Irish Boy wrote:
2.) The purses would have to be substantial enough that trainers would prefer entering their (probably) high-level claimers into those races rather than regular claiming races or low allowances.
Yes, I could see this being a big problem. If they did it with a single elimination, and one horse wins the first three or four races, they are going to want to ship him off to some stakes racing. You'd need there to be a pretty big incentive for the horses to stick around... do you find some sponsor to put up say a 5 million bonus for sweeping the series or something? Not sure. Maybe you do 12 horses, but eliminate 2 every week?
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4.) I wouldn't make the final race head to head, but just have the entire thing be olympics style like how they do the heats, where the top three from a series of races qualify. For example, if there were 81 entries, you would have 9 first round races, 3 second round matches and a final match with 3 horses going on from each one. That's a lot of entries, so you'll need shippers, but if the purses are high enough you might get interest from owners, and you might recoup some of those losses in purses from futures wagering.
Well the more I think about it, the head-to-head thing is a bad idea from just the point of view that tracks can't offer any sort of exotics-- hell even with 4 horses you aren't going to be able to offer a lot. A head-to-head is probably more interesting if you get some of these better quality horses... not sure people would really make a rush to the windows with two 20k claimers running against each other.
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5.) Distance might be an issue. Do you make all the races a specific distance, like 1m? Maybe start with a 1m race, make the second round a sprint, and then the final race at classic distance, so that the winner of the tournament will have had to be in the money at three distances?
My guess is that I'd make them all the same distance. My concern would be that a trainer would jump ship if he thinks that a horse won't be able to stretch... again, that could be somewhat rectified by the size of the purse for the race, but if you set something up where it is 6F in all races (or go 5.5, 6, 6.5 if you want a little variation), you're probably going to get more trainers buying in.
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6.) Scratches are still going to be an issue, and they're unavoidable. I don't know what you do about that.
I don't know either -- your system helps with this though, I think... if you start 9 in each field and eliminate 6, then say even 4 of the 9 horses scratch, you would still just let the top 3 in. This would be something I would really work on getting a sponsor for and then make the final race the feature race of that day... looking at the racing form would be pretty cool on the final race -- all 9 horses having been in the money in the last two races -- would make handicapping a challenge for sure.