Category: Racing

Posted on

Grey’s first outing

Grey Sensation came home sixth of 15 in his Cagnes-sur-Mer debut on Saturday in the 1600-meter (one-mile) handicap, the Prix du Val Carei on Fibresand. Towards the rear after breaking from an unfortunately wide number 12 draw, he made up some late ground to get within 2 1/4 lengths of the victorious Bucentaire, who covered the distance in a quick 1:38.18.

Sent off as the 2.40-1 favorite on the opening day Cagnes card, Grey Sensation was perhaps compromised by a fast early pace and the relatively sticky ground produced by the new Fibresand course at the Hippodrome de la Cote d’Azur. The sharp pace of the race was confirmed in the next event, a good conditions race which was run .26 of a seconds slower than Grey Sensation’s.

Trainer Gina Rarick said: “The way he ran today shows he’d be more comfortable at 2000 meters (1 1/4 miles), and Alexis Badel agreed. He may go next in a handicap at that distance on Jan. 25.” In his previous race last time race at that distance, Grey Sensation had finished a fast finishing third at Deauville. A return to what appears to be a distance he now finds preferble should result in an improved effort.

Posted on

Bleu Astral shows improvement

Bleu Astral showed marked improvement in his second outing for High Street Racing at Deauville on Monday as he finished well to finish ninth in the Prix de Balme, overcoming a number of obstacles in the process.

Cutting back to 1300 meters (6 1/2 furlongs) and breaking from post 14 in the 15-runner claiming event while carrying co-highweight of 61.5 kilos (135 lbs.), ‘Bleu’ broke much more alertly than he did last time, but was taken back by rider Alexis Badel, who angled him over to the rail in a ground-saving move. Still next-to-last approaching the straight, ‘Bleu’ was closing well as the line drew near. In the end he finished 6 1/2 lengths behind the pacesetting winner Super Nothing, who clocked a quick 1:16.80 for the 1300 meters.

“This was a much better effort,” said trainer Gina Rarick. “He was much better out of the gate and carried his head better. It was a promising performance and he should do well next time at Cagnes-sur-Mer going left-handed at a mile or even longer.”

Gina reported that Bleu Astral had come out of the race in good order and suggested that he may be even better when switched back to turf.

Considering his wide draw, the heavy impost which saw him spotting his 14 rivals up to 22 lbs., a 6 1/2-length defeat to a winner who was carrying 15 lbs. less than the High Street Racing inmate must be considered an encouraging performance. At a longer distance and carrying a more competitive weight, there is every chance that Bleu Astral will continue to improve.

Posted on

Bleu Astral returns to Deauville

Bleu Astral makes a quick return for High Street Racing on Monday when he goes in the Prix de Balme on the Deauville fibresand course. The 1300-meter (6 1/2-furlong) claimer is worth 20,000 euros (10,000 euros to the winner).

The race is three furlongs shorter than Bleu Astral’s High Street racing debut at the same track on December 11 when he finished tenth in a 1900-meter (9 1/2-furlong) conditions race, and is also a step or two down in class.

As trainer Gina Rarick explained: “I would have preferred a distance closer to a mile, but we don’t have another entry that is suitable at the moment, so we’ll have to takes this one. I have added sheepskin cheek pieces to help keep him straight and focused. We should look at this race as essentially a second training gallop counting toward his eventual handicap mark.”

“‘Bleu’ did a nice piece of work Thursday,” Gina continued, “and I expect to see a better showing than last time.”

Bleu Astral has been entered for a claiming price of 20,000 euros but Gina does not expect him to be claimed. Carrying highweight of 61.5 kilos (135 lbs.) as he continues to carry a French penalty due to his two victories last summer in Great Britain, he has drawn post 15 in a field of 16 three-year-olds. Post time is 12:15 pm (CET), 11:15 (GMT) and 6:15 am (EST). Alexis Badel retains the ride.

Posted on

Bleu Astral’s first race

Bleu Astral’s first race for High Street Racing at Deauville on Friday resulted in a tenth-place finish, and while that may be disappointing on the face of it, there are a number of positives to be taken from the effort.

Slowly away in the 1900-meter (one-mile, 1 1/2 furlong) Prix de Villepelee on fibresand, Bleu Astral quickly moved up towards a bunched up group at the front, while drifting a bit left under rider Alexis Badel. Never far behind through the backstraight, he faded late as Badel rode him out to the finish. Sent off at 16-1, ‘Bleu’ came home 15 lengths behind the victorious One Foot in Heaven.

“This was a learning experience,” said High Street trainer Gina Rarick, “and we learned something. He needed this race as he hadn’t run since August 28, and he needs a stronger pace than he got today. He came out of the race fine. Before Cagnes-sur-Mer next month, we’ll look for another race at Deauville at 1500 meters (7 1/2 furlongs), which is closer to the one-mile races he won in Britain. We need to get three French races into him before he is given a handicap mark.”

