Sharing with you my fascinating discoveries about Thoroughbred racing, sales, fashion, food, beverage, tips and more.
Today, I attended A Celebration of Life for the late, great, Penny Chenery. Helen Bates “Penny” Chenery Tweady entered the world on 1/27/1922. Though she lived a full 95 years, she left too soon when she passed last month on 9/16/2017. Gone but never to be forgotten, the legends Penny and her horses like Secretariat and Riva Ridge blazed will last eternally.
Continue reading “Praise for Penny”
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This week started with some sad news. Social media was on fire with reports that Helen “Penny” Chenery, owner of the great Secretariat had died Saturday, 9/16/17, following a stroke. There have been countless stories and posts on her passing. It is wonderful to have this opportunity to reminisce about all the great things Penny did for Thoroughbred racing. It is equally fascinating that the passing of Penny has created an increased focus on women in racing. I am really enjoying all of the focus pieces on unique “Queens” that are important to “The Sport of Kings”. I want to share a bit on the legacy of Lucy Gay Bassett.
Continue reading “Bassett the Benefactress”
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With just a few days/steps in time, this year is off to a fantastic start! I had a great response to my post I wrote on New Year’s Eve and there are so many good things going on in the Thoroughbred racing industry. I am so thrilled that today brings the return to racing for California Chrome at Santa Anita. At this same track and this same day, Mrs. Penny Chenery will present the Secretariat Vox Populi Award to the connections of American Pharoah. We have had several new Thoroughbred babies born in the last week. The January Keeneland sale starts Monday and I made it out to the barns to see some of those horses today. Also, the finalist for the Eclipse Awards were announced on January 6th and on the 16th the winners will be announced. Shew, there is just so much to enjoy. Speaking of enjoyment, I’m pretty happy to see that Tepin is up for an Eclipse Award and I hope she wins!
The 45th annual Eclipse Awards will be presented to the winners of 17 horse and human categories including 6 media categories, Horseplayer of the Year and a lifetime achievement/award of merit winner. The awards dinner will be held at Gulfsteam Park. The 6 media winners have been chosen. They are; Jennie Rees, Mary Simon, Tim Sullivan, NBC Sports, Scott Serio and Brad and John Hennegan. The Horseplayer of the Year Award goes to John O’Neill. Leonard Lavin takes the Eclipse Award of Merit. The other 17 categories are up for grabs! Here are the nominees:
I can’ t blog on forever so I picked the Female Turf Horse category. I am crazy about all 3 entries, heck I love all these Thoroughbreds. I had the pleasure of watching Tepin, Stephanie’s Kitten and Found on the last day of the Breeders’ Cup this past year. Read on to see the pictures I took and a small bio on each horse.
Found is a lovely Irish filly. She was born in March of 2012. Her sire is Galileo and her dam is Red Evie, both are Irish as well. She won 1st place in the 2015 Breeders’ Cup Turf. This is the first time a 3 year old filly has won this race. She has not raced since but she has had 11 career starts in which she won 4 times, placed 5 times and showed 1 time. Found has over $2 million dollars in earnings and is ranked 9th in earnings for 2015. Her jockey is Ryan L. Moore. Found is trained by Aidan O’ Brien and owned by Michael B. Tabor, Mrs. John Magnier and Derrick Smith. Her breeders were Roncon, Wynatt and Chelston. She is up for 3 Year Old Filly too! Last I read, she should race again in 2016.
Stephanie’s Kitten was foaled in March of 2009. She is the progeny of Kitten’s Joy and Unfold the Rose. Stephanie’s Kitten is now at Northern Farm in Japan. She was formerly Kentucky bred and owned by Ken and Sarah Ramsey. She won the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Turf in 2015. This horse had Irad Ortiz, Jr, for her jockey and was trained by Chad C. Brown. She was 2nd in the same BC race in 2014 and won the BC Juvenile Fillies Turf in 2011. She ranked 8th in earnings in 2015. She has earned over $4 million dollars. Stephanie’s Kitten has had 25 career starts. She won 11 times, was second 4 times and came in third 4 times. I hope she has a happy life as a broodmare in Japan and perhaps she can someday retire back home in Kentucky.
