Join The Saratoga Special Readers Club for exclusive access to news, swag, discounts, special events and more
Ben Bradlee has nothing on Tim Keefe.
“I looked Friday night, Saturday, looked Sunday, looked Monday,” Keefe said. “I said to myself, ‘Sean’s not going to write about this? I can’t believe it. Of all the things he’s written about…he’s not going to write about this?”
Sometimes I forget. It doesn’t take long to remind me.
It’s been a week. No phone calls. Which is good news. As an owner, you know phone calls only bring bad news. Like waiting for the draft.
There it is in cold, hard print next to Valdez’s name. 1204. Yeah, 1,204 days since his last run. We knew it had been a while, since that fateful day at Chepstow, two, three, four years ago…yeah, the day he fell, slid, strained, the day the house of cards came down.
A barn divided…
Nah, not really, but around the Jack Fisher barn in Butler, Md., hearts were with Mr. Hot Stuff, heads, if pushed, were with Scorpiancer. The latter, with a 2-for-2 season that included a dominant win in the Grade 1 Iroquois, won the Eclipse Award as champion steeplechase horse for 2017. The former, riding a one-hit wonder in the Grand National, wound up third in the voting. The Jonathan Sheppard-trained All The Way Jose finished second, an independent between Fisher’s bookends.
There is nothing that will wake you up quicker than a European horse sale. Well, there is nothing that will wake me up quicker than a European horse sale. The texts started beeping at 5:05 Tuesday morning.
It was 2001, my first spring off the steeplechase circuit and I had gotten to the Derby. Getting to the Derby and enjoying the Derby are two different things.
My friend, Tony Reinstedler, said he had a place for me to stay. He did – in a tent in his backyard off Baxter Street. No problem, we weren’t sleeping much.
It’s cold up here.
The three of them talk, then pause, then another burst, then another pause. They pull up ideas, memories, monuments like they’re pulling up weeds from a garden. Occasionally a flower, a fruit, a gem to keep, to hold. Eyes moisten, but only for fleeting moments, the public results of private thoughts. No one notices.