Badel sounded an optimistic note. “He’ll be fine. He has ability,” he said. “I’d ride him again.” The rider also suggested that ‘Bleu’ would do better on a left-handed track like Cagnes-sur-Mer.

One other factor to take into account is that in carrying co-highweight of 59 kilos (130 lbs.), Bleu Astral was spotting his twelve rivals up to 12 lbs., thanks to the odd conditions of the race which dictate that he had to carry a penalty for his two victories last summer in Britain, races that were clearly of a lower value than the Villepelee. There were no earnings gleaned today, but there is promise for the future under different conditions.

Posted on

Bleu Astral to run at Deauville

High Street Racing will have its first runner at Deauville tomorrow (Friday) when Bleu Astral takes on twelve rivals in the Prix de Villepelee, a 1900-meter conditions race on fibresand worth 29,000 euros, 14,500 euros to the winner.

Purchased for 12,750 guineas at the Tattersalls October Horses-in-Training Sale, the 3-year-old son of French 2000 Guineas winner Astronomer Royal will be making his first start since August 28 when he completed a British double while landing a one-mile conditions race on heavy turf at Ffos Las.

On Friday he will be stretching out an additional 1 1/2 furlongs against a rather accomplished field. Bleu Astral has been working well of late on the Maisons-Laffitte gallops, and while trainer Gina Rarick expects a good effort, expectations of victory right off the bat may be premature. First time out we are looking at this race as a re-entry point to determine future races.

Post time is scheduled for 12:30pm (CET), 11:30am (GMT), 6:30am (EST) for American early birds. Bleu Astral will break from an ideal draw of four in the field of 13. Alexis Badel has the ride.

Posted on

Labor pains

The pheasant that could have ended my life this morning chose not to, for which I was grateful. Far away into my own thoughts, I didn’t see him preening alongside the trail until the last second – Hard Way was nearly on top of him, bowling along toward home in a huge extended trot. Too late to stop, all I could do was crouch lower to the saddle and hope he didn’t choose that second to fly off, which would have resulted in me flying too, probably straight into a stone wall. The pheasant stayed put, and Hard Way coasted past – he probably didn’t see him, either.

Continue reading “Labor pains”

Posted on

The agony and the ecstasy of social media

So it seems this blog is all but dead. My fault. Facebook’s fault. I resisted, in the beginning. I hated the idea of Facebook (not least because that was what the New York Times called their personnel directory, which seemed insulting and…well, impersonal). But a few years ago I cracked. My excuse was that I needed to be on Facebook for marketing purposes, which turned out not to be wrong. Facebook has been a useful tool for that. It also has been a colossal time-wasting addiction, but I digress. And it has also eaten my blog.

Facebook, for better or worse, is an extremely quick and easy way for me to update anybody who cares or claims to care about all the comings and goings in the yard, the races, the results and just random tidbits (that would contribute to the time-wasting part). I have a pretty large following there, and I have been resorting to communicating that way instead of by blog, which some of you have actually noticed. To those of you who still check back here regularly, I apologize. And once again, I will try to do better. Meanwhile, if you’re not already signed on to Facebook, just do it. It’s really not so bad. And if you’re paranoid that signing up to Facebook will open your entire private life in every intimate detail to cyberspace, don’t be. Facebook only knows what you want it to know, so just don’t tell it anything. They don’t need to know your birthday, your address or anything else pertinent. You need an email address and a name. That’s pretty much it. Sign up, “friend” me (yes, Facebook has verbed the noun) and I’ll add you to the Gallop France group there and you’ll see everything that’s going on.

Right, so some of you are still resisting. For you guys (all five of you, so I hope you appreciate it!), here’s what’s going on in a nutshell: Hard Way has resisted retirement yet again, and ran a comeback race down in the country yesterday at the ripe old age of nine. He finished third of eight runners. I had hoped he would win, because to say the competition was weak would be the nicest thing you might say. But third still requalifies him for handicaps, and he probably needed the run after six months off. Despite rock-hard ground, he seems to have come back OK.

Gorki Park also ran his comeback race, finally, after nearly six months off, and he came 4th in a 20-runner handicap in Maisons-Laffitte. He looks like he should be just as useful this year as last. He’s grown up a bit and will stretch out in distance this year – if we can find him a decent race, which is easier said than done at the moment. King Driver, our other stable banker, is just back from a short break. He finished third at St. Cloud in mid-May, but chucked off his jockey (twice!) and ran loose for quite some time around the racecourse before he got down to work. That was him telling us as clear as he could that he was ready for a vacation, so he got one. He’s back in training as of tomorrow after having spent a month at the spa  – a stud just north of us that specializes in massages and has a great water-walker to keep the muscle tone while on vacation.

