Author: grarick

King Driver goes back to racing school tomorrow, trying his first handicap in Dieppe. If he progresses as he should from Vittel, he should be in the money. Two things are working against us: The draw and the ground. We are drawn far outside in hole 13, and Dieppe was a swamp on Monday for the jumps meeting. I think King will handle heavy ground, at least from the looks of the paddles he has for feet, but things should have dried up quite a bit today and I’m afraid we might just end up with a sticky mess tomorrow, neither heavy nor soft. Still, if Tristan can find a back for him, we should have a chance. That’s a challenge breaking from that post, but he’ll do his best. In any case, one thing is clear: The horse is improving, and he comes from a family of winners. If not tomorrow, soon.

We’re also adding a horse to the yard from the Newmarket sales: Grey Falcon, an unraced three-year-old Clodovil gelding. Normally I would shy from a horse that hasn’t yet raced at three, but this one is clearly backwards and just needs a bit of time. He was bought for one of my American owners and should be ready to go in the fall. He gets French owners’ premiums and is a lovely big horse with a good paper, so watch this space for his progress. At the moment, he is at Xavier Richard’s in Normandy working off some of his baby fat.

There is a half-share available on another horse that I think will be a bit of fun: Gorki Park, a two-year-old Sageburg gelding who should be ready to run soon. He is being purchased for an owner who would like a partner for the other half, so contact us if you’re interested. He is French-bred, so he is eligible for 75-percent premiums on purses won this year and 68-percent premiums on purses next year. He is not expensive and should be useful, so if you’re thinking of getting a toe in the water, this is a nice opportunity. This is the first crop of two-year-olds for Sageburg, and all of them to race have been in the money.

 

Two of the four runners over the weekend were in the money, with Milly (Surrey Storm) running a very nice second at Longchamp and King Driver handling the gate much better and coming in 4th at Vittel. Hard Way fared less well there, finishing just out of the money in 6th, and Fibs found a mile at Compiegne too long on Monday.

Antoine Hamelin, a new rising star in the jockey circle, gave Milly a brilliant ride from the front at Longchamp and she gutted it out in the stretch to keep second place. She is a small horse with a decent stride and needs some pace at 2,400 meters, so this time I told the jockey he could take the lead if he had to, but to ride smartly and keep at her in the stretch, because she’s tough. He did just that, and she came through. We thought she might hang on to win but couldn’t quite do it. She came back well, as usual, and will go for a handicap next down in Vichy. She is extremely well placed with a rating of 30, so hopefully she might find the winner’s circle again down there.

King Driver schooled in the gate since his debacle at Chantilly and he seemed to have understood the point on Sunday in Vittel, when he stood like a lamb for about five minutes while the horse in the stall next to him threw a temper tantrum. The starting gate in Vittel was quite the spectacle. The girls leading in the horses look like they were rounded up at the local pony club, and while they did their best, they were no match for fractious thoroughbreds, some running for the first time. Two horses were scratched at the gate when the crew finally gave up, and it took nearly 15 minutes to get the 12 remaining runners in their stalls. Even though King went in with only three to go behind him, he had a good long wait inside. He broke brilliantly, and Tristan Normand had all he could do to keep him off the lead. He ran a little too freely in second or third through the race, and managed to hang onto fourth place and open his bank account. It was a lesson well-learned, but we still have quite a bit to do with him. He is a big baby and unfortunately not all that bright, so everything new is quite a challenge. He caused some problems in the parade ring this time because he didn’t want to leave to go to the track, so that will be our next project. He will probably head down to the track at Maisons-Laffitte to school in the parade ring there on Sunday.

Hard Way kept King company on the road to Vittel, but only finished 6th after being stuck with an outside draw of 15. Tristan’s orders were to absolutely put the horse behind somebody, so in order to do that, he ended up in the last third of the group rounding the first turn. On the small country tracks like Vittel, that leaves too much left to do. He ran well and was closing nicely, but a 300-meter stretch run is too short for him from that position. We’ve had back luck three times with him now and it’s getting frustrating, because he’s a good horse and will find another race to win soon. Entries are a bit tough, because he really should be running 3,000 meters, but there aren’t many races at this point. We may need to be patient for a decent entry.

Fibs and Flannel ran much better Monday than he did in his first try for us, but he needs a shorter distance to be in the money. Again, we’ll hope for a decent entry soon.

