LARRY'S VIEW - RESISTING TEMPTATION IS PART OF THE BATTLE WHEN MANAGING YOUNG HORSES

By Larry Cassidy | Friday, August 5, 2011

Larry Cassidy currently has forty-two Group 1 successes behind his name. He is a multiple Premiership winning jockey having taken out three titles in Sydney and one in Brisbane. Larry’s View, the personal blog of this top class rider will appear on horseracingonly.com.au every Friday, workload permitting.

I have been asked to give my view as a horseman on incentive schemes which are aimed at providing bonus earnings for two-year-old and three-year-old runners and on the huge financial temptations facing connections in general as they try to manage their horses to their best advantage during their two-year-old and three-year-old seasons.

In terms of incentive schemes, like QTIS … which is a good scheme in itself … I think everything in Australia is based around young horses. That’s probably more so in Brisbane too. It’s based around shorter races and younger horses.

When it comes to staying races … you only have to look at the fields of staying races and it drops right away whether it be Maidens or Open Class.

I suppose it’s just what Australia has got used to. They like to get their horses up and running and try to get some money in the bank early.

That’s why you’ll see a lot of good stayers come out of New Zealand. They are happy to give them a race and then turn them out for six months or even one year. No-one does that here. They turn them out for four weeks.

They don't want to wait, but then again some horses are ready for it.

I remember when I first came to Sydney I was riding work for Lee Freedman at Randwick and he chucked me on this two-year-old one morning. I didn’t know who it was. It was a chestnut filly.

I came back after the gallop and said, I’ve never ridden in a Golden Slipper … but this horse will win it … and it did. It’s name was Bint Marscay. It won the 1993 Slipper. I didn’t ride it in the Slipper. Mick Dittman rode it. I actually never got to ride her in a race, but I rode her in a few gallops and the first feel she gave me … well, she was just a natural.

She didn’t really go on with it. I think she had a few problems. I think she might have won a race as a three-year old, but she was a natural racehorse already as a two-year-old.*

As it is there are not a lot of good two-year-olds who do go on with it and obviously there can be a variety of reasons for that, but a contributing factor for some is that they are racing in these high pressure races as youngsters and they are primed to the minute to run in them and to run at their best … and I think they exert everything they’ve got into that and that leaves many of them with nothing left to give.

If they win the Slipper or run a place in the Slipper then they go for the Triple Crown and sometimes it is just too much for some of them. They can’t cope with it. That is where some potential Group 1 horses get lost, because they use up everything.

I know some people have a legitimate concern that some young horses will be pushed along quicker than they normally would be because of the prize-money on offer, but at the end of the day a good horsemen will only push their horse so far because they should know the boundaries and the limits they have to work in. So, basically, it does come down to the responsibility the connections have to their horse and they need to be aware that being tempted to go for ‘one more lucrative run’, could impact adversely on that horse’s future results and the length of its career.

Some star performers early on have gone on with it.**

Dance Hero … he went on. He won the Magic Millions as a two-year-old and then went on to take out the Slipper and the Triple Crown. He might have lost his way a bit in-between, but I know he went on to win a Group 1 race (The Salinger) in Melbourne later in his career … but, geez, you could name them on one hand those who did go on.

The upside of the type of money that is available for the youngsters is that it certainly makes it look a more attractive proposition for owners looking to purchase horses … and, if you are lucky enough to get a horse that can jump and get running early, you are going to have a good chance to win very good money very quickly … but it does come with definite dangers to the longevity of a horse’s career, so that aspect has to be managed very carefully.

As I said, I think an incentive scheme such as QTIS is basically a good scheme in itself.

How would I improve it?

I certainly think there is an opportunity to add an element to the scheme which will do two things at the same time.

If they take a percentage of the money that hasn’t been won and they put that into an QTIS four-year-olds staying series … say a 1600m - 2000m - 2200m -2400m race (just for QTIS horses only) … then you are spreading the benefit of the scheme at no extra expense while, at the same time, you are giving the horses who were not precocious youngsters or who are not sprinters a chance to still become QTIS bonus winners.

Some of the QTIS money on offer isn’t won. It is surplus. You don’t even have to use it all. Just take enough of it out and put on some four-year-old QTIS races.

That benefits the ones who needed a bit more time to mature and gives them a chance to pocket some of that prize-money.

That would add a bit of something different.

Till next week,
Larry

*In the Gallery of The Stars section of the Freedman Brothers website Lee Freedman comments on Bint Marscay. “She was probably the most natural two-year-old I have trained. I regard her as the benchmark for our two-year-olds. She won her Golden Slipper on a very limited, and injury hindered campaign. She came back to win at Group level at three, but her injuries prevented her from training on. She has been a wonderful broodmare, and I won the 2005 Victoria Derby with her grandson, Benicio.

**Dance Hero had seven starts as a two-year-old. He was beaten into third place on debut, but then reeled off six wins in succession including a hat trick of Group 1 wins in the Golden Slipper, the Sires Produce and the Champagne Stakes. He won three times as a three-year-old in seven starts (two Group 2 wins and one Group 3 win). Dance Hero then failed to salute in nine goes as a four-year-old, but he did bounce back with one final hurrah when landing the Group 1 Salinger Stakes as a five-year-old. Dance Hero retired with stake earnings of $3 892 350.

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