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For racing fans, the stars aligned for Curlin, the 2007 Horse of the Year, to return and race at age 4. Now, for just the sixth time since the Eclipse Awards were first handed out in 1971, a runner has repeated as Horse of the Year. Curlin Slide Show Curlin Had ...

Courtesy of Becky Johnston The first bet I ever placed at a track (Birmingham Race Course), I bet on a Fred Hooper owned horse, Florida-bred Shuttle Jet, and I won.  The first time I went to a Florida racetrack (Calder), a Fred Hooper bred and raced horse paid for the trip.My Florida employer told me of dating Mr. Hooper’s granddaughter ...

What do the following horses have in common? Secretariat, Seattle Slew, Spectacular Bid, Affirmed, Alydar, Damascus, Buckpasser, Easy Goer, Riva Ridge, Holy Bull, Spend a Buck, and Swale?  All of them, despite having run at a mile or longer as a 2-year-old, made their 3-year-old debut going seven furlongs or shorter.  In recent ...

The Keeneland January horses of all ages sale is a barometer of, well, nothing. Most years, that is.Unless there is a major dispersal or unless the odd high-priced broodmare or two end up in the January sale rather than in the larger and more prestigious November auction, January normally contains a hodgepodge of mostly middle- and lower-end ...

Before we get to this past week’s races, there is a pedigree pattern developing this year that you don’t normally see to this degree. We can talk all we want about the A.P. Indys and Unbridled’s Songs and other top-class stallions, but as we’ve often seen in recent years it is the female family that is most influential in getting our ...

Rather than just have them disappear from the blog, I want to let everyone know that I will be concentrating on my Ky. Derby Trail columns and Derby Watch and Derby Spotlight features and am putting the historical blogs on hold for a while.I want to thank everyone for their support and encouragement regarding those blogs and for all the kind ...

It was the night before the 1985 Kentucky Derby (gr. I), and I had been invited to dinner at Hasenour’s in downtown Louisville, Ky., by Joe Hirsch. I had been working for Daily Racing Form for a year but had met Joe for the first time just a few weeks earlier at another of his favorite dining spots, Stanley Demos’ Coach House in Lexington.Since ...