Obviously lots has gone on since I’ve been back here…catching up where I left off, let’s start with Hard Way. He got a better ride last time out with Christophe Lemaire back in the saddle, who at least tried to follow orders. Unfortunately, Hard Way did indeed learn a bad lesson last time out and jumped out to the front again. But unlike last time, Christophe slowed him down and tried to ride a smart race with what he was dealt. But as soon as he was headed after the final turn, Hard Way decided the race must be over. Christophe did try to convince him otherwise and he did pick up the pace again to finish 7th. We know he can do better, but we absolutely have to sort the starting gate out and get him to break a little less enthusiastically. Usually, I ask for him to be loaded last because he won’t wait in the gate. But next time out, he’ll go in with a few horses still to load, so he’ll have to wait a little, which may be enough to have him miss the break a bit, which in his case would be good.

King Driver, on the other hand, needs a bit more gate training so he doesn’t miss the break. He ran his comeback race in Chantilly on Sunday and I hadn’t bother to school him in the gate first. My feeling on starting gates is that they are highly stressful for a horse, both mentally and physically, so once the horse knows what it’s about, there’s no need to go back to it when not racing. I had forgotten, though, that King is not horribly courageous and when we schooled him originally, he was spooked by the noise of the gate opening, so he stood back before breaking. He did the same thing when he debuted as a two-year-old, but he had learned the lesson for his second race and it wasn’t a problem. Apparently he needed a refresher course, though, because he was fractious before the stalls opened and when they did, he propped back from the noise. Consequently, he was left several lengths behind the pack, which he showed no enthusiasm to join. He ran very green, and in the backstretch he almost decided to go visit the chateau rather than stay on the racecourse. But Fabrice Veron bravely got him moving in the stretch, and he did pass a few horses once he decided to gallop straight and play with the others. He is a lovely big horse and will certainly run much better next time out, which will be in about two weeks. But he’ll go to the gates again first.

Deep Ocean runs tomorrow in Chantilly in the second half of the Tierce. He hasn’t raced in nearly two months; he needed a bit of a break after being on the go all winter, and we also took the time to remove a small sarcoid tumor near his eye that had been bothering him. Entries for him are somewhat limited, because we need 2,000 meters on a right-handed track, with relatively decent ground. All the rain will keep things pretty soft tomorrow, which might not be to his liking, but he ran very well at Longchamp on soft ground, so I’m hoping for a good race tomorrow.

After that I hope to give Fibs and Flannel another try, this time at Amiens on Saturday, but we need a few more horses to forfeit before we’ll have a chance to get in. At the end of the month, Surrey Storm is likely to go to Longchamp for a claimer. I’d rather have a nice small handicap for her, but the racing calendar isn’t cooperating, so we’ll have to go with the claimer.

For the moment, the focus is on Deep tomorrow, who will be ridden by his usual jockey, Gerald Pardon. We’ll get to see how Deep likes Chantilly.

Where do I start? I will try to write this omitting the stream of obscenities I spouted after Hard Way’s race on Saturday, when Stephane Pasquier single-handedly flushed a year and a half of patience down the toilet by allowing Hard Way to bolt along out front, serving as the leader for the field and then practically crossing the finish line at a trot. We were supposed to have Christophe Lemaire in the saddle again, but at the very last minute, his agent pulled him off to ride for a bigger trainer. I was stuck without a pilot and all my usual suspects were already taken. With a 20-horse field, that happens. Of course, when Lemaire’s agent said he could ride, there was absolutely no doubt, so I didn’t bother looking for a backup. So there we were, screwed, and Pasquier was available. I was actually thinking about scratching, because I’d never used Pasquier before and he appeared to be the kind of jockey I try to avoid: One who can ride a fantastic race if he is so inspired, but who seems not to give a shit if he’s not so inspired. Oh don’t you worry, madame, his agent said, he’ll give you a good ride. Ah, words. He rode like a bad apprentice, setting a nice pace for his buddies behind him. Turning into the stretch, he dropped his hands and let the horse hack home (which was probably the least offensive thing he did at that point, because Hard Way had set a blistering pace and probably wouldn’t have had much left to give).

I usually hold my tongue with jockeys, because I never know if I might one day need them again. This was not the case on Saturday, and I made it clear that I was extremely unhappy. Angry. Furious, really. It’s quite probable that not only did Pasquier get the message, but most of Maisons-Laffitte did, too. Ah, well. Two British owners of another trainer overheard my diatribe and quickly got interested. “Do you always swear like that,” they asked? “It happens,” I replied. They took my business card.