Melrand and Pahlavan also had short stays there, as did Risk Well Taken, an unraced two-year-old who went for two weeks after coming up with sore shins. Risks’s stay there was nothing short of miraculous – she came back nearly 20 kilos heavier and bulging with muscle. Our other unraced two-year-old, Impulsive American, was almost ready to debut when he picked up a virus of some sort, which will set us back a few weeks. Pahlavan and Ray of Hope also got it, but they all seem to be on the mend now.

Charitable Act has been retired; his iffy joints were getting the best of him so we decided to stop while he was still sound enough for pleasure riding. Greatest has also moved on to greener pastures, but is still racing and just finished 2nd for his new connections. We wish him well – I always thought he was a good horse, but we were persistently unlucky with him. Clearly, a change was in order!

La Mer seems finally on track after having just about every problem a growing horse can have. She is back galloping, and will hopefully run a maiden in Deauville in early July. Eternal Gift has finally come down in the handicap to a mark he should be able to win from, and he’ll get a try in Amiens on Saturday. Gut Instinct also should be able to win a small race soon, but she would be better on softer ground. She has some good entries coming up, though, so I’ll have to decide whether to brave the good ground or not.

That rounds up just about everyone, I think. And reading back, I see the other problem Facebook has caused. Since I no longer write much more than a sentence at a time, it seems I’m losing the knack. I’d better get back to it, or I won’t be able to write that novel I’ve been talking about for the past two decades!

Posted on

Winner, winner!

I’ve waited years to finally get a winner at Longchamp, and this month we got two: Hard Way won his handicap two weeks ago, and Eternal Gift followed it up with a win last Saturday. Hard-working Deep Ocean was in the money again this past week, and King Driver ran a fantastic comeback after a year off to finish third. Grey Falcon dropped in a check, too, confirming that the yard is definitely in form.

It’s been a whirlwind couple of weeks. Hard Way followed exactly the same pattern as he did last year: After his comeback race out in the country, he was ready to tackle Paris and found his favorite jockey, Christophe Lemaire, who rode a perfect race to give me my first winner at Longchamp. It was a 3,100-meter handicap, and Hard Way aced it carrying top weight of 60 kilos. His efforts got him back into the Bloodhorse magazine in America, with his longtime fan John Gilmore doing the honors. The next day, Grey Falcon stepped up in class and distance when he ran second division of the Quinte handicap in Maisons-Laffitte, trying 2,400 meters for the first time. He nearly wired it, just getting caught at the post to finish second by a short head. He has been really unlucky not to win yet, but he’s knocking on the door and it should happen soon.

Eternal Gift finally stepped up his game at Longchamp last Saturday, winning a mile handicap by a neck. I knew he was progressing, and he certainly showed us that he preferred the good ground and galloping track of Longchamp to the muddy traffic circle he found in Amiens. It was his third race back after gelding, and I think he’s going to be a useful horse now. He picked up three kilos in the handicap ratings, which isn’t great, but he still has margin for progress.

We barely had time to get him off the truck Saturday night before we loaded up Deep Ocean, Gold Knight and Not Bad for a Boy for the trip down to Vichy and the week-long racing festival there. Deep Ocean finished fourth in the Quinte on Sunday (we were all sure it was third, but there was just the shadow of a nose in front of him), but Not Bad didn’t distinguish himself in his claimer. It was his first race back in a year, though, and he has been a bit sore in the back, so he deserves another chance or two. Gold Knight showed quite a bit of improvement in his claimer on Monday. He didn’t get up into the money yet, but he did give us hope that we’re on the right track.

The star of the week, though, was King Driver, who was coming back after year off almost to the day. He had some serious health problems last year, and I was never able to get him to his potential. He showed that those seem to be behind him now, though, running a strong third. It was a very easy field of 18, and he would have won if he had kept to the rail instead of coming out to the stands side. He is still very green, having run only six races in his life before Wednesday, and there was a good crowd at the track and it was a night meeting, so once he hit the front, he just looked at all the people rather than pay attention to racing. He has come back very well and is likely to run in Deauville in early August.

In between the racing, I went to the Newmarket sales, where we found an addition to the yard optimistically named Greatest. He is a four-year-old gelding by Anabaa out of a stakes-winning mare, and he seems to want soft ground to run his best. So we’ll build him up and get him ready for a fall campaign. A half share in him is available, so contact us if you’re interested.

Next up might be Hard Way and Grey Falcon on Thursday in Chantilly. I don’t particularly want to race them against each other, but they are in the second half of the Quinte handicap and there aren’t many runners declared, so it might be too good to pass up. In any case, I’m pretty sure Hard Way will go, but I’m still undecided about Grey Falcon, who might prefer softer ground. Hard Way is really a soft ground horse, too, but he doesn’t really care what he gallops on as long as he feels good and wants to run. Both will gallop tomorrow morning, and I’ll decide for sure then. All of the horses are struggling a bit with the heat, and storms are forecast for Tuesday, which might make the going a little easier.

