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I am going to make a case for Bayern and California Chrome for champion 3-year-old and Horse of the Year, starting with Bayern. Chrome’s will come in the next blog. Also Main Sequence. We’ve gone five years now without a male Horse of the Year who raced on dirt. You remember those horses, the ones who used to be voted Horse of the Year pretty ...

The first time I watched the replay of the start of the Breeders’ Cup Classic I was standing on the racetrack, and I let out with an emphatic “Whoa!” So, I can understand how strongly people feel about this. It looked pretty flagrant. But when you really think about it, all the uproar over the incident is not about Bayern’s interference. It’s ...

Electricity crackles through the air whenever an auction horse’s price spins upward through six-figure territory. These are treasured days for breeders. But every bit as galvanizing is the experience breeders and owners of more modest means have when one of their horses gets a shot on a stage as big as the Breeders’ Cup World ...

Ellen Pons, wife of Country Life Farm’s Josh Pons, was six months pregnant and knew she had no business working directly with horses. But she just wanted to help out this one time and felt it was pretty safe just leading out a mare and her one-month-old foal. But that one-month-old, as it turned out, was no ordinary foal. When he eventually was ...

Raise your hands if you think I’m out of my mind saying that Micromanage has a shot in the Jockey Club Gold Cup (gr. I) at a monster price? OK, hands down. I can’t help it, those old-fashioned-type stayers get to me in this modern world dominated by speed. There are a number of good horses entered in the Gold Cup, but no world beaters. The ...

Two days before September 11, 2001, my family and I were returning from Lexington, where we attended “John Henry Day” at the Kentucky Horse Park. As the plane flew along the Hudson River to Newark Airport, out the window we could see the World Trade Center set aglow by the setting sun. We all commented what a magnificent sight it was ...

Subdued optimism best sums up the tenor of the Keeneland September yearling sale’s opening session Sept. 8. Throughout much of the day, trade felt more like Book Three than Book One, lacking an undercurrent of excitement and anticipation that is often present when the best of the best are being sold. Not to say the market was soft or participants ...

With only one prep to go for all the Breeders’ Cup Classic hopefuls, and with a lull in the action, this seems like a good time to get an early glimpse at how the race might shape up and what each horse has to do to give him the best chance of winning and what he has to avoid. There is an old adage in advertising, which goes: “Sell the sizzle ...

Some people are driven by success and will take any path in order to achieve it. Then there are those fortunate few where success comes as the byproduct of following one’s lifelong passion. Treasures may await, but it is finding one’s true path that is the greatest treasure of all. Abigail Adsit is one of those fortunate few. Many little girls ...

Is Shared Belief on the threshold of greatness? From a visual standpoint, he is an anomaly. From the side, his action appears smooth, powerful, and flawless. From the front, he paddles his left front and has done it in all his races, but it has had absolutely no effect on his performance. If Shared Belief indeed is headed for greatness, is ...