Hard Way came back fine, if perhaps somewhat confused. He had never raced in Maisons-Laffitte before so he was surprised to find a racecourse at the end of our walk over. He was allowed to do as he pleased during the race, and then he had plenty of grass on the way home, so I’m hoping he didn’t come away with too bad a lesson. The handicappers didn’t see fit to take off a single ounce after our performance, probably because the ride was so bad they assumed I was trying to lose. That leaves our target still Longchamp on June 11, but we will most certainly have a change of jockey. Again.

OK, so this is old news by now, but in our defense, we celebrated for three days, de-toxed for three days, then I had to go to Ireland to look at horses, then the breeze-up sales, then Longchamp, but now, finally, the story of the miraculous comeback of Hard Way!

Let’s not bury the lead too far here: Hard Way won easily at St. Cloud last Saturday, cruising past 19 other runners in the home stretch to win by nearly two lengths with plenty in hand. It was an expert ride by Christophe Lemaire, who had ridden a couple of nice races on Hard Way before, but it was so long ago that he completely forgot about it. Here’s the miraculous part: Hard Way was lucky to be alive two years ago, when we found that he had a crushed first vertabra. We have no idea how or when it happened, but the vets who did the scan were surprised that the horse was still standing, much less racing. Because they had never seen an injury like that, they had no idea what the prognosis was. Time, they said, and then see what happens.

I turned Hard Way out for three months, then did another MRI scan. The vertabra had fused into a bony mass, and the fragments that threatened to compromise his spinal cord healed into that mass. He was given the green light to resume training. Hard Way has always been a handful to ride, so I sent him back into pretraining so somebody else could do the work of getting him moving again. But after three weeks, he had a stiff neck. I took that as a warning and decided to retire him. He spent another eight months or so turned out in Normandy. But he was clearly unhappy in the herd of retirees; it was October, winter was coming and he was looking miserable. I brought him home.

I thought he would just be the stable pony, but he had other ideas. We tried to keep him relatively contained through winter. He hacked out daily in the national forest behind the training center, and we let him go fast on the track a couple of times a week just to burn the steam off and keep him ridable. By January, it was clear he would race again, but taking him south to Cagnes sur Mer was out of the question because he would be lethal to ride down there, where he would have to go onto the track every day. We waited, and on April 1 I took him out to a small country track to give him a run and see what would happen. He ran well, finishing 7th. I gave him another warmup at the same track, and he finished 5th. Then we brought him to St. Cloud where he basically annihilated the field.

Since he hadn’t run in so long, the handicappers were good to us. They dropped his rating to 25.5, which allowed us the perfect entry at St. Cloud. He has picked up three kilos now so stands at 28.5, and the prize money of 10,500 euros (which was inflated to more than 16,000 with the addtion of the French owners’ premium) priced him out of the market for the races I had planned to run next with him. No matter. I think he will easily run to a rating of 30 or 31 before we run into trouble. He may run again at the end of this week in Maisons-Laffitte. He seems to want to make up for lost time.

Today could be an important day for U.S. racing. Joe Drape and company published the second part of the New York Times series on fatalities in racing, coinciding with a Congressional hearing on performance-enhancing drugs in horses. This article looks quite a bit more well-researched, and consequently quite a bit more damning, than the first article. It really paints a horrible picture of the claiming game in America. If you don’t read any other part of the article, have a look at the graphic of what was injected into a single horse in the week before a race that turned out to be the horse’s last. He broke down and was euthanized on the track. There must be at least $800 worth of pharmaceuticals here, and some counteract the effects of others. Hyaluronic acid, for example, is a regenerative product that mimics the fluid in the joints. Methylprednisolone is a corticosteroid, which offers dramatic relief from joint pain but tears down the cartilage in the process. Adequan helps stop that deterioration. Bute and flunixin are powerful anti-inflammatory drugs that can make a lame horse appear sound. Here is the most horrifying aspect of all of this: Every one of those drugs is considered a legal, “therapeutic” medicine in race horses in the United States, so therefore that horse wouldn’t even have failed a post-race dope test, if he were still alive to take one.

And still, a vocal majority of trainers and veterinarians in the States argue that it would be inhumane to do otherwise. We barbarians here in Europe and most of the rest of the world are abusing our horses by forcing them to run with absolutely no pharmaceuticals in their system on race day. Really. How could we? How could we possibly wait until our horses are sound without the aid of drugs to race them? We should be ashamed of ourselves.

