Hoosier Park adjusts final time of Schaefer Mile

After discovering an apparent timer malfunction, Hoosier Park has adjusted the final time of the Schaefer Mile, a stakes race that was run on the Indiana Derby undercard on Oct. 1.

The original time of 1:33.00, which would have been a track record, was changed to 1:36.00 after a review of the race was conducted by track officials. A malfunctioning timing sensor caused the wrong time to be displayed at the track. The race was subsequently hand-timed and the Schaefer now has an official final time of 1:36.00. Hoosier’s fractional times are not recorded in hundredths of a second, and are instead rounded down the next-lowest fifth of a second.

“We had an issue with the sensor at the eighth pole,” Brian Elmore, the general manager at Hoosier Park, said on Thursday. “We looked at the replay many times and tried to see if something tripped it before it should have been tripped. Basically the sensor malfunctioned and the guys are working to replace it today. We hand-timed the race several times, and I am confident that the new official time is accurate.”

Andrew Beyer, who provides speed figures for Daily Racing Form, suspected the Schaefer clocking was off. “I would have had to give the horse a 143 figure, so I knew right away that something was not right with the time,” said Beyer, who instead gave the winning horse, Glenwood Canyon, a 99 Beyer Speed Figure. Glenwood Canyon’s previous lifetime best Beyer Figure was 103. Since Beyer Figures have been published in Daily Racing Form , no horse has received a Beyer Figure higher than 128, which was given to Ghostzapper in the 2004 Philip Iselin Handicap.

“There was no need to discuss it,” said Beyer. “The time was just obviously wrong. It could have been right up to seven furlongs, but there was no way they came home [the last furlong] in 10.6 seconds.”