Tepin was also born in March but in 2011. She is the Kentucky bred daughter of Bernstein and Life Happened. Tepin was owned by Robert E. Masterson when she won the BC Mile in 2015. She is second in earnings for 2015. She has gross earnings of over $2 million dollars. During her career she has 7 wins, placed 3 times and showed once in 15 starts. I saw her win on October 3rd this past year at Keeneland in the Grade 1, First Lady Stakes. She has not raced since the BC win but she had a nice workout at Palm Meadows Training Center yesterday. Julien R. Leparoux is her jockey. Machmer Hall is Tepin’s breeder and she is trained by Mark E. Casse. I’m hoping she has a nice 2016 career and I’d like to see this Eclipse Award granted to her. I thinks it is Tepin’s time! Click the link for Disney’s Mary Poppins song, “Step In Time”.
I like all the choices for Female Turf Horse as well as the other award candidates. I am looking forward to the reveal on the 16th. I hope some of you have a great time live at Santa Anita today and I wish others will join me at the Keeneland Sales starting on 1/11/16 but already bustling in the barns, see below. I will share with you all about the auction. Have a great weekend!
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Greetings racing fans! It is good to be home but there has not been much action for me since I returned other than Thanksgiving and lots of shopping. Yesterday, I had some down time and I started to think about what I wanted to check out and what I wanted to write about. My favorite horse, Juba, had a race that day and that was where my mind was set.
Juba is “Twitter’s favorite race horse” and since my first “tweet” this past February he has quickly become my favorite horse too. Twitter is one of the more popular social media networks. It was created in the summer of 2006 and by this summer it had over 500 million users. I joined to have an outlet to share my blog with. I found out fast that Twitter is the best way for me to get the latest information on current events in the Thoroughbred racing industry. I am happy to have over 200 followers on Twitter. Juba has over 2,200 followers. He is found on Twitter here @Jubacolt . Juba (the Gray), can not do his own tweets, since he is a horse, so an anonymous person handles that for him. He has created hash tags such as #GoJubaGo for his races and #haikujuba to write poetry and inspire others to do the same. Juba, the horse, still strikes the best poses and lights up for the cutest videos.
The real Juba is a 4 year old colt. He is gray with a black mane. He is so fair he looks white on photos and television. He is the Kentucky bred son of Tapit and Adoradancer. He grew up on Lane’s End Farm in Versailles, KY after his birth on 5/25/2011. He was sold to Centennial Farms at Keeneland’s September Yearling Sale in 2012. He lives at Belmont Park in New York now. Juba has had 11 starts with 2 wins, 3 second place finishes and 3 times at 3rd. He has raced at 4 tracks: Aqueduct, Gulfstream Park, Saratoga and Belmont. Juba’s jockey is Jose L. Ortiz. He is trained by Jimmy Jerkins. Yesterday he ran at Aqueduct again. It was a nasty day. The track was muddy and the fog was thick. Centennial Farm tweeted #GreyColtsBlendIntoGreyFog. He was in the 8th race. The 9th race was cancelled because weather conditions were so bad. Juba finished 7th in a field of 11 horses. He was doing well at second place early in the race. It was an odd race to watch because the fog was so dense. Sometimes fog can be exciting like on the top of Mount Humphreys, seen at the top, when I took that climb but in yesterday’s race it looked dangerous. It is very hard to even see. Click watch video here Race 8 Aqueduct 12/2/15
I have never seen Juba live. Centennial broke my heart this past October when it was decided at the last moment that he would not be racing at Keeneland shortly before the Breeders’ Cup. That put Juba and myself in a huff. I hope that I can pet his pretty face someday but it is a long trip from Kentucky to New York. I called Gainesway Farm in Lexington, KY yesterday to see if I could tour, meet his sire Tapit and see 8 other stallions but they responded that they are not currently doing public tours. Too bad, I hope they change that soon. Tapit is gray too. He has been the leading sire in the United States for 3 years now. He has the highest stud fee at $300,000. In 2015 he was bred to 135 mares. This year 5 of his off-spring have won Grade 1 stakes races: Frosted, Tonalist, Untapable, Ring Weekend and Constitution. He is the leading sire of G1 winners. Juba’s dam, Adoradancer, had 19 starts at 8 tracks including Keeneland, my home track. She raced there twice in 1997 so perhaps I have seen her.
