Distressed trainer Maria Borell said Monday that owner Jim “Mattress Mac” McIngvale has refused to communicate with her amid the uproar caused by his firing of Borell as the trainer of Breeders’ Cup Sprint winner Runhappy.
Borell, speaking from her base at the Thoroughbred Center training facility in Lexington, Ky., said she was moving her other horses out of the barn where Runhappy now will be trained by Laura Wohlers and into different stalls at the training center.
A portion of a broadcast late on Saturday afternoon featuring American Pharoah’s victory in the Breeders’ Cup Classic drew a 2.6 overnight rating and six share, the highest rating and share for the race since 2010, according to NBC Sports, which broadcast the Friday and Saturday Breeders’ Cup races on its family of networks.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – The qualities that set American Pharoah apart from any racehorse Bob Baffert has ever trained were on full display in a little more than 12 hours here at Keeneland, for on Sunday morning, the day after he obliterated his rivals in the Breeders’ Cup Classic, American Pharoah came out to greet at adoring public at Barn 62, taking it in with a calmness that was in stark contrast to the speed and power he had unleashed in the race.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Following another dominating performance aboard American Pharoah, this time in Saturday’s $5 million Breeders’ Cup Classic, Victor Espinoza got off the Triple Crown winner one last time and waved to an appreciative, raucous crowd at Keeneland.
Accompanied by a quartet of security guards, Espinoza was hustled through the walking ring and back to the jockeys’ room on his way to one last press conference to talk about another winning ride on the horse of a lifetime.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – From his vantage point in the paddock, surrounded by family and friends, Ahmed Zayat turned his head away from the television screen as American Pharoah cruised through midstretch, his record-setting victory in Saturday’s Breeders’ Cup Classic all but assured at that point, and began to well up with emotion.
LEXINGTON, Ky. - Bob Baffert said in the post-race Breeders’ Cup Classic press conference that, “We can’t be afraid to run these horses.”
We, all of us in this great game, owe Baffert and the Zayat family a tremendous debt of gratitude for this philosophy.
It would have been the easiest thing in the world for them to retire American Pharoah after he completed his historic Triple Crown. Instead, they shared him with us.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Total handle on the 13 Breeders’ Cup races held Friday and Saturday at Keeneland in Lexington was down marginally compared with handle on the same races last year at Santa Anita, according to charts of the races, despite the appearance of superstar American Pharoah in the final race of his career.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – They had won the Triple Crown and now had just seen American Pharoah go out a winner in his career finale in the $5 million Breeders’ Cup Classic. Trainer Bob Baffert, who had been an emotional wreck much of the week, stepped onto the sandy loam of Keeneland as Victor Espinoza, American Pharoah’s jockey, brought the bay colt to a halt just outside the winner’s circle.
Baffert reached up toward Espinoza, who was perched high in the saddle.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – The $3 million Breeders’ Cup Turf ended for the most recent winner of the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe, Golden Horn, just as it had for the first Arc winner to come to the Turf, Dancing Brave in 1986, and the other five Arc winners between the two – in defeat – as the 3-year-old filly Found, beaten both times she’d met Golden Horn, turned the tables and handed him a half-length defeat Saturday at Keeneland.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Despite his unbeaten record, which included two Grade 1 victories, there were doubts surrounding Nyquist entering Saturday’s Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile at Keeneland.
His descending Beyer Speed Figures had some concerned that he was feeling the effects of a busy summer campaign. Heck, even Kent Desormeaux, the trainer of Swipe, who had run second to Nyquist on three straight occasions, thought others – including his own Exaggerator – were better.
