Jimmy Toner might keep a low profile, but his horses are easy to spot, especially in the morning. Just look for those bright orange bandages. Long before trainers began equipping their exercise riders with distinctive vests for easy identification during morning training, Toner was wrapping his horses’ legs in those bandages, mirroring the orange “JJT”…
Training hours are coming to an end on a March morning at Palm Meadows in Boynton Beach, Florida. A lot of outfits have already shipped at least some of their horses north, to New York or Kentucky or Toronto, and quiet sinks over much of the training center. Not so much at Barn 11, one…
On the Thursday after the Belmont Stakes, Belmont Park was nearly deserted. A sparse weekday crowd dotted the apron; upscale specialty cocktails were nowhere to be found; attire tended to denim rather than linen, and the hats adorning people’s heads bore not flowers and ribbons, but the insignias of sports teams. None of that mattered…
The first Kentucky Derby, in 1875, was won by Aristides. On his back was a black jockey, Oliver Lewis; the man who trained him, Ansel Williamson, was also black. Five years earlier, Kingfisher had won the Belmont Stakes, ridden by Edward Brown, trained by Raleigh Colston, both men who had been born into slavery. That…
When Leah Gyarmati first went to the racetrack, she didn’t go willingly. As a 16-year-old, she reluctantly took a job as a hotwalker in the Belmont Park barn of Hall of Fame trainer H. Allen Jerkens at the behest of her father, who wanted her to earn some money to pay her horse show bills.…
A picture might be worth a thousand words, but if those words are coming from Tom Durkin, they command a far higher price. Soporific. Obstreperous. Oracular. The kind of words that used to be called $10 words, SAT words, the kind of words that might get you a bemused look if you use them in…
He arrived late. His luggage was lost. He rode in borrowed boots. He got sick. He had to leave early. But it was worth it. “100 percent,” said Frankie Dettori of his weekend trip to ride for the first time at Saratoga Race Course. “It was always my ambition to get here,” he said Monday,…
Heady words, from a man who should know. Roberts writes about the history and architecture of racetracks, recently collaborating with the New York Racing Association and the Saratoga Springs Preservation Foundation, creating an inventory of Saratoga’s buildings and landscape. With Isabelle Taylor, he publishedThe Spa: Saratoga’s Legendary Racecourse, an architectural history of the track that…
On Friday, the United States will celebrate its independence, 231 years after a fledgling, underdog nation beat the British on these shores, driving them back to England in defeat. On Saturday, Belmont Park will honor that independence with the inaugural “Stars and Stripes Festival,” inviting the English—along with the French and the Irish—back for another…
Racing fans that pulled the Kentucky Derby/Preakness infield double were treated on both days to stupendously beautiful weather, a range of high- and low-end hospitality offerings (and behavior), and terrific racing. Preakness infield denizens were treated to concerts by Lorde and a handful of other musical acts, but if the Churchill Downs infield crowd didn’t…
Brooklyn Backstretch 