Happy New Year. It’s 2024. Got resolutions? This year, I resolve to have a concrete idea for each of these columns – a subject, a point, a declaration, an opinion.
As a friend used say when we coached Little League baseball and our team found yet another unique way to lose a game, “I don’t care who you are, that’s funny.”
Maybe we can start next month, because this thing jumps around like a nervous foxhunter who just saw his first emu.
Library Magic
I made it to the Maryland Horse Library and Education Center. Finally. Beltway traffic is not my friend so I’m not a regular in Reisterstown, but I attended the holiday open house in December and finally got a look at the place.
In short, it’s a winner. In long, I can’t wait to get back. The books, all the books, are there of course but it’s just a great spot with its sky-blue vaulted ceiling, tall windows, reading loft, research room, audio room and so on. For years, I heard Cricket Goodall talk about creating such a facility. She and the team, spurred by the Maryland Horse Breeders Association board and a slew of generous donors, created a lasting home base that will serve the industry. Don’t be like me, get there soon and spend the day – be prepared to get lost in old chart books if nothing else (that Avalon Beach/Guy showdown at Delaware Park in 1978 was something).
No Change
Ain’t Da Beer Cold won the Maryland Million Classic Oct. 14, and again Dec. 14 when an appeal to the Maryland Racing Commission was dropped by Market Maven’s trainer Jamie Ness and owner Gregory Gordon.
Market Maven edged Ain’t Da Beer Cold by a neck in the $150,000 race at Laurel Park, but bumped his rival in deep stretch and was disqualified by the stewards after an objection lodged by Ain’t Da Beer Cold’s jockey Jevian Toledo. In Maryland, stewards’ decisions can be appealed to the racing commission – owner/breeder Vivian Rall lost a Maryland Million race this way in 2020 – but all states don’t work like that. In Kentucky and some others, stewards’ decisions about matters pertaining to the running of a race are final.
Participants can appeal fines, suspensions, medical issues, whatever, but a race declared official stays that way. That’s the way it should be. Stewards, agree with them or not, are trained to make decisions about races. Their decisions about races should be final.
None of that condones bad decisions. Stewards should be constantly trained, educated and evaluated. They should also be free to make final decisions without worrying about an appeal.
Pedigree Surfing
By no means am I qualified to evaluate Thoroughbred pedigrees, but I nevertheless find them fascinating to study and I frequently find regional connections where I don’t expect them.
New Pennsylvania stallion Cloud Computing raced in the Mid-Atlantic just once, his 2017 Preakness Stakes-G1 win, but his roots run deep in the region. Maryland owner/breeder/trainer/veterinarian Dr. William Wright bred much of Cloud Computing’s female family including his third and fourth dams Ameriangel and Ameriturn. Wright’s mother-in-law Allaire duPont bred fifth dam Fanrigo. Frequently bred to Maryland stallions, they’re the dams of regional stakes horses T.V. Highlights and Amerkingdom from the 1970s among others. Maryland-bred Ameriangel produced Grade 1 winner Halo America, whose sire Waquoit stood in Maryland.
Rookie New Jersey stallion Invader’s pedigree starts out with an international flavor thanks to his dam Say (Ire), but returns to the United States and even runs through the region via generations cultivated by the Schiff family’s Fox Ridge Farm. In addition to Grade 1 winners Riskaverse, Plugged Nickle, Tonalist and Havre de Grace, Invader is related to steeplechase winners Petroski and Devil’s Egg who raced for Fox Ridge and Maryland trainer Tom Voss.
Another Jersey rookie, Max Player, is out of Maryland-bred Fools in Love. Bred by Bob Manfuso and Katy Voss, the daughter of Not For Love sold for $80,000 at Timonium as a yearling (she later sold for $1 million as a broodmare). Her dam, the French Deputy mare Parlez, produced seven winners including Maryland Million victors D C Dancer and No More Talk in addition to multiple graded winner International Star.
Colonial Revival
In 1970, Marion duPont Scott pushed her chips – and her clout – to the center of the table and created the Colonial Cup International Steeplechase. The first $100,000 jump race in the world lured 22 runners to Springdale Race Course in Camden, S.C.
DuPont and the other leaders of the day wanted to backstop jump racing after the New York tracks cut back on steeplechasing. They succeeded.
Americans Top Bid, Shadow Brook and Jaunty went 1-2-3, but that year’s Cheltenham Gold Cup winner L’Escargot finished fourth for Ireland. Australian star Crisp, en route to England where he would win the 1971 Queen Mother and place second in the 1973 Grand National at Aintree, finished sixth. French Tan, second to L’Escargot at Cheltenham, finished 13th. Tingle Creek, soon to be one of England’s most popular steeplechasers, was 14th. Irish Grand National winner Herring Gull refused to start.
The November race, 2 3⁄4 miles over packed pine fences and later the standard national fences, lasted 47 runnings through 2016. The Cup ran in the spring of 2018, then went on hiatus and looked gone forever. It returns this year, Nov. 17, thanks to sponsor Mullikin Law and the Carolina Cup Racing Association.
The race founder would be proud.
