Sorry LKID. Sometimes the game can be so frustrating.
I put the link in the response so everyone can easily get to it.
So let's analyze the race this horse ran.
First off, I see 3 dry horses, 1 with slight sweat and 1 soaking wet and all fired up. The 5 is somewhat warm, ( look at where the inner rein is rubbing on its neck and you will see slight marks). Now look at the 1 horse. Not what you hope for in late October. I do not know the horses history though but I do not like that. That said, the horse at the 1-2 second mark lunges forward hitting it's mouth ( I think) on the gate doors. OK, that happens, but the horse is showing it's angst by doing that. Certainly not collected and composed like you hope, want and at 3-5 expect. But the real problem is at 5 seconds, before the gates open, when he steps back with his right front. That should have been corrected. But... maybe this horse always acts like an ass in then gate. I don't know. But the sole reason he broke a step slow was because he had to take a step with his right front before he could go. That also made him break on his left lead. That is not cool at all. Hr needs to be on his right lead so he can switch to his left as he goes into the turn. In short, he was not in the same leg position as the others . That really cost him but it wasn't the end all. So he breaks slow and is trailing, but he is on the bit , understandable because he is all fired up but the expenditure of energy is a waste.
He switches to his right lead, which is fine, at the 25-26 second mark. And that is why the rider has to grab him to not burn more energy.
He was actually slightly outside so the rider put him back down inside ( which by the way, looked from this race and the charts to be a great place to be as the scrape marks through the lane looked very fresh and the inside seemed to dominate all day ), to help try and settle him which I totally agree with but then at 32-33 seconds the horse starts to run off inside and the rider has to severely pull him up. That is ALL on the horse NOT the rider. At that point, IMO, it would be a miracle if that horse can win. He has just burned waaay too much energy being an ass. I find all that has been wrong with this entire mess except getting his legs back under him prior to the start , on the horse not the rider.
So by 33-35 seconds the horse is making the rider look like a jerk as he is checking again. He finally settles down after that . At the 1:00 mark the rider moves his hands thus asking the horse for some response. The response is half hearted and not what the rider wanted I doubt. So Joel needs some fresh goggles to see at 1:21 which is fully expected at that point. It looked to me that Joel did have somewhere to go around the turn but by 1:28 he does not again. Looks like the 5 horse came over and closed the door that might have been partially open around the turn. Again, the horses inability to go when asked. At 1:34 he is in a drive and if he responds, Joel can go out to the three path to be clear but there is no response yet again. He runs flat the rest of the way which was predictable because of all the energy loss early on.
IMO, I put all of this except the standing evenly stuff in the gate directly on the horse. And maybe that as well if his gate history was the reason. IMO the horse made Joel look bad. I don't think the horse cooperated one bit throughout the race while racing on what seemed to be the best part of the race track as well. But obviously , so did the winner . I don't think any rider could have done any better in that situation.
Sorry man. This game is so damn rewarding but can drive you nuts with details that you cannot control. And you know that I will tell you a rider screwed up in a New York minute if that is what happened. But in this case, the horse acted like an ass and made Joel look bad.
As for Joel doing this often, I don't know. But if you see more instances of this post the link. I am always happy to look at any race and will tell you exactly how it is, IMO of course.
All the best my friend.
