Hard track, sore feet

It was probably inevitable that Big Brown’s hoof problems would reappear at some point. Hoof problems in horses are usually chronic.

In terms of timing, two weeks before the 140th Belmont Stakes and the undefeated favorite’s bid to sweep the Triple Crown, affords Rick Dutrow and hoof specialist Ian McKinlay ample time to work on Big Crown’s left-fore hoof, the inside of which is now cracked. It is, though we are taking the diagnosis and prognosis provided by Dutrow and McKinlay as an accurate, not understated, assessment of the injury, not a large fissure, little more than a half-inch long.

“There are lots of quarter cracks here right now,” Dutrow said, who did not blame the ground at Belmont for the hiccup in Big Brown's advance on the Triple Crown but echoed a complaint heard often of late at Belmont, where the main track has gone from hard to harder and most trainers are opting to send horses to the training track in the morning.

The trend at Belmont, the beginning of which followed closely the arrival of John Passero, whose title is director of racing surfaces, from Maryland a few years ago, is troubling. Fast times do not horse races make and trainers have complained about the surfaces not only here but also at Aqueduct and Saratoga, where Passero's methods have turned the once famously deep and kind Oklahoma training track into the same close-to-pavement footing.

It is beyond time to stop the practice of rolling and sealing the ground in order to create artificially fast racetracks, which are punishing on horses and a disservice to their owners. Bettors have dealt with sloppy, muddy and otherwise moisture-effected surfaces for most history and injuries under those conditions were less frequent and severe.

Passero likes to call himself, “Fast Track,” which is revealing.

The sport, horses and people involved would be better served by someone who called himself, “Safe Track.” --PM


Commentator looms large in the Met Mile


Nick Zito made it to the Hall of Fame without ever having won the Met Mile but that gap in his resume will likely be filled on Monday afternoon by a very fast seven-year-old Distorted Humor gelding,

Commentator, winner of two starts in Florida this year by a combined 27 ¾ lengths, has a 4-0-2 record from six starts at Belmont Park, thrives on a schedule of widely spaced races and at distances up to a mile may be the best horse in the nation.


“Basically, spacing his races, giving him time to do what he’s got to do, that’s the main thing,’’ said Zito, who has named jockey John Velazquez to ride. “I wanted to get a mile race somewhere, but I didn’t get anything. The Westchester would have been too close so my choice was to just wait it out. No Grade 1 is easy; they never are. But he’s a great horse. If everything goes good, we’ll be happy.”


The most serious threat to the frontrunning Commentator in the nation’s oldest and most prestigious one-mile race run on dirt comes in the form of Divine Park, who in the favorite’s absence won the Westchester Handicap by five lengths with a career-best effort that suggests the he will either advance from that race or regress. Tough call, but Divine Park in on his best day capable of the upset should Commentator deliver less than his best. --PM

David Prine: Amazing grace (and $146)

By Jenny Kellner / NYRA

For David Prine, just being alive was something of a longshot. Nearly killed in a gas explosion in a Louisville, Ky. kitchen in 1999, paralyzed on one side and unable to speak, Prine endured years of physical therapy, cognitive rehabilitation, and several surgeries as he slowly learned how to walk again, and talk again. The only life he knew – that of being a chef – was gone, replaced by a legacy of suffering, trauma, and pain.

Somehow, the long and tortuous road to recovery led him to the racetrack, where he toiled as a hotwalker, blacksmith helper, and groom. But on Saturday, Prine found himself someplace he’d only dreamt about – in the winner’s circle at Belmont Park, having saddled his first winner as a trainer with his very first starter, a 4-year-old New York-bred maiden named Halation, who returned $146.

“Unbelievable,” Prine kept repeating. “It’s unbelievable.”

Three years after the accident, perhaps stirred by the memory of having worked as a hotwalker while in high school and wanting to reconnect with horses, Prine enrolled in Ted Landers’ course at Belmont Park on the principles of caring for thoroughbreds. He attached himself to a couple of blacksmiths. He procured a job working for trainer Steve Jerkens and also assisted Landers, himself a groom turned trainer. Along the way, Prine attracted the attention of Lois Engel, who in 2003 had purchased a farm in upstate New York with the intention of breeding and racing Thoroughbreds.

