence that Hannon's best horses such as Canford Cliffs, Paco Boy and to some extent Strong Suit race from a hold up position and deliver a finishing kick. Would that be down to the horse or the way they are trained. If you had a front runner that was on the pace from leaving the stalls you wouldn't expect it to have such a finishing turn of foot as one that had a bit left in the tank for a final burst of speed. It always seems to be the best trainers with the best horses but then the arabs/sheiks etc that own the best horses rely specifically on a group of elite trainers. It would be interesting to see how Aidan O'Briens runners or Henry Cecils runners would do with a trainer like Richard Fahey for example. He had Wootton Bassett that looked to be full of potential, did it not train on or did he just not know how to train it properly for the top class races? I find the walkers that are like treadmills for horses interesting and the way they use large pools for them, often for rehabilitation from injury. They do courses in equestrianism at a local college in Skipton, it's a shame they don't do it part time on an evening as I'd have my name down for it just out of interest. We sometimes forget they are animals and not machines. I guess a trainer has to find out if the horse likes to hear the sound of hooves behind it and therefore is kept prominently or whether they like to race in a pack, often a feeling of safety out in the wild and protection. I also find it interesting how a jockey knows when he is on a good one. I could sit on a class 6 handicapper and a group 1 winner and probably wouldn't be able to tell the difference. I wonder what the difference is in terms of facilities when you compare a trainer like Mick Easterby/Richard Fahey to say Cecil, Godolphin or O'Brien.

[Haystacks]

Re: Good horses with bad trainers...

He must have planned Young Micks improvement to start as a 4YO. This may be to extract a few years of training fees for the horse ./QUOTE] Why on earth would you put it in a claimer if you are planning to improve it as a 4YO?

[erhaab1965]

Re: Good horses with bad trainers...

Godolphin used to take a lot of 2 year olds off Mark Johnston and then ready them for their classic campaign at 3. I'm not sure if this is still the case.

M Johnstons brief is to find group horses for Godolphin , which he has been doing for since Godolphin was concieved. In the past year M J has given them Monterosso , Campanologist and Mastery all international Gr1 winners. Infact when Godolphin first changed to the now familiar all navy blue colours the first horse to carry those colours was an ex MJ horse. Conversely with decent horses which dont quite make the grade for Godolphin they go to MJ. It is the same for the Hamdan al Maktoum owned Godolphin horses and M Tregoning