Question for the group.

[john5539]

Is it just me, or is anyone else frustrated by the inability of "bargain breds" to compete in the Sim after breaking their maiden? I know it's not just me because I see it in the auction all the time - a horse wins for the first time and then the owner dumps it. I enjoy breeding cheap horses but I almost don't want them to win because then they become useless unless they can run in the 80's.

Hopefully, state racing will provide a place for these horses to run. However, I do think the Sim is suffering a bit of "pedigree inflation" in that there are so many royals out there that the progeny of cheaper sires are getting squeezed out.

[axeracing]

I'm frustrated with the inability of expensive breeds almost as often. It's the nature of racehorses. You have to figure that the best stallions in the sim have what, 20-30% stakes winners? That means the remaining 70-80% more than likely range from allowance winners down to eternal maidens. Bargain breds have worse odds.

There's nothing wrong with a maiden though, like you said, that earns his keep. But, there are plenty of horses that can't place in a $2000 MC. I would love to see the % of horses that just aren't fast enough to compete at any level.

I don't think bargains are getting squeezed out. There's just less of them. Way less. State racing should help, but the bottom-heavy pedigrees will still outnumber the bargain pedigrees if the big spenders get involved. You can't avoid that. That's why we have the BBRS!

The answer is to breed more bargains! You'll have to breed alot more of them before you get a good one, but it will cost less.

[hawkz]

thats true axe i have had success with bargains in all classes in fact better luck than with my bluebloods

[dragnil]

The first example I looked up for this is Giant's Causeway (280 points on Saturday):

In the sim: 17.6% SW -> In real life: 8.9% SW
In the sim: 86.3% winners to runners -> In real life: 58.5%

Now take a cheaper sire, Louis Quatorze (66 points on Saturday):

Sim: 2.8% SW -> RL: 5.6%
Sim: 58.9% winners -> RL: 73.2%

Giant's Causeway: 8 crops, 761 runners (663 in the sim)
Louis Quatorze: 10 crops, 608 runners (107 in the sim)

I didn't cherry pick these two. They're the first two I looked up from the US General Sires List that looked comparable and in different positions on the blueblood/bargain scale. That's what happens when comparing sires that are currently 2nd and 142nd in the USA. Just imagine what happens when I look at sires from South Africa or New Zealand, for example.

[dragnil]

This one I'm picking on purpose.

Jet Master (5 RL crops)

Sim: 55 runners, 0% SW, 40.0% winners
RL: 227 runners, 10.6% SW, 72.7% winners

Champion Sire of 2 y/o with his first crop.
Champion Sire from his 3rd crop to date (3 consecutive years).
At one stage last year he had 3 sons simultaneously ranked amongst the top 50 horses in the world by the IFHA - he achieved this with what the sim would regard as bargain bred mares (Prince Florimund x Prince Sao, Northern Guest x House Guard, Harry Hotspur x Jungle Cove).

Ok, so it's probably about the most extreme example that I could find if I really searched. I also get that people would want to downgrade him because it's 'only South Africa'. Even so, somethings not quite right, right? To be fair, he now costs 96 bp's and Mike probably has given him a bump upwards this season.

[Knightmare]

Actually I am almost ok with the bargain that only breaks a maiden and then can't compete. Almost. I really do not like it when that happens but I seem to have more mid range to expensive costing breedings that do this very same thing to a certain extent.

For instance it may take 10 tries and they finally break through in a maiden claimer. Throw them into bottom claimers and they run 10th or worse for a couple of starts. I am on the edge of breeding them over or putting them into the auction. I give them one more start and they show a bit of life with a 3rd or 4th place finish. Now I decide to keep them around for a start or two more and the same sort of thing happens. Two bad races and then a race where you finish in the top two. Next thing you know you have kept the runner two years, they have 30 starts with 1 win 2 places 4 shows and 20 last place finishes. I am scratching my head wondering why I kept this horses. ( I have probably 4 right now in my barns with similar patterns)

For me my frustration is with bargains that cannot run at all from start one. I think more people would use bargains if they ran well enough to get one win most of the time. Too often I get several bargains that debut in the 30's or 40's and never improve to be remotely competitive at the lowest maiden claiming levels.

[Knightmare]

I think I have better success than the average sim player with Bargains. Part of the reason is a I breed a lot of them, which gives me more chances to be successful. Another part is just plain luck. Even before I started the BBRS I was breeding a stakes winner or stakes placing bargain bred each year.

If you want to know what is really, really frustrating take a look at Slewpent

[mtk76]

Wow Slewpent has been fast hasn't he nearly took the Bargain Derby. I'd almost (almost) guarantee he wins next out at 9-9.5f

[npark28002]

Slewpent looks like a runner that once he gets a win, he'll roll two or three straight wins in a row off.