“I met him about 18 months ago, when he was helping out Ted,” said Engel. “Spending time at the barn and watching him, you could see he had this sixth sense for dealing with horses. I would ask him what he wanted to do, and he’d say, “Someday, I’d really like to train horses.’”

By December, 2007, Landers was ready for a break. And Engel knew exactly who she wanted to take over training her horses.

“We wanted to give David the opportunity,” she said. “This is what he was meant to do.”

With her support and that of several trainers, Prine began studying for the state exam to get his trainer’s license. It wasn’t easy. Although he knew about horses, because of his brain injury, reading and writing remained a challenge. But with the same perseverance he demonstrated in coming back from his devastating injuries, Prine was able to master the requirements and pass the test with flying colors.

Three weeks ago, he received his official license. And in Saturday’s fifth race, Halation came roaring from off the pace under Jean-Luc Samyn to win a seven-furlong turf event for New York-bred maidens.

“It’s amazing,” said Prine, who Sunday will send out Volmoose, another New York-bred maiden. “When I was in high school, I thought about veterinary medicine, but I always had a flair for cooking, so I went to the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, and became a chef. I worked at Tavern on the Green, the National Tennis Center, other places.

“Then, after the accident, I didn’t know if I would ever have another chance. I’d always had a rapport with animals, so it seemed natural to work with horses.”

These days, Prine, who lives pretty much on Social Security, takes the Access-A-Ride from his apartment in nearby Glendale to Belmont Park, where he spends most of his time in the back of Joe Lostritto’s barn at Belmont Park. Stabled there are three of Engel’s horses, including Halation and a filly named Mercy’s Image that he spoils rotten. Drawing on his background in the culinary arts and his own ideas about nutrition, the horses are fed three times daily – at 3:30 a.m., 11:30 a.m. and 4 p.m. – and routinely feast on Prine’s special blend of hay.

“There’s alfalfa in there, and timothy – it’s kind of like a mesclun salad, and they love it,” said Prine, who, chef-like, refused to divulge the exact recipe. “They’re pretty happy horses.”

Prine hasn’t given up cooking for people, either. After the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, he spent a month in the galley of the “Spirit of New York,” where he joined with other chefs and prepared food for the recovery workers at Ground Zero. On the backstretch, he cooks for the Anna House annual Christmas party and volunteers his services to other backstretch organizations as well.

In all, says Prine, it’s been an amazing journey.

“I’ve had a lot of setbacks,” he said. “So to be where I am is pretty amazing.”

In the winner’s circle.

Vagrancy: Dream Rush returns

By Jenny Kellner/ NYRA

After Dream Rush won four graded stakes last year as a 3-year-old, it’s no wonder her connections were anxiously awaiting the launch of her 2008 campaign. But the day before what was to be her final breeze for the Grade 2 Distaff Handicap at Aqueduct on March 22, the daughter of Wild Rush suffered a minor injury that delayed her seasonal debut.

“She racked up her hind leg and we had to be careful with her for about a month or so,” said Rick Violette, who trains Wild Rush. “But she’s been doing great and training great.”

On Sunday, after a seven-month absence, Dream Rush returns to action as she heads a field of six for the 58th running of the Grade 2, $150,000 Vagrancy Handicap at six and one-half furlongs.

“We’re looking forward to her getting back to the races,” said Violette, who last year saddled the filly to victories in the Grade 1 Test at Saratoga, the Grade 1 Prioress and the Grade 2 Nassau County Breeders’ Cup at Belmont Park and the Grade 3 Old Hat at Gulfstream Park.

Dream Rush also finished second to Cotton Blossom in the Grade 1 Acorn, and closed out her 3-year-old campaign with a fifth-place finish behind Maryfield in the inaugural Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint after leading to the top of the stretch.

“She’s matured since her 3-year-old campaign,” said Violette of Dream Rush, who totes high weight of 120 pounds including Eibar Coa. “Aside from the little hiccup with the injury, she’s been doing everything we’ve wanted.”

Among those facing Dream Rush in the Vagrancy will be two who have seen little action recently. The Allen Jerkens-trained Any Limit returns to the races for the first time in a year after finishing third in last year’s Vagrancy to Indian Flare, while Sangrita will be making only her second start since the fall of 2006.

