Opinion

Road trip. Keeneland Friday. Maryland Hunt Cup Saturday. Middleburg Point-to-Point Sunday. Who’s in? Full tank. Iced coffee, on ice. Pistachios. Clif Bars. Audio books. Suits hanging on the driver side. Extra coats in trunk. Binoculars. Money. Round trip: 1,152.57 miles. Estimated 18 hours, 42 minutes of travel. What a game, the Elkhorn at Keeneland will … Read more

While working for a racing publication in Lexington I sometimes found myself feeling a bit envious, downright jealous even, of friends and family who would annually watch the Kentucky Derby comfortably from their living room couch.

Plenty has been written about trainer Dickie Small, who died of cancer April 4. Plenty of other stories have been told, but not written, by friends and family over the past 10 days or so. Here’s one from longtime friend Ted Mudge about a trip to Camden, S.C. a few years ago. Small loved it there and told Mudge to tag along, that he’d love it too. Finally, Mudge agreed and Small said they were leaving at 7 in the evening.

My Flag, Grade 1 winner and dam of champion Storm Flag Flying, died April 12, after producing a healthy Bernardini colt. My Flag was 21. The Saratoga Special talked to trainer Shug McGaughey about My Flag and 31 of his best horses in 2004, the year he was inducted into the Hall of Fame. The … Read more

Guess, I’m supposed to write something now. This started out as a feature on the front of the website, then it became a blog, then I gave up and started scrolling Facebook (snow in Kentucky, orange moon last night, Shirley stubbed her toe…) and now it’s back as a blog. Here’s the deal, I won … Read more

Disappointing weekend on the racing front. Just one runner, Valdez, at Ayr. Five of us huddled around Racing UK, ready for splendor. Instead, it was sputter. Well, Valdez finished second, but beaten a long way and never providing the spark he showed earlier in the season. A month after Cheltenham, perhaps, that effort still lingering. … Read more

“What do you want for your birthday?” At 44, it’s a throwaway question, because none of it is really going to happen. You get a card and a cake and move on, another day, another year gone. At 44, you start to want less and think more. The birthdays coming fast, years tumbling over the ledge. You begin to look back as much as you look forward. There are things I’d like today and there are things I’d like from yesterday.

Weekend in Virginia. Dad, 79, Miles, 5, and I traveled to my sister’s house in Richmond for a weekend of racing. The Dogwood Classic, held at Colonial Downs. Certainly nothing like the old days of the Strawberry Hill Races, held at the fairgrounds, years ago. Thinking there would be traffic like the old days, we … Read more

Keeneland’s decision to remove its Polytrack and replace the main track with a traditional dirt surface is the latest maelstrom in the Thoroughbred industry.

I’m glad there was no hidden camera in the barn when I got in the fight with the King’s Bishop colt at Delaware Park all those years ago. He nearly killed me, and I broke the handle of a pitchfork when I hit him across the back. I’m sure I swore at him. Sorry. And he barely flinched.