Barrier Trials

[The Steward]

Barrier Trials can't hurt confidence. The point is to get fit with no downside.

How can a horse finish last in the SC Juvenile when it is a freak? Because it's a race, not a workout. If every horse ran a :57 flat in a race they would all get 100s and it would be a 5+ way photo finish. This was a race, not a workout. Does that make sense?

[Rochelle Bos]

The few horses I tried did great

6: 3-1-1 Win-50.0% OTB-83.3%

I ran them so they would have full confidence and be 100% fully fit for when they race, which happens if they win or not

[Ali Hedgestone]

Placement doesn't matter in these things... It's all about gaining confidence, fitness, and experience regardless of placement. All the best things about winning a race without caring about where they actually run!!

[Carole Hanson]

It doesn’t make sense to me. Why is my freak finishing last by 10 lengths and running close to 3 seconds slower than what it runs in the morning? Or why is my other freak finishing behind what looks like a productive turf miler at best, in what is technically a turf router barrier trial? Using the example of races like the Juvenile is misleading imo, because freaky horses are finishing behind mediocre ones, and from what I’ve seen it’s a pretty common thing. That’s not exactly something that’s common in real races, sure it happens but not very often.

I appreciate the fitness and experience benefits, but I will stand by the fact that barrier trials tell you nothing about a horse’s true ability. That’s why we might as well do away with it being run like a race, pretend that horses are running against each other in a barrier trial and make it a training option like swimming your horse or galloping it.

[Nini Panini]

If this is a race, and it's supposed to be indicative of ability, I'm in big trouble!

[Lisa Bennert]

For some reason I thought we would get Speed figures, though I'm not sure how my brain came up with that, lol.

I was also very confused by the times at first, but I suppose we still have to figure out how times and Performance in barrier Trials will relate to Performance on actual race day? We know fast Workouts don't have to translate into a fast racehorse, but this is run like a race, so.. it should be very closely related? I didn't have any good horse finishing so badly so I thought my few results "madee sense". I don't know.

If anything results today made me more curious and I'll have some more entries this year before deciding how to use them for future Training. Right now I think their greatest use is to get older improvers etc fit and more confident again

[Nena Olson]

Does running last boost your horse's confidence?

Also, my 5f turf barrier I entered was won by a turf sprinter.

[Danny Derby]

Ignore the times. There’s zero indication in the results I saw today that the barrier trials are indicative of any actual ability a horse has. The issues isn’t that I didn’t win, but if a freak who looks to be one of the best of their generation finishes 6th over a dozen lengths behind what looks to be an allowance type in a training race, then there’s just something I’m missing.

[George Knatz]

Can't wait to see some of those 100 speed figure babies in Barrier Trials over 5 furlongs this week!

That’s why I thought we would have SF

[Andrew Chillin]

I thought we were promised SF too

[Rochelle Bos]

Does running last boost your horse's confidence?

Yep!

[Lisa Bennert]

Ah, that post About "100 Speed figure babies" is probably why my brain made that Connection About getting Speed figures in barrier trials, though that was clearly not indicated, reading it now

I just looked at the other results and found some of the Trials people were Talking About, and yeah.. I can't really come up with an explanaition for that, that does seem Kind of strange. I guess using it like a Training feature to get confidence/ fitness etc is the best use for them. Still very welcomed by me especially for my older improvers!

[Te Akau Downs]

i was happy with my stakes TM 2yo trial, i use them for fitness in babies and confidence in my horses than have run a couple of ordinary runs

[Mr. Lord Rich]

I think until this is fixed, I’ll save my GPs and do things the old way.

[Cleo Patra]

It’s actually pretty realistic for very good horses to not run great time or even win trials

This explains it: https://youtu.be/Keu91BiBlYI