Trained by Michael Matz, Sangrita, now 5, won three of her six races in 2006, including the Grade 2 Chilukki at Churchill Downs that November 2. She did not start again until January of this year, finishing second in an optional claimer at Gulfstream Park.

Rounding out the field are Baroness Thatcher, who has made three starts for Hall of Fame trainer Bill Mott, including a close second to Intangroo in the Grade 1 Humana Distaff at Churchill Downs on Kentucky Derby Day; Looky Yonder, who took an optional claimer at Belmont over a sloppy track on May 9 for trainer Rick Dutrow, and Bedside Story, who won an optional claimer at Philadelphia Park on April 28 for trainer Anthony Dutrow.

Weekend guest: Left Coast pathos

From CTBAboardwatch

Apparently the California Thoroughbred Breeders Association is employing a troop surge this month in defense of its new president, Leigh Ann Howard, to whom we affectionately refer as The Inseminator. Readers of our March and April newsletters on artificial insemination may recall our documentation of Ms. Howard's use of the forbidden practice at Valley Creek Farm (co-owned by a previous CTBA board member, current Bay Meadows president Jack Liebau). Because of her flagrant and deceptive violations we called for her resignation last month as head of the breeders' association.

Can it be sheer coincidence that the May issue of the CTBA publication California Thoroughbred devotes itself to singing Ms. Howard's praises?

We counted five-and-a-half photos of The Inseminator in this month's California Thoroughbred. We doubt if even Cal-bred Horse of the Year Tiznow received as much in-house cheerleading. Did the CTBA think we had forgotten on four-and-a-half occasions what she looks like?

Not only did she write the lead editorial (including three of her photos), but magazine editor Rudi Grootheede spotlighted her in his "Born To Lead" story. As is his custom, Mr. G. generously shared his monthly photo op with his latest recipient of brown-nosing adoration. That's why we counted it as only a half-photo of The Inseminator.

In spite of all this artificial hoopla, we strongly believe The Inseminator has much to prove if she is to live up to the "Born To Lead" moniker Grootheede bestowed upon her. Thus far, in her 10 years on the CTBA board, her accomplishments are unsubstantial. Then again, it may not be fair to pin the overwhelming negligence of the California Thoroughbred Breeders Association on one person. Clearly, it took a village of no-doers to raise the CTBA to its current high standard of insignificance.

We have known many great TBA leaders in the past; the office holders today aren't to be confused with them.

CTBAboardwatch has for the last three years submitted to the CTBA our annual recommendations for action. To date the CTBA has adopted only two of our suggestions: providing members with free admission to California racetracks, and ceasing the use of phony (N) black type in sales catalogs. So some progress has been made. But the substantive issues facing our industry remain untouched by the CTBA board of directors.

California breeders want decisive action by their leaders. Talk, talk and more of their talk simply is no longer acceptable. Our industry is at a crossroads and our leaders must begin acting in accordance with reality. Horsemen are tired of syrupy CTBA magazine campaigns; they demand pragmatic solutions.

The CTBA board--even if under the shroud of The Inseminator's poor decision-making history--has to step up to the plate. In addition to acting on our suggestions (which include a professional polling of California breeders for guidance), it must entertain other progressive ideas with enthusiasm.

If it is serious about its responsibilities, the CTBA board can't hold its meetings once every 60 days, closed to the public, without published agendas or minutes. It can't pretend any longer that it's been doing a good job for its members. It needs to act as a bona fide, corporate Board of Directors whose job it is to lead. It needs to "get real."

CTBAboardwatch is a 'Grass Roots" movement supported by more than 400 horsemen and women who are vitally concerned about California's struggling Thoroughbred industry. Former CTBA and CHRB chairmen are among us. More than 2,400 industry participants receive this newsletter. We have no membership applications, dues or fees. You're a member if you say you are! Please send all questions and comments to ctbaboardwatch@yahoo.com.

Friday notes / Anybody's Sheepshead Bay

The Met Mile holiday weekend, also known as the Memorial Day weekend, is underway Saturday at Belmont with an uninspiring and paceless renewal of the 11-furlong Sheepshead Bay Handicap, which will be contested on the inner turf course by two fillies and six mares, seven with the same running style and one closer.

