Back in the Game...or Writer's Chair

I go ahead and give the blog a fresh, new look and then promptly disappear for 3 weeks! What could possibly be going on that would keep me away 3 weeks missing the Eclipse Awards and a Tabby Lane race preview?

Turns out…a lot!

First off, let me say that it’s been tough to write the last few weeks.  I’ve had some ideas and items that I wished to comment on but I simply could not get myself to sit down at the computer and write.  It could be very well that I was a bit hungover after the Breeder’s Cup, the end of Tabby’s 2011 season, the launch of TURF and the holidays plus the seemingly non-stop search for a “real” job.  No matter how hard I tried I could not bring myself to sit for any length of time and write anything of any value or substance.

I can’t honestly say that I’ve turned the corner in that regard, but a lot has gone on over the past few weeks to maybe reinvigorate me a bit.

Tabby Lane – On Saturday, Tabby Lane bounced back from a 5^th place finish in a $5,000 Starter Allowance with a stirring stretch running victory in an $8,000 claiming race at Tampa Bay Downs.  Mid pack throughout, she looked defeated at the 3/16^th pole.  Dean Butler shook her up and Tabs responded, making up nearly 6 lengths in the stretch for the neck win.  With that win, Tabby passed a couple of milestones: she is now in a 3^rd place tie for most wins by an Even the Score progeny (9) and went over the $100,000 mark in career earnings.

Job Front – On January 30^th I’ll be starting with a new company as a business development manager.  Though not in the racing industry, it will enable me to stay here in Minnesota.  When I actually begin I’ll let you all know the company but I’m excited to remain here and be able to cover Canterbury for the Daily Racing Form next summer and, hopefully, for many summers beyond.

Vacation – This past week my wife and I spent some time on a beach.  Along with the new job will come considerable travel requirements and this was an opportunity for us to get away and spend some quality time together before I start road warrior-ing it again.  Turns out in the midst of our return flight was Tabby’s win!  Listening to a six second voice mail from our trainer saying, “She just got up at the wire!” was a great way to be welcomed back to the frigid, sub-zero Minnesota chill – in fact perhaps the only way that could be considered great!

The Derby trail will start heating up soon, Tabby Lane is in good form and I’ll be spending quite a bit of time in hotel rooms again.  It feels like things are getting back to “normal”.  That should include regular posting!

A Different Take on Thanksgiving This Year

In many ways, 2011 has really been awful yet in others it has been truly remarkable.  On this day I usually write about what I’ve been thankful but instead of the usual (family, friends, trainer, jockey, horse, etc.), I’m going to go with what I’d like to be thankful for NEXT Thanksgiving. 

• A racino is open at Canterbury Park AND the ramifications to our Native American friends are next to nothing.
• Tabby Lane stays healthy and gets on a roll at Tampa and Canterbury much the same as this year – but with a bit more purse money thrown in!
• The Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders’ Association looks after the little guy a bit more.  As an example, see the next bullet.
• States ease up a bit on the “registered security” requirement for small partnerships (in most states if you’re in a partnership and not registered as a security you’re violating the law – I know, right, but its true).  The annual financial burden to meet this requirement when running a $10,000 claimer for a group of 9 people is onerous and prohibitive.  (As an aside, if anyone knows how to better handle this, I’m all ears).
• Racing and its partners learn to better market themselves.  ESPN had part of the Breeders’ Cup telecast and there was not a lick of coverage on ESPN Radio leading up to the event.  Nothing.  A bump in ratings means more money for everyone – a little promotion or interview wouldn’t kill anyone.
• The Breeders’ Cup develops a rotation between three or four tracks.
• Maryland racing again becomes the jewel of the Mid-Atlantic.
• Suffolk Downs picks up one of the slot licenses in Massachusetts.

And a few on a more personal level:

• I’ve made a difference as a board member of the Minnesota Thoroughbred Association to which I was elected last week.
• We have a few more horses in training and more folks involved in racing.
• I have an agent that gets my work published.
• I celebrate another summer as the Daily Racing Form and Midwest Thoroughbred Magazine writer covering Canterbury Park.
• I’m either working full time on something I love (hard to imagine I haven’t been snatched up yet, huh?) or not having to in order to make a living!

While the holiday has become associated with Pilgrims and, to some, the beginning of the persecution of the Native peoples of North America, please remember that in a time of deep national division President Lincoln established the national holiday we celebrate today.  It’s a time of healing, peace, unity and love.  My best wishes to you all for this and much, much more.

Working With Andy Beyer

I was reading a story in the Daily Racing Form by Andy Beyer about a gentleman in Nevada diagnosed with pancreatic cancer trying to beat the odds and live long enough to make it until the National Handicapping Championship in Las Vegas. Reading the story reminded me of an episode I had with Beyer in college back in the mid-1980’s.

I was a senior at Colby College in Waterville, Maine.  My best friend, Paul Mooney, and I would make trips to play the races throughout New England when we had the opportunity.  Back in the 80’s there was a dearth of handicapping information out there so you grabbed what you could find and latched onto it.  For harness racing at Lewiston and Scarborough it was Ainslie’s Complete Guide to Harness Racing while for Thoroughbreds it was Beyer’s Picking Winners.

