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Derby contender returns to the track, with energy and enthusiasm
ST will follow Fair Hill-based 3-year-old Toby’s Corner to the Kentucky Derby, chronicling his life and his training, bringing readers details about the horse and serving up a small taste of what it’s like for his connections as he gets ready for the Grade I Derby at Churchill Downs in about three weeks.
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Winter in Maryland, not Florida, produced Derby contender
ST will follow Fair Hill-based 3-year-old Toby’s Corner to the Kentucky Derby, chronicling his life and his training, bringing readers details about the horse and serving up a small taste of what it’s like for his connections as he gets ready for the Grade I Derby at Churchill Downs in about three weeks.
!["0414toby2"]("images/stories/Horses/0414toby2.jpg")
A light jog in a meadow and the first steps toward Kentucky
ST will follow Fair Hill-based 3-year-old Toby’s Corner to the Kentucky Derby, chronicling his life and his training, bringing readers details about the horse and serving up a small taste of what it’s like for his connections as he gets ready for the Grade I Derby at Churchill Downs in about three weeks.
Note to Stewards: If trainers and jockeys are running late at Stoneybrook, Old Dominion and Elkridge-Harford Saturday morning, give them a break – they were watching the John Smith’s Grand National from Aintree in Liverpool, England.
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Spring time. Pimlico. Time to hit the beltway and get up the road to the home of the Preakness. Laurel’s leading jockey Sheldon Russell is named on eight horses including Bright Array in the feature. In Kentucky, you have to wait one more day for Keeneland’s opener. Aqueduct, Hawthorne, Santa Anita and even a few more days of Gulfstream keep the rest of the country on boil.
You’ve got to wait for the real newspaper to read a proper “print” feature about the season opener at Aiken. It’s nearly 2,000 words strong, but for now, here are some quick quips from the winners.
Last year’s winner primed for repeat after missing second half of 2010
After finishing fourth behind eventual champion Slip Away in the 2010 Temple Gwathmey last April, Spy In The Sky went to the sidelines with a relatively minor injury. Trainer Jimmy Day could have ordered a few weeks off and aimed for a summer campaign.
Yes, that’s Tom Voss and Slip Away on the cover of the most recent Steeplechase Times. Yes, the trainer was riding the reigning Eclipse Award winner. Yes, they galloped earlier in the morning.
And, no, it’s not a really big deal.
Whether it’s open stakes horses, novice stakes horses or fillies and mares, the spring condition book doesn’t require or invoke much imagination. For American steeplechase trainers, mapping out a schedule is more like paint by numbers than a blank canvas and a palette of colors.
In 2010, Hall of Fame trainer Jonathan Sheppard became the first trainer to eclipse the 1,000 win barrier while dominating the trainer’s standings for his 24th championship since 1970. Sheppard outgunned Tom Voss by eight wins and snapped the three-year reign of Jack Fisher who slipped to third with 12 wins.
