Opinion

One question was all it took.

Jock’s agent Mike Monroe slid on his barn shoes, grabbed his phone and went to the track, likes he’s been doing every morning for the last 15 years.

It was the third day of the meet. Monroe didn’t need his condition book, he was out of work. Eyes reddened around the edges, Monroe looked like he had just climbed out of a three-car pileup. Monroe stood at the Oklahoma track, shook his head and swallowed the pain, as friends and rivals sought him out.

Ever feel like a visitor in your own town? Try this scenario on for size.

Today’s column is about Eric Guillot.

Laugh. Scoff. Scream. Run. Hide.

Finished? OK, let’s move forward.

In the eclectic world of horse trainers, Guillot is on his own continent. Born in New Iberia, Louisiana, 30 miles southeast of Lafayette, Guillot looks like a bouncer at a college bar and acts like the bounced from the college bar.

It gets late early around The Special office sometimes. That’s when the ideas start flying. What if other sports were like racing? At the end of every NFL game, the winning team lined up for a photo. 

It was a sad day here Sunday morning. Bill Hirsch, standing at his corner at the Morning Line Kitchen, told me first.

Phil Serpe flagged me down as his golf cart went east and mine west, behind Rick Violette’s barn. Eddie Dees found my number and called, just wanted to make sure we knew.

Then Leah rode up on her pony, Chief, and stopped at the Kitchen. A day after she won her third Grade 1 stakes of her life, she was down. She looked me in the eye, she didn’t say a word. I looked her in the eye, I didn’t say a word. There was nothing that pain hadn’t already said.

I was asked to write a 45-second script about Saratoga. An essay, about anything, the old days, the new days, what it’s meant, what it means.

Tie it all together. Personal, my essay. Have you ever listened to “This I Believe” on NPR? That’s what I’m thinking. The horses, the history, the people, the town and why it works, why Saratoga captivates us. I need to check with Mom, but I’ve seen photos of me as Secretariat galloped to the start for the Whitney, so I’m guessing I’ve been coming here 41 years…45 seconds for 41 years.

When a Dogwood Stable horse named None Like Nolan won Thursday’s second race, I just wanted to say congratulations and find out who Nolan was. 

Leah Gyarmati sat on Thunder Chief, her racehorse turned lead pony, outside her barn deep in the corner of Clare Court and Greentree Thursday morning. Exercise rider Jorge Sanchez jumped in his car for a bathroom break. Former jockey Noel Wynter stood and waited for another set. Assistant Herbie Castillo organized the state vet to look at a main-track only entry later in the day. Gyarmati talked a little and thought a lot.

For years, I said it.

“Whenever you’re ready.”

For years, he laughed.

“Not yet.”