Another common argument across the pond is that eliminating drugs would cut the “little guy” out of the sport. Horses that aren’t good enough to run stakes races, but must earn their living at the lower levels of racing couldn’t possibly do it without pharmaceutical help, they say. Here’s what I have to say: Bullshit. I’ve got a yard full of “little guys,” who are having plenty of fun racing horses at lower levels on hay, oats and water. Yes, they see an occasional vet bill. They will never, ever spend a fraction of what the “little guy” in America has to spend on vet bills alone, never mind the training fees.

I am very lucky to have owners who are in the sport for the right reason: to enjoy themselves in the company of the noble thoroughbred. I am doing my utmost to keep their horses in the money, and we all dream of hitting upon the Big Horse. But the reality is that we’re thrilled when a horse pays its way. Horses cost money. Keeping horses costs even more money. There is a reason it is called the Sport of Kings. If you are looking for a return on your investment, buy a bond and leave the poor horses alone.

Deep Ocean went to Longchamp yesterday with just about everything against him: He had picked up four kilos in the handicap, which meant he had to run against open company rather than in a limited handicap; the track was very heavy, and Deep also would have to negotiate the famous “descente”, the downhill slope into the “false” stretch before turning into the final stretch and galloping all the way to the second post – about 600 meters. It was the second division of the big “Tierce” handicap on a Sunday at France’s premiere racecourse. All the good horses were there. But good old Deep showed us that he is a serious racehorse. He was well back in the field coming into the straight, because his jockey had to steady him up and slow him down on the downhill part of the course. On top of that, he was blocked in traffic. He looked like he had a bit in the tank, but couldn’t get out. Until he could. And then he started to fly past horses and made up enough ground to finish fourth, just stealing it at the post. He was well-beaten for the first two places, but only two lengths off third and leaving everyone else behind. It was an amazing showing, considering how poorly placed he was in the handicap here and how heavy the ground rode. I realize fourth isn’t a win, but it showed me he can win off this mark, which is important. He’ll have to wait a bit for another chance, because there are no decent entries coming up for him. He came back in great form and the manger was licked clean not five minutes after I’d put the food down.

Next up, the race many of us have been awaiting for quite awhile: Hard Way at St. Cloud, on Saturday. I think we’ll have a pretty good crowd of supporters on hand to cheer him on – it’s been a long road back for him.

Fifth place seems to be our spot for the moment. Hard Way went back to Lisieux on April 15th for a second warm-up gallop and snagged a tiny check in the process, finishing fifth. He seemed to have a good time, and certainly took our amateur jockey for a rodeo ride going down to the post. He was ridden by a “gentleman rider” who was making only his second start, and Hard Way made sure it was a memorable one, leaping through his usual routine when let loose on the track. He galloped along freely in third, then made his move on the final turn, taking the lead. By that point in the 2,600-meter race, our poor jockey was cooked, and couldn’t really push him to the finish. Hard Way, thinking he had already won the race on his own, merely galloped out and hung on to 5th place in the 14-runner field. He seems in fantastic shape, and I’m really looking forward to seeing him race at St. Cloud on May 5, his next target. This will be his first serious race since August of 2010.

Milly, meanwhile, also ran 5th, on Saturday in Argentan. The first two home were unbeatable, but I thought we might be third, and we might have been if the race had any pace. Instead, they crawled along for the first 2,000 meters of the 2,500-meter race and then sprinted for home. Milly ran with them decently, though, and hung on to a bit of cash in the process. She seems to take her racing very well and might possibly run back this coming Friday in Fontainebleau. I hadn’t planned to run both races, but she doesn’t have another decent entry until the end of May and she seems to have come back from Argentan in good shape. We still have 48 hours to commit, so we’ll see how she seems.

If not, our next runner is likely to be Deep Ocean at Longchamp on Sunday. He has picked up four kilos in the handicap because of his win in Lyon, so the task will not be easy. Plus the ground at Longchamp is sodden at the moment and the rain that has been pelting us for weeks shows no sign of stopping. I don’t think heavy ground will exactly been Deep Ocean’s preference. Somebody please turn on the sun lamp!

Little Milly is a maiden no more; she won this past Sunday in Lisieux, battling to keep a neck in front of 13 other runners, all of whom considerably bigger than she is! Lisieux is a country track in Normandy, decently designed and with a tape start rather than starting gates. Milly (Surrey Storm) handled it like a pro and got a great ride from Tristan Normand, who sent her to the front at just the right time. She’s a tough little horse, and she pinned her ears back and held off two or three fast finishers.

