Lots of people consider their pets part of their families. And while a racehorse might not exactly fit into the category of “pet,” that doesn’t change how trainer Ron Moquett and his family feel about Whitmore, the seven-year-old gelding that will make his 35th start in Saturday’s Grade 1, $250,000 Alfred G. Vanderbilt Stakes. “My…
At 9 A.M. on a chilly Saturday morning, the farm at first seems quiet. The parking lot is largely empty, devoid of visitors who will begin to arrive soon after the noon opening, and on first glance, it might seem impossible that the 15-acre facility a short drive from Saratoga Springs houses 17 retired Thoroughbreds.…
On July 31, 2006, a 3-year-old black horse named Songster made his Saratoga debut in the Grade 2 Amsterdam Stakes. The Darley-owned colt was already a graded stakes winner: he achieved that when he won the Grade 3 Hirsch Jacobs Stakes on the Preakness undercard, crushing the field by 10 lengths. Three weeks later, he took the Grade 2…
There is a Genaro family tradition of heading to the harness track in Saratoga on the Saturday after Thanksgiving for an afternoon of simulcasting, and in 2007, I joined my father and brother for the first time, setting up shop on the second floor and settling in for a day of wagering on Aqueduct, Laurel,…
The Olympics are as much about stories as they are about competition. The athlete who overcame adversity. The rags-to-riches story. The “discovery” of a diamond in the rough. A bit of heartbreak, a lot of sacrifice. As they say in the world of Thoroughbred auctions, Blackfoot Mystery ticks all those boxes. And like the world…
We’ve been spoiled. Over the last few years, the rain has avoided Saratoga like a gambler avoids an overbet bad favorite, but over the last few days, the wet stuff has descended like punters on a Pletcher firster. We’ve been off the turf for two days, and Tuesday isn’t looking much better. Fortunately, there’s plenty…
Two years ago, on the advice of bloodstock agent Tom McGreevy, Fox Hill Farm’s Rick Porter entered the bidding fray in the Humphrey S. Finney Pavilion at the Fasig-Tipton yearling sale in Saratoga, trying to add a dark bay Medaglia d’Oro filly to his already prodigious list of stakes-winning fillies and mares. Four-hundred thousand dollars…
In early March, Emily Daignault-Salvaggio logged onto Facebook and saw that her friend Bev Strauss, the co-founder and president of Mid-Atlantic Horse Rescue, had tagged her in a post. When she clicked on it, her heart sank. Staring at her from the screen was a familiar face, a chestnut horse that she had, months earlier,…
When Jack O Liam left New York in March, the 3-year-old son of Lookin At Lucky was a maiden. A veteran of six races in which he’d never been better than third, he started his career in the barn of Gary Contessa, who shipped him south to run at Laurel after a string of New…
At a Sept. 1 summit presented by the New York State Gaming Commission on racehorse aftercare, the New York Racing Association pledged that it would donate $5 per start at its tracks to the Thoroughbred Aftercare Alliance. NYRA follows in the footsteps of the New York Thoroughbred Horsemen’s Association, which in 2014 began contributing $5…
Brooklyn Backstretch 