How Did This Happen?

Haven’t looked at the past performances printed in the Turf Authority of New York & New Jersey for many years now, so can’t figure out why this horse got hammered.

Today’s feature at Aqueduct, picked the wrong horse (when has that ever happened, huh?) but had the proper idea in eschewing the even-money morning-line favorite, #3 Changing Skies.

After all, the classic V6 output shot her all the way to the bottom of the Betting Line! Dead last!

For added confirmation of ‘Skies’s (what’s with these apostrophes and single quotes on WordPress, anyway?) shaky status, the exciting new LifeLiner Speed Column Analysis had her next-to-last on that vital score.

So what made this horse, the unfortunate (?) Changing Skies, such a prohibitive favourite, so much so that there was a mad plunger in the show pool, and when she ran out, the show prices, top to bottom, were $17.80, $15.20 and $49.20 — and this was on horses whose win odds were 3½-1, 3½-1 and 24-1!

As was mentioned in the first graf of this post, haven’t opened the Racing Times past performances lately (they’re overused, for sure!), but how did Changing Skies manage to bamboozle so many innocent victims? Or one or two knowing victims so thoroughly?

Thanks for any insights. Until then, we remain blissfully unawares! “Vacuum Handicapping”: You can’t beat it! There’s a lot of babble out there; merely shut it out!