After that, we’ll gear up for Deauville in August, although we’ll probably have fewer runners than in July. Competition is tough there, and unless we have very good entries, it makes more sense to wait until September. In any case, the horses will tell me what they want to do. All I have to do is listen.

Posted on

Sunrise waits for a spot

Satwa Sunrise was eliminated from her race this past week so didn’t get a run, but she is certainly ready to race. She’s been working very well, and there’s been no sign of any respiratory distress that would indicate a bleeding problem. (Her previous trainer galloped her on Lasix, even though she couldn’t race on it – thankfully.) Her next entry will be Dec. 21, and we have a priority after being eliminated last time, so hopefully she will get a run. Only a race will really test whether conditioning trumps pharmaceuticals, as I believe it will.

It’s very tough to get into races in Deauville; there were 134 horses entered for Satwa’s race, and 96 start declared for 16 spots. This results in ridiculous “double” and “triple” priorities by the end of the meeting. I hope to race Surrey Storm next Saturday, but there are 71 entered. I have to hope for a lot of forfeits and that France Galop will add a second race.

Deep Ocean was supposed to run next Saturday, too, but he has come down with something and is out for the moment. He had a fever and was coughing this week; we have had a terrible year for viruses even though we have taken every precaution in disinfecting boxes and making sure every horse has their own tack. Vitamin C is helping, too, but it’s been very frustrating. I can take some solace in knowing I’m not alone; there are lots of horses coughing out there in the morning from various yards. I was hoping we had already had our share, and now Deep comes down with it (whatever “it” is – lab results are due back tomorrow).

The rest of the team seem fine, touch wood. Now it’s just a matter of finding the races we need.

Posted on

Breeders’ Cup madness

Can’t help but venting a bit after watching the Breeders’ Cup races last night (or what little of the Breeders’ Cup races Equidia chose to show us). I have to say this year more than ever has left me with the impression that horse racing in the United States has absolutely nothing in common with horse racing anywhere else on the planet. First off, the Americans have shown they have absolutely checked their horse sense at the door with the handling of Announce in the Filly & Mare Turf.

Maxime Guyon was hacking the filly down to the start when she spooked at something and managed to touch a trailer of some sort parked on the track. The contact was all of a split second, and about two seconds later the outrider was over telling Guyon to dismount and unsaddle, because track veterinarians had decided to scratch the horse. One wonders what the hell was a large piece of equipment doing parked on the side of the track? But no matter – Guyon handled the situation very well, and as soon as the filly touched whatever it was behind her, she settled down and moved forward, like a sensible horse will. Apparently there was a tiny cut. There were rumors that it later needed stitches (I’ve seen no confirmation of this).  Clearly the horse was sound, and if a vet had bothered to take a look at the horse, this would have been evident.  And clearly, connections of Announce were paying the price of the ineptitude shown in last year’s Breeders’ Cup when Life at Ten was allowed to race despite every indication that there was a problem.

Earlier, another filly in the sprint, Shotgun Gulch, also was scratched at the gate because a vet apparently saw a sign of lameness when the horse was warming up. How this could happen is beyond me, since the American horses “warm up” with their head twisted toward a lead pony, so they all trot sideways. No news yet on whether anything was actually wrong with the horse.

Obviously, an unsound horse should not be allowed to race. But if the vets stationed around the gates at the Breeders’ Cup are able to make that sort of diagnosis in less than 10 seconds without getting within spitting distance of the horse in question, they are a talented bunch of doctors indeed.

Another thing that always jars me when watching American racing is the loading process at the gate. It seems the gate crew try to outdo each other in proving their testosterone levels by slamming the back of the gate as hard as possible behind the horse, and the more flourish the better. Are they looking for high marks for artistic impression? I do appreciate the speed with which they work, but is it really necessary to do it all with that much yelling, slamming and gesticulating? And don’t get me started on the insanity of crawling up into the gate with the horse and holding his head.

All that mayhem at the gate means they jump out fast and terrified. The first fractions are usually faster than the finish – sort of like watching Arabian racing here. And gunning into those tight turns makes me hold my breath and hope for the best. Then there’s the added unease of knowing nearly all of the horses out there are racing on Lasix and probably Lasix adjunct and anything else permitted by the rules. With all this, I found myself watching the races by peaking through my fingers like a kid at a horror movie.

So what will I be doing tonight? Watching anyway, because I can’t help myself. I have to cheer on Goldikova and see how So You Think adjusts to both dirt and blinkers. Come home in one piece, guys.