It was an easy maiden, with most of the other runners fist-time starters, but there were some decent pedigrees there and time will tell just how easy it was. If we see the horses who finished behind her running in decent rates, that helps us. It was great to get the maiden win for the catalog page – Milly is by Montjeu out of a stakes-winning Dansili mare and she is a first foal, so she definitely added value to the family on Sunday. It was also really great to see her owners back in the winner’s circle. They have been wonderful faithful clients, but it’s been too long since they’ve won.

The other big news of the week is the return of Hard Way, who finished 7th of 14 runners in a little handicap in Lisieux. Hard Way is a special horse. I retired him more than a year ago after we discovered that he had a crushed first vertabra and was basically lucky to be alive. We have no idea how or when it heppened, and chances are he was already racing with the injury when he ran his last race for me, at Clairefontaine in August of 2010 (with Olivier Peslier up, no less!). He had six months off, a treatment of Tildren and then had another MRI scan, which showed that the damage had healed into a bony mass and that nothing was touching the spinal cord. (Oh, and by the way, he also has a slight case of wobbler’s syndrome, but that was secondary.) He was given the green light to resume training. I considered it, but decided to retire him instead. Hard Way had other ideas.

Hard Way was orphaned in the days after foaling, and was raised with a nurse mare, who was a draft horse. Consequently, he didn’t socialize with the other thoroughbreds in the field, and I’m pretty convinced he thinks he’s a draft horse, too, maybe just a little faster than your average Clydesdale. Over the winter, Hard Way actually grows so much hair he has feathering on his legs, and he could certainly pass for something ready to pull the milk cart. He was absolutely miserable turned out with the other retirees, and when I saw him last fall, he seemed pretty much begging me to take him back home. I did, and he strutted into the yard like he was ready to head back to Longchamp. By January, it was clear he would race again, and by last week, he seemed pretty ready. The race in Lisieux was too short for him, but I didn’t want to over-extend him his first time out. He ran very well, and was passing horses charging toward the finishing post. He’s come back in great nick, and he will head out to the same racecourse on April 15 for another easy spin, this one longer, and I think he’ll be ready to get serious and take on the big tracks starting in May.

It’s great to have him back. He’s always been sort of the yard mascot, and we’re all looking forward to seeing what happens this year. He gets to decide where and when he wants to race. We’re just along for the ride.

I have had my differences over the years with the New York Times, my former employer via the International Herald Tribune, but there are some things they still do well. While the old gray lady seems to prefer to spend money on lavish executive bonuses rather than gathering and reporting the news, they still have a reserve for funding investigative reporting, and they recently threw a packet at a series looking at the U.S. racing industry. The first installment (of how many, I’m not sure) was released over the weekend, and it has caused quite a stir. I’m only worried it isn’t causing enough of one. There were about 100 comments on the Times’ web site in the first hours after publication, and there are about 480 now. The pace has slowed dramatically in the past few days.

My friends at the Paulick Report are following it pretty closely, and there is a good debate going on over there, but one would expect that since the site is a gathering place for people either connected to the industry or dedicated fans and gamblers (a dying breed, to be sure).

The first article was pretty sensational, but it had to be to get the point across: Fatal accidents are rife in American racing, much moreso than elsewhere in the racing world, and the major difference between the United States and the rest of the world is the allowance of various medications to be in a horse’s system on race day. I have been crusading against race-day medication in America pretty much since I learned about racing as a journalist and certainly since I became a trainer. I remember very well a few long conversations with Joe Drape on the subject when we met up at the Dubai World Cup in 2007. He had never really thought much about the prevalence of Lasix use or the fact that most other jurisdictions banned such drugs. I expounded that I didn’t think it was right that most horses racing in America had two or three injections for breakfast on race day. That planted the seed.

A few high-profile accidents (Eight Belles or Barbaro, anyone?) and one Big Brown later, and people started to wake up to the difference. When the unfortunate Barbaro was put down, I was asked to write a European perspective for the Times, which I did. At the time, I didn’t feel I could hit the subject as hard as Joe and his team have now done, but if you read my story, all of the same issues are raised. And therein lies the problem. There has been endless talk of the problems plaguing U.S. racing and plenty of pledges to do better. But nothing has changed.

I applaud the new Times series, and I hope – yet again – that something can change. But given the track record of those in charge of the sport, I’m not optimistic. Still, I add my voice, yet again, to those who know that racing CAN truly be the sport of kings, with thoroughbreds from age-old bloodlines competing on their merits, rather than on those of their veterinarian.