Maverick

[jupiter]

Another Tactical Landing, give him to somebody else (Takter) and try to get some money back. It will never happen Tony isn´t Bobby Stewart  he has no class.////           

[augustaandy]

he performed better than Damien so far

[jupiter]

Great a pair of expensive duds

[Crash]

Another Tactical Landing, give him to somebody else (Takter) and try to get some money back. It will never happen Tony isn´t Bobby Stewart  he has no class.////         

agreed, Alagna has never been a trot guy. Just doesn’t have the experience to sort balancing issues etc. out. Successful otherwise but far down my list of competent trotting guys.

[augustaandy]

he could be a force at The Meadowlands in some of these classes this year



19   Trot   3 Year Old Colts & Geldings Winners of 1 but not more than 2 Extended PM Races Life AE: N/W $20,000 (N/W L3 $22,500) Life AE: Maidens may enter and draw inside   $16,000   

20   Trot   3 Year Olds Winners of 2 not more than 4(Fillies or N/W L3 5) Extended PM Races or $40,000(N/W L3 $45,000) Life   $18,000   

21   Trot   5 Year Olds & Under Winners of 1 but not more than 2 Extended PM Races Life AE: N/W $20,000 (F&M or N/W L3 $22,500) Life AE: Maidens may enter and draw inside   $16,000   

22   Trot   5 Year Olds & Under Winners of 2 but not more than 4(F&M, N/W L3 or 3 YO 5) Extended PM Races or $40,000(F&M or N/W L3 $45,000) Life   $18,000   

[Carnival People]

agreed, Alagna has never been a trot guy. Just doesn’t have the experience to sort balancing issues etc. out. Successful otherwise but far down my list of competent trotting guys.

The problem with Maverick has nothing to do with "shoeing and balancing" or Alagna's training ability. That is the biggest crock of shit that imaginary trainers say when a trotter can't go and then they go on and train the horse in their mind.  As soon as you hear someone say 'shoeing and balancing' you know that they are an amateur who saw an article once or knows a guy who owns a horse or they are nobodies who NEVER win a race and their horses step on the track with really colorful equipment and never go forward.  The list of people like that is endless.  There is no such thing as a "trotting guy" but there is such thing as a guy who prefers trotters and can afford to buy really good ones.   

Nobody from Sweden or Norway or all the other delusional places can get a piece of shit trotter to go.  A good trotter is a good trotter.  No one creates a champ out of a rat.  Yeah some guys can really improve a horse off a complete idiot but Alagna is far from an idiot and he has so much going his way that if he can't figure a horse out, he has someone around who can.  Tony has a lot of experienced people riding for him and I would bet a million dollars that every one of his guys knows that the horse needs to be gelded.   

Going back to the shoeing and balancing thing. Takter  isn't "better" than any of the people I have worked with over 50 years that I viewed as good horsemen.  He is just a very good trainer and businessman but more than that he is a  guy like a shifty politician who hypnotizes rich horse buyers with all of his glamorous shit with all the bells and whistles.  Rich people with huge egos want to belong to the Takter country club and they give him money and he uses that money to buy the best horses and then just trains then like any competent trainer.   The cream rises to the top and the rest you never hear from.  I can name 10 guys off the top of my head who would do just as well or better if they had Takters stock.  I am not putting down a guy who wins 100 Hambletonians but he did not win because of money grab fake stories about  his "special" training and shoes and resistance jog carts and interval training yada yada yada.  He does great only because he is a good trainer with the best of the best stock.  Give Takter a barn filled with 50 ordinary overnight horses and he will be only as good as everyone else who struggles with problem horses.  Jimmy doesn't have problem horses because he doesn't keep them and when they are gone he goes out and buys ones that look promising for other people.  Takter's problem horses vanish faster than his ex son in law who was actually a nice kid with a good pair of hands who got screwed over. 

As far as Maverick goes, you have to ignore his yearling price.  It means nothing.  As far as trotting colts go he's actually way ahead of most of the other babies who sold alongside him.  Like I said, his yearling price means nothing.  He is just another trotting colt who has the misfortune of being the full brother to the most overrated trotter that ever ever ever ever set foot on the track and he is the first million dollar yearling.  Those are the reasons why this horse looks bad when he really isn't.  The trouble with Maverick is easy to  see with the trained eye and through what you hear through the REAL grapevine. Maverick  needs to be f****ing gelded ASAP and he is just a "nice" trotter.  In the real world he would have been gelded 4 months into his training.   That's the end of the story.  You don't need to know anything more than that. Trouble is that nobody will geld a full brother to a world champion that they paid a million bucks for.  If he had been gelded he would be a very nice colt who could grind away money over the course of a long career.   He is actually a very talented horse who needs his balls cut off.   

