Well Said Draws the Outside - Hooray for the Open Draw

Post positions for the Adios were drawn yesterday and Well Said got the worst of the draw, getting assigned post position nine. The complete draw for the race is:

1--Vintage Master
2--If I Can Dream
3--Ideal Danny
4--Keep It Real
5--Chasin Racin
6--Schoolkids
7--Mr Wiggles
8--Straight Shooting
9--Well Said

But wait, didn't Well Said win his elimination? How can you win your elimination and get saddled with the worst post position in the race? This is because the Adios uses the open draw. Unlike races like the Kentucky Futurity where the heat winners draw for the inside posts or the Meadowlands Pace where the winners get to choose their post positions, what you did in your elimination has no bearing as to the post position your draw in the Adios final. This is the way it should be.

Assigning post positions based on the finish of an elimination quite frankly does not make sense. Think about your overnight events. In an open handicap race, the best horses draw the outside posts; claiming handicaps the horses with the highest base claiming tag draw the outside; for those that use a classified racing system the highest class horses draws the outside. This is done to make races more competitive. Yet, with races like the Pace or the Futurity we are actually giving our best horses the most advantageous post positions; we are handicapping the other horses and as a result we have races that are less competitive with favorites becoming unplayable due to unfavorable odds. The morning line has not yet been released for the Adios. When you see the morning line, think what the line would have been for Well Said if he was assigned one of the inside posts or picked his post position?

Yes, I know assigning post positions based on your performance in an elimination is supposed to ensure a horses best performances instead of racing just to advance to the final but this is not the way to do it; all we are doing is stacking the odds in favor of elimination/heat winners. Readers of this blog know I am a proponent of eliminating eliminations and limiting the number of starters in our stake races to the highest money earners and having meaningful consolation races as done in the Battle of Brandywine. However, if we insist on keeping eliminations then the best way to ensure we get the best performance possible from our competitors is to make the elimination purses more significant.

Well Said appears to be our three year old pacing champion this year. A true champion overcomes bad post positions; the path to championship should not be made easier by being assigned favorable post positions. Thanks to the open draw, the Adios is going to turn out to be one heck of a horse race and a test of Well Said's abilities.

It should be no other way.