Churchill unveils new CFO

Churchill Downs has a new CFO. No, it's not a chief financial officer, it's the term I give to horses who make a bold move on the far turn and then flatten out after fanning wide turning for home. I call it the Churchill Flatten Out.

One of the criticisms of synthetic surfaces is that reduces the race to a turf-like dash for the cash when horses turn for home, but I don't mind that so much. As someone who's usually invested in the race, I kind of like thinking I still have a chance regardless of where my horses is at the top of the stretch.

At Churchill, you really have to have some strong stamina to sweep past horses on the turn and then sustain that run through the lane, and it seems as if at Churchill you either win on the lead or you close on the rail. That middle move just doesn't work.

If I could predict which horse would make the CFO move in each race, then I would throw it out automatically. Maybe I need to keep statistics of which jockeys make that move most often?

Ironically, the exception to this rule seems to be the Kentucky Derby, a race in which the winners are almost always within striking distance by the eighth pole. Even noted "closer" Street Sense, for instance, was ahead of Hard Spun outside the sixteenth pole. So here's hoping Garrett Gomez makes that move on Pioneerof the Nile in the Derby and never again in any other race in which I bet him. He can make that move all day when I'm against him, of course.