Thursday, June 19, 2008

Sometimes Second is a Success

We had quite a crowd tonight in the paddock. A friend of our partner Mike came over with her two little kids and partner Laura and her boyfriend Steve brought a large contingent as well. It was fantastic and made for a lot of electricity in the paddock. I wasn't near as nervous as I usually am before a race and I had a sense of confidence that I haven't felt before either. We were third choice in the betting and after that last race, I thought we stood a good chance of nailing this field.

When the gates broke, so did Fizzy Pop. So far so good. A nice clean start and away we went, but it wasn't long before Fiz got into trouble. Fizzy races the best when he can close, but today he refused to settle down and was climbing into the bit the first time past the stands and faded quickly to eighth and last.

Turning down the backstretch Fizzy finally settled into stride, but we still trailed the field. I held out some hope as the fraction were :23.33 and :47.2 - honest for a mile race, but jockey Dean Butler could not find a hole on the inside. Turning for home, we were still dead last and still no hole was opening. At one point there looked like there was a slight hole, but it closed so quickly I'm glad Dean didn't give it a shot. Dean fanned 7 wide in the stretch and then came flying! We were picking horses off one a time, but the wire was closing in quickly. Thirty to one longshot Mr. Playwright won the race, but Fizzy made it to second, 1 3/4 lengths back. A mile and a sixteenth and it was ours, but the race was a mile and so was second money.

I was disappointed for a second, but I bounced back pretty quickly. As tough as he had it early and as far out of it as we were, he and Dean did one heckuva job getting up for second. As long as he comes back well, we'll be back against these again soon. Like Bernell Rhone, our trainer, said jokingly, "He should come back OK, he only really ran a quarter of a mile!"

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

If a hole would have opened up, Fizzy and you would have been posing for pics. It's nice to see him in good form though, and he definitely needs to stay on the grass.

A nice claim indeed for you Ted.

Anonymous said...

Ted, sorry I missed you and the race but due to a commitment for my daughter I was tied up until 8:00pm but I did get there in time to see the replay and it was a heck of a race for Fizzy. Another 1/8 mile and he would've won :-).

I guess the positive (for me) was I saved $8 (my standard trifecta bet) as I never would've had Mr. Playright in the mix.

Congratulations as that was a nice run for Fizzy and you should be excited for his next race.

Theodore L. Grevelis said...

Thanks, gents, I appreciate it. Oncehe settled down he ran a good one. For the time being we feel very confident keeping him in allowance comapny on the grass. Bernell and his team deserve all the credit for getting - and keeping - him sharp.

Anonymous said...

We take our shot on the turf at distance tonight with Parisian Friend so I'm looking forward to that.

Anonymous said...

Novice question.

How do you tell if a horse is on(?) the bit? What does it mean if he is or isn't. Is that good always or never or depends?

I guess that is more than one question.

Thank you.

Theodore L. Grevelis said...

The horse uses a bit that fits between gaps in the teeth in the his mouth that allows the rider to guide the horse. A horse that is said to be 'on the bit' is eager to run, has a hold of the bit and is running well(usually a good thing unless he is really pulling on the bit and won't settle thereby using a lot of energy that will be needed later in the race). A horse is said to have 'spit the bit' when they are just done running and no longer have a hold of it anymore. Always a bad thing.