Sail The Seas won at L’Ormarins King’s Plate day last year (Picture: Wayne Marks)
Sectional Timing provides data that is hard to analyse, but on occasion there is a race where the sectionals are self explanatory and such a race was the L’Ormarins King’s Plate.
Eight of the eleven runners in the WSB Met ran in the L’Ormarins King’s Plate and the sectionals for the latter race have become a useful tool with which to analyse the WSB Met.
The Real Prince ran the most efficient race in the LKP.
The pace up at the front set by Dave The King was ridiculous and gave Dave The King no chance.
In the Green Point Sail The Seas had sat some lengths off Dave The King’s pace and the field was stacked up behind him.
The field only just failed to fetch Dave The King in the Green Point.
In the LKP they were all stacked up behind Sail The Seas again, but Muzi Yeni went faster on Sail The Seas than he had in the Green Point, not wanting to have too much to do like the previous time.
However, the sectionals show him to have gone just marginally too fast in the sectional from the 600m to the 400m mark.
Yeni said later he felt he had gone for home too soon.
Sail The Seas was beaten only 0,45 lengths.
Karel Miedema’s raceform has a useful statistic that shows the sectionals as a percentage of the average time for that sectional.
100% is average, smaller than 100 is faster than average and greater than 100 is slower than average.
In the sectional from the 600m to the 400m mark in the LKP Sail The Seas went at 90% of the average time.
The Real Prince went at 89% for that sectional, but that was necessary as he had not been going as fast as Sail The Seas and he still had about five lengths to make up on him.
In retrospect Sail The Seas could have afforded to have taken a bit of a breather between the 600m and 400m and Yeni realised that close to home.
Sail The Seas paid the price for not taking that breather by running the final two sectionals at 94% and 100%, compared to The Real Prince’s 90% and 99%.
So, all in all, Sail The Seas went a bit too slowly in the Green Point when dictating the pace in front of the bulk of the field and he then went a touch too fast in the LKP.
How will he fare if Muzi gets the sectionals exactly right in the Met?
He must be a big runner considering he finished just 1,50 lengths behind Eight On Eighteen in last year’s Gr 1 Splashout Cape Derby over the Met course and distance and he has had a better preparation than the latter for Saturday’s big race.
Furthermore, Sail The Seas is a colt by Vercingetorix and the progeny of the latter just seem to perform wonders at any age … little wonder the champion stallion broke the record for the most stakes winners in a season last term (23).
Sail The Sea’s dam was by Philanthropist and won three times from 1200m to 1400m, which does perhaps create a slight stamina doubt for him over 2000m.
However, Vercingetorix himself won the Gr 1 Daily News 2000 and the Gr 1 Jebel Hatta over 1800m, so his contribution to the genes will help Sail The Seas get the trip.
A fascinating Met runner is the biggest outsider Legal Counsel, the son of another excellent stallion in Legislate.
He went way too fast in the L’Ormarins King’s Plate, running percentage sectionals from the 1400m to the finish of 90, 95, 93, 91, 90, 98, 106.
He ran together with the favourite Jan Van Goyen in the running and what is of great interest is he finished 4,85 lengths in front of the latter.
Considering the pace he went at he stayed on remarkably well to finish 4,45 lengths behind The Real Prince, just a neck behind Eight On Eighteen and half-a-length behind the like of Gladatorian.
1800m is the furthest Legal Counsel has ever raced and he won that start.
Legislate won the Gr 1 Cape Derby, the Gr 1 Daily News 2000 and the Gr 1 Durban July, so imparts enough stamina.
Furthermore, Legal Counsel is out of a mare by stamina influence Silvano. The mare is called Imperial Wish and in a career of just six starts she won twice. over 1000m on debut at Clairwood and then two runs later over 1600m on the Greyville poly.
Legal Counsel should stay the trip and how will he do if ridden more conservatively than he was in the King’s Plate?
