In Thoroughbred racing, for a horse to be a \u201cfreak\u201d is a GOOD thing.\u00a0 <\/SPAN>The term is generally used to describe a horse that is outstanding in a surprising way.\u00a0 <\/SPAN>A \u201cfreak\u201d is one of the most respectful terms that can be used to describe a horse.\u00a0 <\/SPAN><\/P> \u00a0 Let\u2019s reminisce about some of racing\u2019s better known \u201cfreaks.\u201d\u00a0 <\/SPAN>First of all, newsmagazine coverboy, Secretariat.\u00a0 <\/SPAN>\u201cNo Bold Ruler is going to want to go much beyond a mile.\u201d\u00a0 <\/SPAN>That was the common wisdom of the time.\u00a0 <\/SPAN>Bold Ruler sired quite a few 2-year-old champions, but \u201cthey\u2019d all fade in the stretch\u201d as the distances got longer.\u00a0 <\/SPAN>Then along came Secretariat \u2013 a brilliant 2-year-old champion (like so many others), with a \u201cfreakishly\u201d long stride, officially stated to between 27.5 and 28 feet, as compared to an average for Thoroughbreds of approximately 21 feet (note, that is the length of stride of a racing Thoroughbred in full stride \u2013 the average for all breeds of horse is closer to 17 feet).\u00a0 <\/SPAN>In 1973, the big red horse became the first Triple Crown winner in 25 years by winning the mile-and-a-half Belmont Stakes in what was then world-record time, by 31 unbelievable lengths.<\/P> \u00a0 That\u2019s \u201cfreakish\u201d enough.\u00a0 <\/SPAN>But how about the Kentucky Derby?\u00a0 <\/SPAN>In the first leg of the Triple Crown, Secretariat ran each quarter mile of the mile-and-a-quarter FASTER than the preceding quarter.\u00a0 <\/SPAN>Put more simply, he accelerated<\/I> for 1 \u00bc miles.\u00a0 <\/SPAN>One analyst described this feat by saying \u201cIf you feed Secretariat\u2019s Derby calls into a computer programmed to analyze racehorse performance, smoke starts pouring out the back.\u00a0 <\/SPAN>Horses just don\u2019t DO that.\u201d\u00a0 <\/SPAN>In general, the fastest quarter of any race is the first or second; closers don\u2019t actually accelerate to pass front runners \u2013 they merely slow down less as the race progresses.\u00a0 <\/SPAN>Except Secretariat.<\/P> \u00a0 To add to the freak show, when Secretariat\u2019s stride was given a biomechanical analysis, his stride was described as being \u201cas close to a wheel in motion\u201d as it\u2019s possible for an animal to be \u2013 extraordinarily efficient (and a trait he shared in common with another \u201cfreak,\u201d John Henry, a horse physically very different in appearance).\u00a0 <\/SPAN>And finally, when Secretariat died and was necropsied, it was discovered that his heart was substantially larger than that of most horses, while still being perfectly healthy.\u00a0 <\/SPAN>As a \u201cracing machine,\u201d he seemed to have been equipped with upgrades.<\/P> \u00a0 For those of us who are a bit snobbish about pedigrees when we breed our SIM horses, or predict who\u2019ll be the top sires, take a close look at the pedigree of another \u201cfreak,\u201d Seattle Slew.\u00a0 <\/SPAN>Oh, there\u2019s nothing WRONG with his pedigree \u2013 it has a rather nice balance of speed vs. stamina influences, and both his sire and damsire were moderately successful stallions.\u00a0 <\/SPAN>That, however, is the key word:\u00a0 <\/SPAN>\u201cModerately.\u201d\u00a0 <\/SPAN>He certainly didn\u2019t have the spectacular pedigree that would \u201cguarantee\u201d success at stud, as compared to the very blue-blooded Secretariat, for example.\u00a0 <\/SPAN>Yet as a sire, Secretariat was a very good sire \u2013 Seattle Slew was a great one.\u00a0 <\/SPAN>These days, Seattle Slew is very, very fashionable in a pedigree; and he did it \u201con his own.\u201d\u00a0 <\/SPAN>If you saw a pedigree that crossed Bold Reasoning x Poker, it wouldn\u2019t be very appealing\u2026unless the result happened to be Seattle Slew,\u00a0the \u201cfreak.\u201d\u00a0 <\/SPAN><\/P><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Being a freak isn’t always a bad thing!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":311,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1393","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1393","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/311"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1393"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1393\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}