These are not your typical trivia questions, as they are meant to be informative and fun even more than testing your knowledge of racing, They are just put in question form. Some are fairly easy, but there are others that are more offbeat. So have fun with them. I will provide the answers to the questions no one gets in the comments section on Thursday. Remember, there is no fun Googling it. If you don't know the answer, guess or just wait until Thursday. It will be more fun that way....
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I have never taken a puff of a cigar, but the smell is intoxicating, bringing me back to my childhood and Ebbetts Fields and my Uncle Sam's cigars, and then later Yankee Stadium and then the old Madison Square Garden on 50th Street. Those were the special places of my youth where the smell of cigar smoke blended so perfectly with the smell of beer and mustard. Soon those three aromas would come together in the grandstand of Aqueduct Racetrack, which was only eight years old when I first inhabited it in 1967....
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Secretariat, Dr. Fager, Affirmed, Hoist the Flag, Cougar II, and now Maximum Security. This is quite an elite group, and to be included would link you with four Hall of Famers and five champions. But, alas, in this context it is a list trainers and owners would prefer not to be on. You see, all these horses were disqualified from first in major stakes; some warranted, some questionable, and some extremely...
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Fifty Years. Half a century. A lifetime ago. Seems like yesterday. There is something about anniversaries, excluding weddings and births, that make us remember events we normally don't give that much thought to. When you reach way back and pull out a 50th anniversary, it brings your life into perspective. There is no year in memory that evokes more nostalgia and brings back historical events than 1969...
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Dr. Fager emerged from his street brawl in the United Nations Handicap in good shape, despite having to withstand the fight of his life against the tenacious Advocator, the 134 pounds on his back, and the 22-pound weight concession to his adversary. But, unlike his previous races, the Doc was not ready to come back in only 17 days to face his arch rival Damascus in the Woodward Stakes. John Nerud had...
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The only world Dr. Fager had not conquered was the grass. ...
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Everyone knew the world record was in jeopardy as soon as Nerud announced his plans to ship to Arlington, despite Dr. Fager being assigned 134 pounds....
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Racing fans had been clamoring for a rematch between racing's two titans since the previous September when Damascus crushed Dr. Fager, as well as reigning Horse of the Year Buckpasser, in the Woodward Stakes to clinch 3-year-old and Horse of the Year honors....
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No horse has ever excelled at as many facets of the sport in one year as did the legendary Dr. Fager, who combined world-record speed from seven furlongs to a mile and a quarter, despite carrying staggering weights all year; won world-class stakes on dirt and grass; and won major stakes on both coasts and in the Midwest....
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Boy, do we have some amazing 50th anniversaries in Thoroughbred racing to look forward to in 2018; anniversaries of some of the greatest horses in history, some of the most amazing performances, and certainly one of the most controversial stories of the century. Many of these will be addressed in columns throughout the year....
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So, one must ask: When is a mile not a mile? In a pure horse racing sense it is a mile run around two turns instead of the more traditional flat mile around one turn....
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Why spend a million dollars on an untried yearling with an uncertain future when you can buy a piece of history that will endure forever? We're not talking just any piece of history, but items that represent three superstars of The Turf, Secretariat, Dr. Fager, and Arts and Letters. ...
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It is 2017. That means it's been 50 years since Thoroughbred racing entered, encompassed, and changed my life, altering its course forever. It pulled me out of the frenzied, often cutthroat world of Wall Street and brought to my life a passion and a spirit I had never experienced before....
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If only he had been given the opportunity, how fast could Dr. Fager have run that day?...
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The date September 30 is so ingrained in my mind I sometimes have to pause for a second so I don't confuse it with the date of my wedding anniversary....
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Could it be the truly great horses of the past simply were faster and were bred to carry their speed longer distances, or could it be that today’s horses are not given the opportunity to set new American dirt records?...
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It was races like the New Hampshire Sweepstakes that came to mind as I looked out over the beautiful Rockingham Park infield for the first and only time. Soon that infield and the grandstand will be gone, taking with it some of the great moments in racing history and some of the sport's greatest innovations....
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But even after all these years, I still treasure those early scrapbooks that helped to preserve my memories of a time when you could actually feel those stories in your hand and protect them from time and the elements as you would a fragile plant or that intricate model of Old Ironsides, with its hundreds of pieces, that it took you weeks to glue together....
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I was cheering the most for Damascus' rare accomplishment of going over the $1 million mark in earnings, becoming only the eighth millionaire in racing history....
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How do you choose the crowning legacy of a person's career, especially when that person is John Nerud, who had so many careers and has left so many legacies it's difficult to single one out?...
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This column is about Titans of the Turf, both equine and human. It is about Dr. Fager and Damascus and John Nerud and Frank Whiteley....
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"Horseplayers," mainly Team Rotondo (Peter Rotondo Sr. and Jr. and Lew Davis), brings me back to a time long ago in my life; a time of smoke-filled busses and a cacophony of thick Brooklyn accents moaning about the double they almost hit and how "da faw hawse is a lock in da toid." OK, that was a bit exaggerated, but effective nonetheless....
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A set of yearlings strutting across a grassy field in pairs, as dripping strands of Spanish moss hang over their heads....
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In 1968, racing fans had been clamoring for a rematch between racing's two titans, Damascus and Dr. Fager....
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What they have in common is they all carry the John Nerud influence in their pedigree, mainly through the descendents of Fappiano and Dr. Fager and continuing through Unbridled and Quiet American. It is the last two on which we will concentrate, as they both reflect the true genius of Nerud, who celebrated his 100th birthday this year. What is ironic is that Nerud never believed in the Derby and ran only one horse in the race -- Gallant Man in 1957....
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