Jay Privman, Daily Racing Form’s national correspondent, was announced the winner of both the 2017 Joe Hirsch Award for outstanding newspaper writing and the 2017 Bill Leggett Award for outstanding feature writing. The awards were announced at Wednesday’s annual National Thoroughbred Writers and Broadcasters dinner, during which DRF’s Midwest correspondent Marty McGee was honored with the prestigious Walter Haight Award for career excellence in turf writing.
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DRF Past Performances
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Mendelssohn’s last-place finish in the Kentucky Derby spurred trainer Aidan O’Brien to “change the system” when it came to preparing the 3-year-old for Saturday’s $6 million Breeders’ Cup Classic at Churchill Downs.
So far, O’Brien believes the plan has worked. Saturday could provide the proof.
“We would feel he’s probably in a better place now than he was going to Kentucky,” O’Brien, referring to the Derby, said Thursday at Churchill Downs. “He’s had more experience, and he knows what’s expected. We’re looking forward to it, really.”
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Under normal circumstances, the weather would have been the main story Thursday at Churchill Downs, where the rain, which began Wednesday afternoon, continued to fall throughout training hours, leaving the main track a sea of slop and the turf course soft and boggy one day before the two-day Breeders’ Cup begins.
Key contenders
Strike Silver, by Violence
Last 3 Beyers: 76-71-76
• Morning-line favorite drew the inside post in a full field. Broke from post 2 of 12 in the Indian Summer going this 5 ½-furlong distance, and worked out a trip after poor break to rally for the win.
• Julien Leparoux, aboard for all three of his prior starts, is in the irons.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Drama has surrounded the Breeders’ Cup when it has been run at Churchill Downs, ranging from the stirring rally by Personal Ensign in the 1988 Distaff to retire unbeaten, to the narrow loss suffered by Zenyatta in the 2010 Classic in a similar bid to have a perfect career.
Sometimes it takes but a few brief brushstrokes to paint a vivid picture of an individual, leaving not much left to explain.
For John Gosden, who has brought British superstars Enable and Roaring Lion to the 35th Breeders’ Cup, that picture was frozen forever in time on the afternoon of July 23, 2011, at Ascot Racecourse, where the faithful had gathered to watch the King George VI & Queen Elizabeth Stakes.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – A couple of years ago, trainer John Sadler took a trip to Spain. When he got back he had a wall calendar affixed above the desk in his barn that had as its featured photo one month the Sagrada Familia, the famous church in Barcelona that was designed by the great architect Antoni Gaudi in the 1880s and which, to this day, though a major tourist attraction, remains unfinished.
That building is a metaphor for Sadler’s career.
Thu, 11/01/2018 - 08:09
Future Stars Friday at the 2018 Breeders’ Cup figures to showcase a little bit of everything: fantastic betting races, tremendously talented runners, and potential Kentucky Derby and Kentucky Oaks contenders in 2019. The pick four sequence comprising races 6-9 appears intriguing - a heavy favorite looms in the first leg, but handicappers can get creative in the remaining three legs in search of value.
JUVENILE FILLIES TURF, race 6