The year was 2007, The Saratoga Special’s seventh in business. We were young (or less old), the paper was a tall tabloid (today’s version is more square), the participants were at once familiar and unfamiliar and the magic was still there. The Special set up in a half-under-construction house on Lincoln Avenue with a staff … Read more
You might come to thisishorseracing.com for steeplechase news or to find the latest edition of The Saratoga Special – or hopefully to sign up for The Saratoga Special Readers Club, buy a calendar or look into advertising – but much of our work for the last several years centers on the monthly print magazine Mid-Atlantic … Read more
How good was Flightline? The son of Tapit came into Sunday’s Grade 1 Runhappy Malibu Stakes at Santa Anita Park with two wins in as many starts, all at odds-on and each earning gushing praise from his connections and adoring fans.
With the 2021 Saratoga meeting all wrapped up, I’ve had some time to reflect on the opportunity given over the past two years at The Saratoga Special. I’ve never written a column before, but I hadn’t written a race recap before this summer either and things seemed to work out well.
To regular readers of this column it will come as no surprise that I know far less about horse racing than you do. A good chunk of our readership, after all, is active in the sport in one capacity or another.
A group of dedicated racing enthusiasts assembled on East Avenue each morning last year to soak in what little bit of horse racing they could outside of the Oklahoma Training Track. Though the views were limited, the same group of more than a dozen fans and photographers lined the fence each day without fail, thrilled to talk horses for a while instead of the usual pandemic discourse. This year, the view is different for the East Avenue crew, and so are the circumstances that bring them together.
In 1921, a headline-grabbing soap opera began in the racing world when Playfellow, a 3-year old full brother to Man o’ War was sold for $100,000, roughly $1.5 million in today’s money. The buyer was oil-baron Harry F. Sinclair, who later became notorious for his central role in the Teapot Dome oil scandal.
The Maryland State Fairgrounds at Timonium plays temporary host to nearly 600 horses in training this summer, and the community is welcoming the change.
In my short life I have been fortunate enough to travel all across the country. I’ve gazed upon the alluring and untamed wilderness of the Northwest. Walked the arid desert sands of the Southwest. Left my imprint on warm beaches in the Southeast and had theirs left on me. Submerged myself in the dark salty grasp of both oceans and call the seemingly infinite miles of prairie in the central plains home. Yet, none of my travels or experiences prepared me for the sublime experience of the Northeast.
The mood at Suffolk Downs on October 4, 2014 was grim and the weather gods seemed to be sharing the despair that permeated throughout the local racing community. The raw, rainy, quintessentially miserable New England fall day was a fitting backdrop to what, at the time, looked like the swan song for horse racing at the East Boston oval.
