Turning tracks - short runs to turn

Doomben is a tight turning track. The 1010 metres start is also very tough on horses with wide barriers. There is only a very short run to the first turn.

We've seen plenty of examples at Doomben where a short priced horse starts from barrier eight in a field of eight, barrier nine in a field of nine, or barrier ten in a field of ten and is trapped three wide throughout, outside the leaders and weakens in the straight.

The racing media tipsters of course were telling you, "It's a good thing and deserves to be a short price. It has too much early pace and should find the lead without any problems."

But those racing media tipsters didn't count on the jockeys on the inside often pushing up extra hard to make that "good thing" from the outside barrier work hard and to keep the horse wide.

With an inside barrier it would have been a different story for many of those favoured horses.