Mauralakana, winner of a listed race at Calder in her most recent start, is the morning-line favorite if only because one of these had to be cast in that role. Five others – Hostess, Herboriste, Rising Cross, J’ray and Flawless Treasure – are capable of winning this race if they bring their A game.

Meanwhile …

The Japanese look at things differently. For instance, they find Rick Dutrow’s dismissal of Casino Drive … well, fun.

“He’s done well every day,” said Nobutaka Tada, racing manager for Casino Drive’s owner, Hidetoshi Yamamoto, after a Friday morning canter. “On Sunday, he will go a little faster than usual, and then he will breeze on Wednesday.”

Tada said he and the colt’s connections were enjoying the experience of being involved in the Triple Crown and all the hype that surrounds it. On Wednesday, Dutrow said that if everything goes right, Casino Drive had “no chance” to beat Big Brown in the Belmont despite being the sibling of the last two Belmont Stakes winners, Rags to Riches (2007) and Jazil (2006).

“We are enjoying hearing his comments about Casino Drive,” said Tada. “It’s fun. Big Brown is a great horse, and we are honored to run with him in a great race.”

Big Brown’s contribution to scholarship

A tragedy on Long Island has moved the owners of Big Brown, who are currently quite flush, to donate a portion of the colt’s earnings from the Belmont Stakes to establish a scholarship fund for the young son of a Nassau County police officer who was critically injured in the line of duty.

On May 18, a drunken driver with a suspended license slammed into Kenneth Baribault’s police car during a traffic stop the Long Island Expressway. Baribault had pulled over a sport utility vehicle on suspicion of drunken driving when the driver of a silver Mercedes, whom police said was drunk, plowed into the back of the police cruiser,. The impact pushed the police car into the SUV and lifted it six feet off the ground, according to witnesses.

Baribault remains in a coma at Nassau County Medical Center, having undergone surgery to relieve swelling to his brain.

In a Friday news conference in the Belmont Park paddock, IEAH Stable owners Michael Iavarone and Richard Schiavo, both of Long Island, pledged to donate a substantial portion of whatever Big Brown earns in the final leg of racing’s Triple Crown toward college expenses for Baribault’s six-year-old son, Chris.

“In time like this it is imperative we come together,” said Iavarone. “We want to stand up and make something good happen. It’s not just a financial thing – we want to be there for the family.

Nassau County Executive Thomas R. Souezi and Police Commissioner Lawrence W. Mulvey, both of whom spoke in front of the statue of 1973 Triple Crown winner Secretariat in Belmont Park’s paddock, praised the owners for their generosity.

“We are all pulling for Big Brown in the Belmont here on Long Island, but we are also pulling for Big Blue -- Kenny Baribault,” said Suozzi. “This means the family has one less thing to worry about as he recovers. It’s one less burden in his family’s life.”

Now, for some bad timing

If Big Brown runs at all after the Belmont, the Travers will be his next start, Dutrow said on Wednesday. If Casino Drive wins the Belmont, he will be returned immediately to Japan. Nevertheless, despite the unlikely presence of a winner in the current Triple Crown series at Monmouth Park this summer, the track is offering $25,000 per Triple Crown series win to the owners and trainers involved.

If Big Brown, who has already won the Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes, completes the Triple Crown in the Belmont, his owners and trainer would each receive a $75,000 bonus if the horse runs in the Haskell.

“Obviously you always want to attract horses with Triple Crown races on their resumes,” said Robert J. Kulina, vice president of racing and general manager of Monmouth Park. “The Haskell has stamped itself as the next logical step following the Triple Crown, the beginning of the second half of the season and a target race for horses looking at year-end honors.”

Recent champions that have competed in the Haskell include Point Given, War Emblem, Funny Cide and last year’s Horse of the Year, Curlin. Probably not this time, however.

Law provides tax break for horse owners

From the NTRA

Members of the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives voted today to override a Presidential veto of the 2007 Farm Bill exercised by George W. Bush yesterday. As a result the 2007 Farm Bill is now law, and it includes the Equine Equity Act, a provision that amends the depreciation schedule for racehorses to a uniform three years.

