A dusting of frost coated the blades of grass on the Churchill Downs turf course as the sun rose Saturday morning - and that wasn't a very good thing at all. The turf, already holding moisture, now had a further cloak of solidified water sitting atop it. 

This Breeders' Cup has demonstrated how deficient our terminology and methodology remains regarding classifiying turf condition. What is "good?" That's what Churchill Downs termed the course for BC Friday. Some folks thought that was absurd. European jockeys, used to riding on soft ground, described the course as soft. Yet some English turf experts, and an overseas horseman with going stick, poked and prodded the ground Friday morning and deemed it somewhere between good and soft. What is "yielding?" That's how the course is designated on the official charts for Friday's races. Maybe that's more accurate than "good." Maybe.

The point is, it's all subjective. One woman's "good" in Kentucky is another woman's "soft" in New York. It'd be really nice if all racing jurisdictions could develop data-collection methods and establish quantifiable standards for turf-course going designations. Then we'd actually know how to assess situations like this.

But back to the course at hand. The Churchill course will be just as whatever - good, yielding, soft - it was Friday.

One thing we know - it was laboring and demanding and a lot of horses didn't handle it. That's not changing. Churchill to their great credit had a crew 30 or 40 strong out Friday night replacing the scores and scores of divots that came up during Friday's three turf races. That completed, they rolled the course. I ran into Dr. Mick Petersen, who consults all over the place on track surfaces, while walking on the turf this morning and he said he was shocked at how good the turf looked considering it's state after racing Friday. 

The hedge remains the softest part of the course, but now the outside lanes preferred by jockeys Friday have taken quite a bit of wear. The divot replacement helps, but the ground still is soft in many places, and have no doubt - a lot of horses will fail to get over this going at all today. One also has to wonder how things will stand by the time the last grass race today, the BC Turf, starring Enable, comes around. 

This just is the challenge one faces running turf races this time of the year in this part of the country. The least one can say is the people involved here are trying to do a good job.

Or is that a yielding job?