Despite yesterday’s race I still wanted to do some jotting for Juba. I wanted to share that even horses that don’t win every race are still ever so wonderful. Penny Chenery, owner of the great Secretariat, is wise to stress this truth and award accordingly. She created the Secretariat Vox Populi award in 2010. Vox Populi is a latin term meaning the voice of the people. The winners from the 1st year to 2014 have been: Zenyatta, Rapid Redux, Paynter, Mucho Macho Man and California Chrome, respectively. She noted that while most awards for Thoroughbreds are based on statistics and performance measures she thought some horses should be honored for being a favorite of the public and an ambassador for the sport. Thru an on-line poll, done by the public, votes are collected. You can vote here now Vox Populi Award . Voting is open until 12/6/15 then the votes are reviewed by Ms. Chenery and a panel of 8 experts. On 1/9/16 the recipient will be announced at Santa Anita Park. American Pharoah, Beholder and Rachel’s Valentina are the horses on the ballot but write-ins are accepted. The horses listed are all lovely and deserving choices but Juba is “Twitter’s favorite horse” and I think that is quite a distinction in the popularity department.
Who will you vote for? Give Juba a thought or share who means the most to you. I will be blogging again before next week’s end and I will share the people’s choice with you in January as well. Please, keep following and sharing. Thank you!
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Old Friends, a retirement home for Thoroughbreds, was founded by Michael Blowen, former movie critic and current Thoroughbred racing fan, in 2003. These farms operate at Dream Chase Farm in Georgetown, KY, Old Friends at Kentucky Downs in Franklin, KY and Cabin Creek Farm in Greenfield Center, NY. I was fortunate to tour the largest of the 3 farms, Dream Chase, yesterday afternoon, 9/9/15.
I first met Blowen at the Noor lecture I attended and blogged about earlier this year. www.thoroughbredu.com/a-night-for-noor The work he does is amazing. After the 1986 Kentucky Derby winner, Ferdinand, was slaughtered in Japan in 2002, Blowen wanted to prevent further tragedies. He began to rescue Thoroughbreds who were no longer racing and breeding and brought them to his farm. His is the only farm who rescues stallions and he has many mares too. Currently, over 100 horses live on the 3 properties. 103 alone are at Dream Chase. They are currently raising funds to bring home 2002 KY Derby and Preakness winner, War Emblem. They hope to get Charismatic one day as well.
At the farm, I first met Lisa, my tour guide and she promptly took the group to see Gulch. He is the oldest horse they have. He is 31 years old and he takes his carrots, shredded. He is the oldest living horse to have participated in all 3 legs of the Triple Crown. Sired by the great, Mr. Prospector, Gulch had an excellent racing career. He won the 1988 Breeders’ Cup Sprint and also received the American Champion Sprint Horse award that same year. He had an outstanding stud career at Lane’s End Farm in KY. His progeny have earned over $90 million. His son Wallenda lives at Old Friends too.
Then I met Sarava, he likes to bite but he missed out today. I didn’t give him any carrots but fortunately Lisa did, he has bit her before. Sarava spoiled War Emblem’s chance of winning the 2002 Triple Crown when he beat him in the last leg of the series, the Belmont Stakes.