Under previous tax law, racehorses were depreciated over either three or seven years, depending on their age when "placed in service." A horse is generally deemed to be placed in service when it begins training. Racehorses over the age of 24 months (from date of foaling) when placed into service are depreciated over three years; otherwise, they are depreciated over seven years. In a given crop of horses that make it to the track, about half will start as two-year-olds and the rest will start as three-year-olds. Most racehorses (except geldings) are off the track by age five, making a seven-year depreciation schedule anachronistic. Legislation contained in the 2007 Farm Bill allows an owner to recover his/her costs over the period of time that the horse is likely to race.

"This crucial piece of legislation finally provides fair and equitable tax treatment to the Thoroughbred industry," said Alex Waldrop, President and CEO of the National Thoroughbred Racing Association (NTRA). "This day is the culmination of many years of effort on Capitol Hill by the NTRA legislative team, and we thank Sen. Mitch McConnell, who secured inclusion of the racehorse depreciation measure in the Farm Bill, for his strong support of Kentucky's signature industry."

The 2007 Farm Bill also contains two other provisions, promoted by the NTRA, to aid horse owners. These provisions would make horse breeders eligible for the first time for emergency federal loans following a disaster. Further, the bill includes a new permanent disaster assistance program that will provide relief funds to farmers and ranchers who suffer losses in areas that are declared disaster areas by USDA. This additional disaster program will be available to horse owners.

The NTRA will be holding tax seminars this year around major Thoroughbred sales, explaining the new law as well as legislation changing the terms for the Section 179 expensing allowance and for bonus depreciation that was passed earlier this year as part of President Bush's Economic Stimulus Act.

According to "The Economic Impact of the Horse Industry on the United States," produced in July 2005 by Deloitte Consulting LLP, the horseracing industry carries a total economic impact of $26 billion, $20.7 billion of which is from Thoroughbred racing. There are nearly 845,000 racehorses in the United States and the racing industry supplies more than 380,000 jobs.

Big Brown and Michelle Nevin at Belmont Park on Wednesday
NYRA photo/ Adam Coglianese

The Belmont ... at what price?

The New York Racing Association issued a press release after the Preakness announcing the availability of tickets for the June 7 Belmont Stakes, in which Big Brown will attempt to sweep the Triple Crown, an accomplishment that had evaded 10 other Kentucky Derby and Preakness winners since 1978.

Before that release was transmitted, however, the tickets were sold.

The largest crowd ever assembled for sporting event in New York, 120,139, stood in stunned silence while Birdstone thwarted Smarty Jones’ bid in 2004, the last time a the Triple Crown was at stake in the Belmont. War Emblem’s failed bid in 2002 drew 103,222 and 101,864 braved an all-day downpour in 2003, when Funny Cide was denied by Empire Maker.

The Belmont, when a Triple Crown is possible, is always a hot ticket and distinct possibility that Big Brown will become the 12th horse successful in that quest is almost certain to result in a new record crowd on June 7. For those currently without tickets, however, admission will not be inexpensive.

Already, more than two weeks from the event, gotickets.com has set the price on a table for 10 in the Garden Terrance, lunch included, at $16,000 and the best-located clubhouse seats are priced at more than $3,000. Grandstand preferred seating is being sold at $1,830 a copy. The bidding for tickets on e-bay is also robust. As of Thursday morning, clubhouse seating offered at auction was bid up to $2,000 and grandstand preferred seats near the sixteenth pole were offered at a buy-it-now price of $1,000.

The difference between a Triple Crown being on the line and virtually any other Belmont scenario is stark. The Kentucky Derby is run independent of circumstance, as is the Preakness. But the Belmont is dependent entirely upon the first two to create the high drama that draws a six-figure crown in Elmont.

A year ago, with the Derby winner, Street Sense, absent, 46,870 – the smallest Belmont-day crowd in a decade -- saw Rags to Riches upset Curlin. This time, after two powerful performances in the Derby and Preakness, Big Brown on his own, assures a crowd that will rival if not surpass that drawn by Smarty Jones. The addition of the unbeaten, Japan-based Casino Drive raises the Belmont’s profile exponentially within the Asian community. More than 100 credentials have been issued to Japanese media outlets, which makes this the first truly international Belmont.

