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There are different weapons horses use to win a race, and the key is to get a chance to use those weapons. But sometimes the battlefield is not conducive to a particular weapon. In the case of Gunnevera, he has one main weapon, and that is a wicked turn of foot and an explosive move on the far turn. As powerful a weapon as that can be, it is ...

A few days after new standards for tax reporting and withholding of big wins in pari-mutuel wagering were put in place Sept. 28, professional horseplayer Mike Maloney hit a Pick 6 that returned $46,000. Even though he was well aware of the new standards—he's been pushing for the changes for 15 years—he recalls an odd feeling when the ticket ...

Few, if any, owners and trainers have been more on a mission to win a single race than Coolmore and Aidan O’Brien when it comes to the Breeders’ Cup Classic, which has eluded them for 17 years. Here they are still trying to avenge the neck defeat of Giant’s Causeway at the hands of Tiznow back in 2000. In between, there has been another ...

By J. Keeler Johnson (''Keelerman'') Twitter: @J_Keelerman  Pre-entries for the 34th running of the Breeders' Cup were released yesterday morning, giving handicappers a few days to analyze the prospective fields before final entries and post positions are announced on Monday. Since it's never too early to start planning wagering ...

So here is trainer Brian Lynch’s dilemma. He has a brilliantly fast grass horse named Oscar Performance who used that brilliance to win the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf last year. The colt then overcame a rocky start to his 3-year-old campaign by having a terrific summer, stretching out to a mile and a quarter. But when stretched out to a mile and ...

 By: Erin Shea, @BH_EShea   Often we hear stories of off-track Thoroughbreds winning hunter/jumper classes, competing in the upper levels of eventing, and even taking home prizes in barrel racing competitions, but it's not as common to see them become police mounts, typically a job that's reserved for warmbloods or draft ...

The big preps for this year’s Breeders’ Cup have come and gone. Grade 1 races were going off at the drop of a hat—and that hat was dropping all the time—earlier this month at Belmont Park, Keeneland, and Santa Anita. To us there’s no better month for racing than October with its more predictable and temperate weather. Yet, the three biggest names ...

You know it's been a tough time in Thoroughbred racing when the best news heard all week is that a big-name horse has been suffering from stomach ulcers. With the tragic and unexpected deaths of Effinex and Irap and the retirement of last year's 2-year-old champion Classic Empire, racing needed some good news as we approach the Breeders' ...

Greatness is a tricky thing. We don’t know exactly from where it emanates and why some are born with it and some are not. Perhaps it starts deep within and then makes its way to the surface. But sometimes that journey is blocked by obstacles and never quite makes it. In the case of Classic Empire, there is no doubt the greatness was there. ...

This is a recent Dollars and Sense column, which appears weekly in BloodHorse Daily, typically Friday. The success enjoyed on opening weekend at Keeneland by horses who made their previous start at Kentucky Downs serves as the latest example of the improving quality of horses competing at the lucrative September meet in Franklin, Ky. Horses who ...