Outside horses clearly had the advantage on Travers Day

If your horse saved ground Saturday on Saratoga’s dirt track all was lost.

“Travesty” probably is too strong a word, but it does rhyme with “Travers Day,” and there’s no doubt the main-track bias at Saratoga shaped results throughout this important card.

Six of the dirt races carded looked a lot alike: Horses inside and placed near the lead began gasping for air at the top of the stretch, while out on the crest of the track a wall of stalkers and deep closers descended.

Only race 2, the day’s first dirt race, had a different shape, and either the second-time-starting 2-year-old Tap It to Win (who cut the corner after battling for the lead early while along the rail) is an absolute monster, the track surface changed through the day, or that maiden race just was a radical outlier.

Race 4, an older maiden dirt sprint, started the string of main-track races dominated by horses outside and off the pace. But, as was the case in the dirt stakes later, it also yielded a completely logical winner in Performer, who had been working well with Travers winner Code of Honor. Florent Geroux rode a horse named Off the Record in that maiden race and wound up setting the pace. Geroux kept his mount as far from the rail as he could but in the end, pacesetters were defenseless when attacked on the outside. Geroux in the Travers rode Owendale, who broke from post 1 and while three or four paths off the fence got stuck on the inside of other horses.

“You can see most of the jocks during the day tried to avoid the rail,” Geroux said. “It wasn’t like regular races; guys were looking to go out instead of staying on the fence. In the Travers, my choices were very limited drawing No. 1 and the guy right outside pushing on me so I couldn’t get out.”

Take nothing away from Code of Honor, who finished well in front of Tacitus to win the Travers and was moving purposefully from start to finish. But Tacitus, racing with blinkers for the first time, wound up on the lead, was only about 1 1/2 paths off the fence on the first turn, and was pushed back down near the rail around the second turn, too. It’s fair to wonder how things would look if you switch Code of Honor’s and Tacitus’s journeys.

By race 9, the Personal Ensign, someone in Midnight Bisou’s camp had come to understand the bias’s power. Mike Smith broke Midnight Bisou from post 1 and had nothing on his mind besides taking back and getting outside. Elate pulled a four-wide trip but hit the front near the top of the stretch as Midnight Bisou came about six paths wide. On tracks like this, the outside sweeping move wins if horses are closely matched.

Shancelot’s odds-on defeat in the H. Allen Jerkens can be put down to his trip: He broke from post 1 and the inside pace he set finally took its toll the final 50 yards.

Come Dancing probably was the best horse in the Ballerina regardless, but trouble at the start gave her the outside-closing trip working best. Separationofpowers wasn’t nearly so fortunate, winding up near the fence and on the lead.

Separationofpowers is better than her fading fourth, while Promises Fulfilled’s last-place Forego finish had something to do with setting a pressured inside pace. Now, Mitole proved an utterly worthy Forego winner, and at least on this day the bias didn’t yield any illogical results. That doesn’t mean it didn’t play a key role in the action.