The whole "Swedish training is better thing" and the push to "sen him to Taketr" is a con game when they say that they do special tricks with shoes and equipment.  The Swedes have been pulling that con game with all the bells and whistles for 30 years and suckering in American and Canadian money.  You would be surprised at how these stupid morons who buy horses like Maverick are impressed with the Takter delusion.  Gurfein was a nobody until he had a top horse and knew how to talk himself up and get more money and better horses.  There is nothing special about him.  This is why I rarely tinkered with trotters because they are either good or they suck and drive you insane.  Every good trotter I ever had was good from the very start and even then most of them turn shitty as  they train down.  If you work on a small budget and buy 3 or 4 mid range trotting fillies and colts every year you are bound to look bad and go broke.   I had a few top pacers three years in a row and then this guy comes to me out of that bunch and wants to invest  money into young trotters for me.  I sent him to someone else without even a second thought.  I figured that since 1966 I have looked good and never put a rat on the track.  If I started dealing with baby trotters I was going to blow my whole career.  The odds are stacked against you.  My dad made his name with trotters but he worked twice as hard as I ever had to work and his motto was "they either go or they don't".   Even if you spend millions of dollars you're only going to get a few that are good and even then in races your 6 figures horse will usually be not nearly as good as someone else's $5,000 yearling.   This happens more often than not. 

Mavericks brother Greenshoe will be a flop at stud ( you heard it here first) and by then it will be too late to geld Maverick because his bad habits will be ingrained for life.    That's all you need to know.   Maverick is a perfect lesson in how a talented horse can accidentally look like a rat and leeches in the cheap seats scream SEND HIM TO TAKTER!   

[SDST2009]

Carnival People,
While there’s a few minor things in your post I don’t necessarily agree with (or have visibility to), I’d say 90% of it is spot on 

[Harnessfan902]

Just watched the replay.  He was trotting perfect until Andrew asked him to go.  Ear pinning and jumping off.   Sadly he will never be gelded. 

[LUCPARK]

too much pressure now for horse to succeed..

...

not horses fault

they are what they are...

breeding him can be a great option,,

brother to greenshoe

will be lots of lookers on babies

[Jazzman]

canival great reading i agree with most everything you said training colts is just a numbers game buy the best and 0ne out of ten might make money as far s swedes go people used to rave about nordin he was the most over rated trainer ever his secret was to buy all the expensive colts train them to death and grind out the odd good one all this crap about breeding is a con game if breeding meant anything horses like maverick would be automatic champions there is no reason for two brothers should be that diffferent if breeding means anything

[augustaandy]

Carnival,

Loved your comments. Thanks for sharing!!!

[Locked in with pace]

I say this happens. He will be shipped to Sweden and breed there. If his foals can go forward at all. he'll be back in the states.

[Carnival People]

I say this happens. He will be shipped to Sweden and breed there. If his foals can go forward at all. he'll be back in the states.

My opinin is that virtually nobody will breed to Maverick for the same reason that no one breeds to White Bliss.  Both horses are famous for something that has nothing to do with their racetrack talent.   When you are investing a lot of money and three years of your time into making a baby and then a racehorse, you aim for proven stallions.  With that said, for my money, with a gun to my head I would breed to Maverick before I would breed to Greenshoe.  Maverick is better looking and larger than his brother and he has a better way of going.  He gobbles up ground but he needs to be gelded.  I don't know if you know this but if you get your horse gelded it seriously limits their ability to breed  haha!  Trouble is that he needs to be gelded to show how good he can be but then you can't breed him.  Maybe freeze some of his sperm or something.  Why bother though because there are proven stallions out there.  When I was a kid this was the problem with horses sired by Tar Heel.  Tar Heel was a good horse who didn't like the game one bit but he managed to do well in spite of it. In the breeding shed it came out in the wash.  It got to the point where you always gelded your Tar Heel colts because he stamped them with poor attitudes but with racing talent.  The fillies were okay. The sons he had who went on to be sires were the ones who didn't act like their daddy from thr get go but had his speed and durability.  The whole Maverick/Greenshoe story will be told after we see what Greenshoe does as a stallion.  I have serious doubts that he will be any good.  I was not impressed by his gait and his looks but I would still kill to have a horse like him.  Green Manalishi is much better and we will see his babys soon but with trotters a lot has to do with pedigree.   Maverick is a perfect looking horse and if he only passes that fact on to his foals you will get some really good horses, My opinion is that Maverick in a perfect world would be a dependable stallion on a smaller level and he will sire raceway horses that will all be geldings.  A few will be top horses.  Both brothers would be very successful if you bred them to french mares.  The whole picture changes big time if you do that.  That might be the European plan but as it stands now Maverick is as worthless as White Bliss.  But if I had a spare mare hanging around I would take a shot with him if his stud fee was 2,000 or less.  It will pan out quick too because stallions who throw horses with bad attitudes do so right off the bat.  You know from the first crop what you've got.  These are just my opinions but I am correct most of the time.  I predicted that an unknown horse named waikiki beach would be a good sire and nobody knew who I was talking about. 

[Locked in with pace]

FYI: White Bliss was bought by one of Svanstat's very wealthy owners who breeds white horses in Sweden and surrounding countries for a hobby. He was not bought to be a dominant pacing sire. IT WAS SOLELY FOR THE COLOR. As it turned out being Albino limited his breeding availability.

You may be correct on Maverick needing to be gelded. Just want to be sure the facts are out on White Bliss.

[Locked in with pace]

Plus White Bliss brought $260,000 as a yearling. In today's market, not an absurd figure. I see many $200,000 plus yearling from some of the top proven sires be duds.