Across the dirt path lives Game On Dude and Starspangled Heat. Game On Dude, born in 2007, had 34 career starts. He won 16 of those and he placed and showed in 8 more of his races. He earned nearly $6.5 million racing and he is the only horse to ever win the Grade I Santa Anita Handicap 3 times. Starspangled Heat is new to the farm, having just participated in last year’s Breeders’ Cup Turf. He was born in 2008 and had 39 career starts. The orange tag on StarSpangled Heat is helpful to ward off flies. Lisa said that Game On Dude has the least trouble with flies.
Next up, I met Rail Trip. He is a real sweetie. I fed him a lot of carrots and got my picture taken with him. He won the Grade I Hollywood Gold Cup in 2009 and many other graded stakes races. He was second in the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile in 2011.
The tour proceeded on to see, Catlaunch. That is a name I would have surely bet on. I love all the cat and kitten named horses. He is the tallest horse at the farm. At 14 years old now, he has had an amazing 108 career starts. He was still racing and winning at 12 years old. He is a big winner, and in 2006 he was the 17th best ranked horse in the nation.
One field further, I met Rapid Redux and Amazombie. Rapid Redux is seen unmasked in the photo above. The horses at Old Friends take turns rotating who wears the fly masks. Rapid Redux has beaten both Zenyatta, Citation and Pepper’s Pride records of 19 wins with an amazing 22 consecutive wins. In 2011 he was honored with The Secretariat Vox Populi Award and the Eclipse Special Award. Penny Chenery first created the Vox Populi award in 2010 as the peoples choice award for race horses. Amazombie won an Eclipse Award in 2011 as well. He has won many graded stakes races. He won the 2011 Breeders’ Cup Sprint and in 2012 that same sprint was his final race.
Then, the sky opened up and it began to pour rain. Some horses loved it and they soaked it up or rolled in the mud. Other horses tucked into their shelters. The tour group headed into a barn. There I could barely see, behind the screens, Afternoon Deelites, Mixed Pleasure and Wallenda. Afternoon Deelites was owned by Burt Bacharach and Angie Dickinson. He had several graded stakes wins in 12 starts and then he went to stud and he sired some great horses including Popcorn Deelites. Mixed Pleasure has Seabiscuit in his pedigree. He had 22 career starts with some graded stakes winning success and he sired some winners as well. Wallenda loved his carrots and he was fed them by Michael Blowen himself. He is named for the high wire celebrity family, the Flying Wallendas, who have been to see him at the farm. He had a nice racing career, earning over $1 million in 33 starts with many graded stakes wins. He has very delicate hooves and special shoes.
It was still raining when Popcorn Deelites and his buddy hid from us. Popcorn Deelites is best known for playing Seabiscuit in the movie by that same name. I would have liked to had a better look at these two.
Fortunately, Silver Charm loved the rain. He was content to stand there throughout the brief downpour. He won both the 1997 KY Derby and Preakness. In 1998 he won the Dubai World Cup. He doesn’t like his meals to be late.
Finally, the rain stopped as we went on to see Genuine Reward and Star Plus. Genuine Reward is a foal of KY Derby winner Genuine Risk. Genuine Reward had a good stud career and in addition to race horses he sired polo horses too. Star Plus raced in graded stakes in Argentina and the United States. He was still racing at 8 years old. He was a winner at my favorite track, Keeneland.
Once a horse comes to Old Friends, they will stay there until it is time to cross the Rainbow Bridge. Other great horses, like Noor, come here after death as a final resting place. There are numerous memorials and grave markers for the mostly cremated deceased horses on the property.
The farm is simply gorgeous, right down to the barn quilt, pendants of the quilt are for sale at the gift shop. If you can make it to Georgetown you should take the tour. My Grandmother would have loved the long paths. I loved the well fed kitties and of course, the horses. I greatly appreciate what Old Friends has been able to accomplish for so many great horses. Thank you Old Friends! To donate or tour visit the website: Old Friends
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