Small time in the Shuvee
Fifteen days ago the $200,000 Shuvee Handicap, the feature race on today’s 10-race card, closed with just 10 nominations. When entries were taken Thursday, only three were entered.
‘Legendary’ Gerrity harkens back to glory days
Puffs of smoke emanated from cigars, circling the heads of spectators on the clubhouse apron. Mosquitoes, moths, and scores of other insects zipped to and fro, dancing in the beams of the track lights. The lights themselves hung from their posts and shone down on the half-mile stone dust racetrack. They are decades-old pillars, a reminder of an era when nighttime harness racing was one of the most popular sports in America.
Unique approach to stallion marketing
Millions of Americans tune their televisions to ABC Monday nights to watch the popular reality program The Bachelor – or The Bachelorette depending on the season – for an escape, the chance to predict the winner or just to be entertained by the frequently included irreverent contestants.
Better Talk Now: Time to say goodbye
Fenella O’Flynn was riffling through her Toyota 4Runner in search of a cigarette lighter. “I haven’t smoked since New Year’s Eve,” she paused long enough to say. “But f*** it.”
Amateur jockey Hadden Frost’s American adventure
Englishman Hadden Frost, 26, came to the United States this spring and rode several jump races. He picked up wins at My Lady’s Manor and Willowdale and nearly won the Maryland Hunt Cup. Before all of that, he won “50-odd” races on the flat and another 70 or so over jumps while following his father … Read more
Trainer Richard Valentine
You know him as the guy behind 2014 steeplechase champion Demonstrative and some other stars to come off Whitewood Farm in Virginia. He grew up in a family with little or no horse background, but dove in and now operates one of the country’s most successful stables. We caught up to him by telephone last … Read more
Short resume, long run of success
Alan Woodbury won’t play the name-dropping game of high-profile people. But he will talk high-profile horses.
Jockey Sean McDermott
An experienced jockey in his native Ireland, Sean McDermott is in his third full American season and got off to a big start to 2017 with two major stakes wins aboad Scorpiancer. And to think he started out riding a donkey and eventually a horse named Flamenco Fury. We talk to him about horses, Ireland, … Read more
Champion owner Irv Naylor
He’s won six of the last seven National Steeplechase Association owners’ championships, just missed passing $1 million in seasonal earnings in 2016, campaigned the last two steeplechase champions in Dawalan and Rawnaq, and started 2016 by retiring the Virginia Gold Cup trophy with Ebanour. Irv Naylor discussed his origins in the sport and more in … Read more
Irish jockey Ruby Walsh
This was all supposed to be newsworthy, timely and dramatic, but – as anyone in racing knows – it doesn’t always work that way. We talked to Ruby Walsh last week about Nichols Canyon and his chances at the historic TVV Capital Challenge of sweeping Cheltenham’s Stayers Hurdle and America’s Iroquois Steeplechase. Walsh was ready, … Read more