The size of the crowd, ultimately, is dependent upon weather, which determines the sale of walk-in general admission and it is difficult to estimate exactly how many people can be shoehorned into Belmont Park. There is a point at which the NYRA would be forced to lock the gates. That has never happened. So, there is more than one bit of history at stake on June 7.

Dutrow: Confidence squared

If he was a study in brash confidence before the Kentucky Derby and Preakness, Rick Dutrow, may be making room in his home already for the Belmont Stakes trophy he expects Big Brown to earn along with the first Triple Crown in 30 years.

“Our horse is doing so well right now, I can’t imagine him being beaten by a post position,” Dutrow said after Big Brown drew the extreme outside position in a field of 20 at Churchill Down.

Check.

“The field is suspect. I can’t see him getting beat in the Preakness,” Big Brown’s trainer said in Baltimore.

Check.

While the number of decisive intangibles that can interject themselves during the running of a horse race is incalculable and the most serious threat to Big Brown’s Triple Crown sweep comes in the form of visitor from Japan, Casino Drive, whose siblings, Jazil and Rags to Riches, have won the last two runnings of the Belmont, “I’ll be in the winner’s circle before the quarter pole,” Dutrow said on Wednesday at Belmont Park, where the dual classic winner jogged once around the 12-furlong course on which 10 consecutive attempts to sweep the Triple Crown have been derailed in three decades.

Casino Drive, who has started only twice, most recently making his North American debut with an impressive victory in the Peter Pan Stakes, has, Dutrow said: “No chance. None. The horse from Japan is just another horse in the race. I’m sure they have to have more thoughts about running against Big Brown than we do about running against him.”

Check?

Nobody is arguing. An undefeated horse two legs into the Triple Crown who has turned the Kentucky Derby and Preakness into laughing victories both inspires confidence and discourages disparagement even from the most skeptical horseplayers.

Apparently, the Derby and Preakness have left Big Brown unscathed. Neither decisive victory over horses who are not in his league required more than minimal extension.

“I wish [the Belmont] was now,” Dutrow said. “Our horse is doing so good right now. I can’t see and issue with our horse. But there are lots of days [before the Belmont] and lots of things can happen.”

All Big Brown all the time

Between now and June 7, the Big Brown watch will somehow maintain a full-blown hysteria as newspaper editors and television producers spare no flight of fancy in examining the minutia beyond the minutia.

Once, a day or two before Funny Cide would attempt to run the table, came a call from an editor suggesting a story on what the would-be Triple Crown winner’s day would be like on that Saturday, an assignment deftly deflected to another writer. Newspapers that blithely ignore racing otherwise, manage to summon a dither when presented the possibility of a Triple Crown.

Already there is a discernable division between those who are foursquare behind the Kentucky Derby and Preakness winner and those who would prefer not to see his people carried onto hallowed ground where they would stand beside the revered connections of the 11 winners of the Triple Crown.

There are cases to be made for both positions. A horse does not buy its people. Then again, while much is known about Big Brown’s trainer and more suspected, little is known about the principals of IEAH Stable, who seem to have barely left barely a trace of their presence on Wall Street, where they made fortunes in the hedge fund business before a meteoric rise in the racing game. This is not exactly Plain Ben Jones and the Wright Family of Calumet Farm.

So, Big Brown’s arrival at Belmont Park on Monday afternoon required a police escort from the George Washington Bridge to Elmont, where the racing paparazzi had gathered. They will return on Wednesday morning, when Big Brown returns to the track for presumable light exercise. They will follow him back and forth from barn to racetrack every day.

The other point of general contention involves Big Brown himself. He is either a potentially great horse, though retirement will eliminate the opportunity to establish his true standing, or he is the best of a profoundly ordinary generation of three-year-olds – by a lot. By the numbers, this is a bad bunch. By the numbers, Big Brown’s Preakness was no more than a solid effort that may have, since he was throttled down in the late stages while galloping along with his ears pricked forward, been better than the numbers suggest. Quite likely, Big Brown actually regressed a bit in the Preakness and was still that much better than the totally outclassed opposition.

The presence of Casino Drive only sweetens the pot. As someone standing nearby said after Big Brown hit the wire on Saturday: We’re having fun again. --PM

Baltimore leftovers ...

