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It hit me between 2:30 and 3 in the morning. Having fallen asleep on the couch as usual, I awoke to a mellifluous voice flowing from the TV. The voice spoke of horses and racing, and after a few seconds of unscrambling my brain, I remembered that I had been watching one of my favorite racing shows, “Against the Odds,” on HRTV and must have dozed ...

As has been customary the last several seasons, a standing room only audience gathered in Fasig-Tipton’s Humphrey S. Finney pavilion for the Hall of Fall induction ceremony on Friday morning.  Sam the Bugler, wearing an outfit that was not what you’d expect─his red coachman’s coat and top hat─but a black polo shirt with the uneven tails ...

One of the meet’s best innovations has been having jockeys sign autographs and pose for photos on Thursday mornings at breakfast on the Clubhouse Porch. Considering the good that the program serves all people involved, you would hope that NYRA could figure out how to get it in an extra day or two a week. “We’ll do even better when more ...

The name Medaglia d’Oro has become elite in breeding circles, as the sire of the great Rachel Alexandria and the highest-priced yearling ($1,575,000) at the recent Fasig-Tipton Saratoga sales. In short, Medaglia d’Oro has emerged as a powerful force -- in the breeding shed and the sales ring. This was a natural progression from a successful ...

Breeders' Cup announced it will hold its two-day championship event at Santa Anita Park in 2013, for the second year in a row. Nothing against Santa Anita, but as a fan, I liked the Breeders' Cup a lot more when it rotated its venue every year. The rotation that went California-New York-Kentucky-Random Track was perfect. Every ...

Triassic, the dam So You Think, in April 2012 I recently had the opportunity to interview Cecile Smith, owner of Piper Farm and co-breeder of Australian champion and 10-time group I winner So You Think (NZ) (TrueNicks). Cecile owns So You Think's dam, the 22-year-old Tights mare Triassic, who is currently in foal to Medaglia d'Oro ...

Mechanicville, N.Y. has 5,000 residents. One in 10 attended Ray Price’s 15th annual “Stakes at Saratoga” party in the backyard of Saratoga Racecourse.   “I started with 10 people,” Price explained. “By the third year I had enough people coming that I began to make tee-shirts.”   Tee-shirts commemorating Ray Price's party hang between ...

The media took about a nanosecond to realize that both trainer Roger Attfield and jockey John Velazquez, who teamed up to win Monday’s feature race with Kissable, were about to enter the Hall of Fame on Friday.  Attfield sent Kissable down from Woodbine for the 1 ½-mile, $100,000 Richmor Aviation Waya Stakes. He proved to be more than a man ...

(Originally published in the August 11, 2012 issue of The Blood-Horse magazine. Feel free to share your own thoughts and opinions at the bottom of the column.) By Evan Hammonds - @BH_EHammonds on Twitter In this issue Steve Haskin presents his list of the top 10 geldings of the last 75 years. While few could argue about the top ...

(Originally published in the August 11, 2012 issue of The Blood-Horse magazine. Feel free to share your own thoughts and opinions at the bottom of the column.)  If there was a horse-for-the-course in the $200,000 Pennsylvania Governor’s Cup Handicap July 28 at Hollywood Casino at Penn National Race Course, it was Kyma, a 4-year-old ...