Newbie question: Shipping distance

[Gwen Morse]

What is a good rule of thumb for shipping horses (without First Class Shipping)?

When newbie track races are all filled up, how far can we be be shipping horses to get to races on basic farm rest and avoid tiredness issues?

[William Atteberry]

Great question. My newbie answer would be it is not a question of distance as much as it is time and fitness. If they are fully fit and rested and if you get to the new location a couple of days early, things should be fine. I shipped a horse from Montana to India this week and he won his maiden v 11 horses.

[Carole Hanson]

Before first class shipping, I tried not to ship further than 5hrs away from the farm my horse was at, and for my better horses I planned races in advance to know to ship them to a farm close to their next race. For example, I might start out a horse in Europe week 3 but I will want to race in Dubai week 6 so I will ship the horse to a farm in Dubai after the week 3 race.

For other horses, I chose a circuit and mostly stuck to it, though occasionally there was a race I couldn’t pass up in which case I would do the long ship, but I certainly wouldn’t be doing that often, and ideally I’d like 3 weeks rest between races where that happens (by that I mean a long distance ship).

Also, if you have simperior, sorting by distance is great! When using that feature, I would try not to look at races further than 1,200 miles away (but again, sometimes a better race just comes up further away in which case I think it’s worth taking a risk).

[The Harlequins]

I remember a older player saying, if its worth it, i e small field ..last minute, but as a rule 3-4 days before post time

[The Harlequins]

Gwen even if a newbie race is full ,try yours it may be higher in the pecking order than some, and a chance of a split if not.

[Dave Trainer]

3 days is a good rule.

[Gwen Morse]

Gwen even if a newbie race is full ,try yours it may be higher in the pecking order than some, and a chance of a split if not.

Frank, I was talking about being locked out of races because I already have 2 entries. ie: how far in distance should I send horses once all my TP race slots are full (or JH once I get there).

[Dan Kauffman]

Before I switched to first class, I sent all my runners to the track automatically 3 days prior to the race. The only exceptions were with prominent stakes horses who I knew were going long distance for their next race, in which case I did the long ship to a farm close to that track immediately after the previous race (or the same as Carole mentioned).