Big Time: Lojeski, Servis win MD Million Classic with Pennsylvania-bred Forest Fire

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From December 2019 Issue

Written by Sara Gordon

Shirley Lojeski called her Pennsylvania farm between Philadelphia and Allentown “a small operation,” which makes sense in October. When she’s in the midst of foaling season, helping 25 or so mares deliver, the place feels anything but small.

“Foaling season is a long time and, no, it doesn’t feel small then,” she said. “I’m the night watchman and the day watchman too.”

The work pays off sometimes, especially with a horse like Forest Fire. Foaled at Lojeski Farms in Emmaus, the 4-year-old son of Friesan Fire won a race-long battle with Prendimi to take the $150,000 Maryland Million Classic at Laurel Park Oct. 19. The feature race on the 34th edition of Jim McKay Maryland Million Day, the Classic attracted a big field of 11 but was a two-horse race late.

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Hotshot

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From September 2019 Issue

Written by Cindy Deubler

Maximum Security wins Haskell in delayed scorcher

It’s a bizarre world for this year’s 3-year-old crop. The adventures continued for the 52nd running of the Haskell Invitational at Monmouth Park.
Kicking off the second half of the season with a division still seeking a leader – after the first six months saw disqualifications, loose horses, and champions and classic winners falling by the wayside – the Haskell drew a solid field of seven, led by the most talked-about 3-year-old of the year, Maximum Security.
The Haskell had been moved up one week and a day from its traditional Sunday to accommodate NBC television coverage – as luck would have it, the new date, July 20, was a day of near triple-digit heat and high humidity that shut down every daytime track in the northeast, save one.

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Locals Only: West Virginia-bred Runnin'toluvya nabs big score on home track

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From June 2019 Issue

Written by Tom LaMarra

Despite eight consecutive victories and 11 overall, all at his home track, the West Virginia-bred gelding Runnin’toluyva had something to prove in the most lucrative race of the year at Hollywood Casino at Charles Town Races.

A little more than six months after a smooth front-running score in the $300,000 West Virginia Breeders Classic for state-bred runners, Runnin’toluvya was asked to take on the challenge of the $1 million Charles Town Classic, a Grade 2 event that has attracted its share of big-name invaders with previous wins at the top level of United States racing.

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True Grit

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From October 2019 Issue

Written by Vinnie Perrone

Hardships endured, the Merrymans
hold fast at Anchor and Hope Farm

Watermen knew the perils. Even then, the 1600s, rocky shoals downriver on the Susquehanna left no safe passage to the Chesapeake Bay. The goods they ported, the whiskey, lumber, coal, could be discharged at Creswell’s Ferry, wagoned along bumpy roads and born again to barges on the deep.
Ceding valued freight to offhand agents trundling unsure pathways, sailors thus described the trading gamble: anchor and hope. On a granite bluff above the river, the Creswells built an estate in 1682 and named the stretching acreage Anchor and Hope Farm.

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