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should horses in the SIM be running within a year?
I am looking over my horses and wondering if 5 or 6 races a year is a good amount. I am thinking it depends on the horse (sprinters or fragile horses may be different from others), but I am just looking for some advice.
I have a few horses I would like to point to the Breeders Cup, but I have many others that won't be good enough. So I am trying to plot out some schedules for my horses while the SIM is on break.
Mine will probably have about 7 each, just because I try to run them every other week but occasionally have to miss an extra week to get them into just the right races. However, most of my horses are dead sound. If your horses are a little breaky follow whatever advice Eric is sure to give.
My thinking on this topic is kind of complex, and mostly geared towards my own stock, but for what its worth:
I run horses every 2-3 weeks, occasionally stretching that to 4 and always stretching to 4 if I run back on very little rest (i.e. 2 weeks off or back-to-back). To make sure everyone's clear on that 2 weeks rest is, I consider running weeks 1-3 to be "2 weeks rest," weeks 1-4 to be "3 weeks."
Two year olds run every 4-5 weeks and generally no more than 5-6 times in a year (lean towards 5 or 4). An extremely precocious horse you may want to run 6 times, while a horse that's going to be best at age 4 or 5... run it 3 times or so, just to see what you have in the engine room, but keep him under wraps for when it matters and he's in his element.
Three year olds I'm generally planning on running 6-7 times, mostly because Derby preps and the Triple Crown put a big time-crunch on three year olds. Its not ideal, but its life and we've gotta deal with it. Thats part of what makes the Derby so difficult, at least in the SIM: it's pretty hard to get a horse properly prepped with the necessary foundation but still fresh enough. If the horses aren't of that caliber, 5-6 times with 2-3 weeks rest and the occasional longer break will work.
Older horses can generally run more frequently, 6-7 times. The exception is if they're shipping internationally on a regular basis, then they'll need a long break.
All this is subject to pedigree concerns. I generally have to personalize schedules for my less sound horses, figuring out how to get to the races I want to get to but hopefully leave enough in the tank that they'll stay sound. Mirror, Loki Paradise, Variable, Icon, Era, and to an extent Saga fit this category. Others (i.e. Prefamageps) can run as often as I want and I'll be ok with them, its really a matter of paying attention to whatever patterns you can find in the pedigree or bits of soundness knowledge you can glean on this forum or elsewhere.