It appears that Frank Stronach, head of the Maryland Jockey Club’s parent Magna Entertainment, is fairly certain that the citizens of Maryland will approve slots for the state’s racetracks in a November referendum. He has stopped leveraging the Preakness, a revered part of the state’s identity. You have to wonder, though, what difference slot machines can possibly make in a state surrounded by casinos in Delaware, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Atlantic City. Maryland may have missed the boat on this one.

Frank’s energy drink was readily available at Pimlico last weekend. Oh, man. It may be impossible suck more. The term drink would suggest the possibility that this stuff is palatable. Not.

You learn something about a state in its hotel bars. For instance: The Maryland lottery’s version of video crack is an animated horse racing game. A large part of the Maryland countryside is home to a native horse-breeding and training community and racing is part of the very fabric of life in a state where the future of racing is, at best, uncertain and, perhaps more realistically, doomed. Something wrong with that pictur? Strange that the lottery would chose racing as the theme for its version of video robbery. Stranger: the races are set at Australian tracks.

Stronach is advertising a racing partnership involving the horses bred at his Adena Springs operations. Whatever chaos he has brought to the racing business, there is no denying the remarkable success Stronach has enjoyed as a breeder and owner. In this sense, he is a throwback – one of the few large breeders who races the horses he breeds. If more people were doing this, the PETA people might not have been standing on a corner in a bad neighborhood outside Pimlico on Saturday. (By the way. They brought children. To that neighborhood? Reckless endangerment?)

The death of Eight Belles after the Kentucky Derby has raised questions in many areas including one concerning the prevalence of Native Dancer in the overwhelming majority of American pedigrees. Another question: Where is it possible to find a stallion or mare absent the influence of that ancestry? Big Brown himself is inbred 3x3 to Northern Dancer, whose maternal grandsire is Native Dancer. He, then, is 4x4 to the source of all this brittleness and probably another accident waiting to happen. --PM

Big Brown, Rick Dutrow (right) depart Pimlico
Maryland Jockey Club photo/ Jim McCue

Big Brown shipped to Belmont

From the Maryland Jockey Club

Baltimore

Nearly 40 hours after Big Brown delivered a memorable 5 ¼ length victory in the $1 million Preakness Stakes, the dual classic winner left the Pimlico stakes barn and headed to New York for a date with destiny as the son of Boundary will attempt to become the first Triple Crown winner in 30 years in the $1 million Belmont Stakes on June 7.

“I am feeling pretty confident about things,” trainer Rick Dutrow said. “I can see that he is sharp. Yesterday he was bouncing and today the same thing. He is doing good and that makes everything so much easier.”

Big Brown, who has won all of his five career races by a combined 39 lengths, is only the fourth horse to emerge from the Kentucky Derby and Preakness undefeated, joining Majestic Prince (1969), Seattle Slew (1977) and Smarty Jones (2004). Seattle Slew is the only horse in history to emerge undefeated from the Belmont Stakes and a Triple Crown sweep.

“I haven’t seen anybody that has made him run yet,” added Dutrow. “I have to believe that this race the other day was just an absolute super free race for the Belmont. He wasn’t under any pressure at any time in the race. It looks like the jock asked him for run for maybe a sixteenth of a mile just to separate him from the field to put the race away. After that point he just glided to the wire. We were really hoping for a race like that and we got it. We can’t complain about anything.”

Thirty-one other horses have left Pimlico with a chance at the Triple Crown, including six since 1997, with only 11 finishing what is described as the most elusive prize in sports. Dutrow is confident his star can join elite company.

“Everyone can see he is a special kind of horse,” Dutrow said. “As long as we can keep him well within himself, we’ll have a chance. Everybody is very excited about him and how can you not be. It looks like he has a chance at being one of the best ever. If we get beat in the Belmont we are just going to be amongst a whole lot of horses that almost got there so we need to win this race. He looks like by far that he is the best horse going into the race.”

After walking the shedrow at 8 a.m, the colt boarded the Brook Ledge van without incident and exited the Pimlico backstretch at 10 o’clock headed for the Big Apple.

“I haven’t been in New York for like three or four months,” joked Dutrow, who is based at Aqueduct. “I have like eight dinner reservations tonight. Whoever makes me the best offer is where I’ll go.”