Aqueduct handicapping roundup: Week of Jan. 25

Back to basics

By now, you have noticed refreshingly straightforward race conditions since Martin Panza took the reins as director of racing.

The handicapping process begins (or should) by reading the conditions to see who is allowed and who is not. Indeed, James Quinn’s “The Handicapper’s Condition Book” devoted 230 pages to the subject when it was first published in 1981 and ranks among the best-selling handicapping books of all time.

Until recently, though, an increasing amount of legalese in race headings routinely baffled even the most experienced fans, who pored over such convolutions as: “For three-year-olds and up which have never won three races or 3-year-olds or which have not won a race on dirt in the past six months.”

Then we had the starter/optional affair, a mystifying marriage of starter-allowance and claiming conditions that entail all of the above, punctuated at the end with: “or claiming price $35,000.”

Huh?

Evidently, the idea was to bolster field size by creating parameters of eligibility as diverse as they were complex. Now, though, other than traditional age and gender restrictions, we are back to the three basics: 1) open to all comers; 2) nonwinners of two races lifetime; 3) nonwinners of three races lifetime.

It was fair to wonder whether simplifying things would result in shorter fields. Cheerfully, as we approach the halfway point of the season, a comparison with Aqueduct’s two previous slots-fueled winters indicates that any fears were unfounded:

Meet	Races	Starters	Average field
2013-14	243	1,861	7.66
2012-13	524	3,761	7.18
2011-12	675	5,075	7.52

For obvious reasons, most of Thoroughbred racing’s media coverage necessarily focuses on the Triple Crown, the Breeders’ Cup, and a handful of other marquee events. Yet, as observed by Quinn and Tom Ainslie before him, claiming races comprise the vast majority of all races carded in the United States and are the bread and butter of most horsemen and horseplayers.

Standard adjustments

Perhaps more than any other group, do-it-yourselfers who bolster the published Beyer Speed Figures with their own Quirin-style pace and speed figures have celebrated the New York condition book’s reworkings.

As a quick refresher for those who resolved to make their own numbers in 2014, the figures are built around the average times of $10,000 claiming races for older males ages 4 and up. The $10,000 par is 100.

Typical adjustments for claiming races restricted to older fillies and mares are three-fifths of a second slower (+3) in sprints and one full second slower (+5) in routes. So, the $10,000 filly and mare pars are 97 in sprints and 95 in routes.

The nonwinners of two (N2L) adjustment also is +3 in sprints and +5 in routes.

The nonwinners of three (N3L) adjustment is +2 in sprints and +3 in routes.

What is the par for a $10,000 claimer at 1 1/16 miles for fillies and mares who have never won two races? It is 90.

The general rule in starter-allowance races is to double the claiming price to obtain the par; a starter allowance restricted to horses who have started for $17,500 or less in a given time period equates to the $35,000 par.

In starter allowances limited to maiden-claiming winners for a specified price, halve the amount; such a race for maiden-claiming graduates of $35,000 or less equates to the $17,500 par.

What'll it be, ladies?

The Ladies Handicap, the nation’s oldest stakes race for fillies and mares, won in 1928 by a mare named Twitter, has its 143rd running Saturday.

Strangely enough, six-time Eclipse Award winner Todd Pletcher has never won it, but he might check it off his to-do list as he bookends the field with Teen Pauline, the morning-line favorite from the rail, and Royal Lahaina, the third choice from the outside.

The field includes Centring, a 6-year-old Darley Stable homebred who split those two in the recent Affectionately for her third straight runner-up finish as the favorite. She likely will be retired by winter’s end and, remarkably, is nearing $500,000 in earnings despite never having won on a fast track.

“Our goal is to make her a stakes winner,” trainer Tom Albertrani said. “Now, we’re going a mile and an eighth, which should be to her advantage.”