I had just come off of spending a year in Washington, DC spending my “year abroad” at George Washington University and Beyer’s column in the Washington Post was must reading.  While he covered racing from a national perspective he also covered the Laurel/Pimlico scene in great detail.  There were columns on track biases, equine stars and trainers, owners and jockeys.  I couldn’t get enough Andy Beyer and I wrote one of only two pieces of fan mail I ever wrote in my life (the other was to Mel Blanc when I was in high school – quite the combo, huh?).

In my letter to Beyer I told him how much I enjoyed his work in the paper as well as paperback.  I thought that the possibility of following horses every day was my idea of heaven and asked him: how do I get to be you when I grow up?

Beyer’s answer came back hammered out on a manual typewriter and hand signed: “You don’t want this gig.”  Or something to that effect.  I don’t have the response anymore, lost over time in my moves around the country and the world, but I will always remember the advice he gave me:  get a real job and follow the horses in my spare time.  He said that betting horses and writing about them wasn’t easy and that it didn’t pay particularly well, unless you got lucky.

I followed that advice.  I graduated from college, attended graduate school at Maryland (and Pimlico & Laurel) and had a series of “real jobs” until getting laid off this past December.  Thanks to the recommendation of a friend, I picked up a freelance job for the summer covering Canterbury Park for the same Daily Racing Form that Beyer calls home.  His advice is still spot on.  The gig is a lot of fun but I won’t get rich doing it.  However while I’m looking for a “real job” I am living the dream and – technically speaking only – working with my hero while I’m doing it.

I have never met Andy Beyer and the odds are pretty good that I never will.  I tried hard to follow his advice though the years yet when all was said and done, at least for now anyway, I ended up under the same masthead. 

I promise, Andy, I AM looking for a “real job”…unless I get lucky!

Like Church and State

As many of you know by now, I was selected by the Daily Racing Form to cover this season at Canterbury Park on a freelance basis. I wouldn’t put this in the category of getting a new job, but until full time employment comes around again, I will approach this exactly like it is.


The reason for this entry is to delineate what will be occurring here in this space as opposed to what will be written for the DRF. The two spaces need to be very clearly separated. Here, I will continue to chronicle the exploits of Tabby Lane and any other runners we come across for our stable. I will post occasionally on items of interest to me – and hopefully to you – in racing as well as my futile Kentucky Derby pick and my more successful Breeder’s Cup posts. There will be opinions expressed here on a variety of subjects. THIS is the space for opinion, conjecture and racing partnerships.

IT NEEDS TO BE VERY CLEAR THAT ANY OPINIONS EXPRESSED IN THIS SPACE ARE THE VIEWPOINT OF THE AUTHOR, NOT THE DAILY RACING FORM.

Sorry for the caps and bold, but it’s really necessary to make that very clear. My stories for the DRF will be short, factual and mostly previews and recaps of stakes races during the meet. There may be more in-depth previews and recaps here of those races here as space will allow a deeper analysis than I can give in the Form. News items of interest to the racing world emanating from Minnesota will be covered impartially for the Form. Those pages are not the place for my opinion or bias. You can get enough of that here.

I’m grateful for the opportunity to professionally write about racing, especially for the DRF. Thank to Jim Dunleavy for the offer and David Miller and Jeff Maday for being supportive – I’m sure I’ll lean on you all for a while until I get my feet underneath me.

See you on the backside!

What is the Claiming Crown?

The Claiming Crown was established in 1999 as the product of a joint effort between the Thoroughbred Owners and Breeder's of America and the National Horsemen's Benevolent and Protective Association to honor the every day heroes of horse racing: the claiming owners, trainers and, of course, the horses. I like to think of the Claiming Crown as a Blue Collar Breeder's Cup. Each and every one of the horses you'll see competing in this event were for sale at a given point in the last year and a half from prices as low as $4000 to as high as $35,000 and now they have the opportunity to take a shot at total purses valued at $600,000. Racing for this kind of purse money is something many of these owners and horses never dreamed they'd get a shot at. When you claim a horse you hope to have some fun, move up the ladder a bit and get your picture taken a few times. When you claim a horse for $7500 you certainly don't think about racing for $75,000, but that's exactly what some of these folks will be doing on Saturday.

The Claiming Crown, in all but two years of it's existence, has been run at Canterbury Park. It's central location and easy access makes it a nice 'neutral' location for the event to be sure, but I also like to think that the way the staff at Canterbury puts on a show has something to do with it as well. In past posts, I have repeatedly mentioned that the national 'powers that be' in racing could learn a lot by the way things are done here at Canterbury and I hope that many of these folks come in early this week to see how popular Buck Night and Happy Hour Fridays are and to see that there are still racetracks in America where, on an ordinary night, there is a still a roar when the horses are giving their all in deep stretch.

On Saturday, Canterbury Park will be opening it's gates free of charge for the Claiming Crown. There will also be a handicapping seminar at 10:30 on the Mezzanine level featuring handicapping author from the Daily Racing Form Steve Davidowitz as well as track handicapper Kevin Gorg and Raceday USA's Steve Fierro to get you started on handicapping all the shippers coming to Canterbury from all over North America. In addition, leading jockeys Julian Leparoux and Robby Albarado will be joining legend Russell Baze with mounts on Claiming Crown Day. If that's not enough of a draw, the $100,000 Lady Canterbury Stakes will also be contested that day.

If you can't make it to the track, I hope you'll join me here throughout the day as I will be blogging live from high above the racetrack all day on Saturday.

Tomorrow: Previews of the Iron Horse and the Pepsi Express.