DRF's McGee to receive Walter Haight Award

Marty McGee, a longtime racing reporter for Daily Racing Form, has been selected to receive the Walter Haight Award for career excellence in turf writing by the National Turf Writers and Broadcasters, the organization announced on Wednesday.

McGee was one of four award winners the organization announced, along with jockey Mike Smith, who will receive the Mr. Fitz Award for “typifying the spirit of racing”; Donna Barton Brothers, who will receive the Jim McKay Award for excellence in broadcasting; and Jim Gluckson, the head of media relations for Breeders’ Cup Ltd., who will receive the Joe Palmer Award for “meritorious service to racing.”

McGee has worked for the Daily Racing Form for 26 years, following a seven-year stint as the racing writer for the Baltimore Sun. He covers racing on the Kentucky circuit year round, and he also contributes to the coverage at Gulfstream Park in Florida and elsewhere around the country. McGee won an Eclipse Award in 2013 for a story about brothers Keith and Kent Desormeaux.

Smith, a Hall of Fame jockey, rode Justify this year to the sport’s second Triple Crown in four years. At 53, his career purse earnings of $314 million ranks second all-time. A release from the NTWAB said that he represented the sport “in idyllic fashion” during Justify’s Triple Crown run.

Barton Brothers, an ex-jockey, has covered horseracing for NBC’s networks since 2000, often as a mounted reporter. She frequently gets the first interview with the winning rider of the Triple Crown races and Breeders’ Cup races. The NTWAB release noted that during Barton Brothers’s tenure at NBC, the company’s broadcasts have earned 13 Eclipse Awards.

Gluckson, who has long headed some of the most ambitious publicity efforts in racing, is the media’s go-to for all things Breeders’ Cup. He is also a member of the Eclipse Awards Steering Committee, and helps coordinate coverage of the Eclipse Awards dinner. In 2005, he received the Red Smith “Good Guy” Award from the New York Turf Writers.