LEXINGTON, Ky. - The purses on opening day at Keeneland Friday looked like typographical errors but they were for real: Maidens running for $51,000, two-other-than allowance horses going short for $57,000, three-other-than fillies racing for $65,000.
ARCADIA, Calif. - Since Swaps went east in 1955 to surprise the powerful Nashua, Santa Anita Derby winners have consistently been major factors in the Kentucky Derby.
Though they didn't win the Kentucky Derby after winning here, such good ones as Hill Rise, Avatar, Sham, and Cavonnier distinguished themselves at Churchill Downs. Point Given, so impressive in winning last year's Santa Anita Derby, had an off day when he ran for the roses but atoned in the other two classics with brilliant performances.
LEXINGTON, Ky. - Keeneland opens its eagerly awaited spring meeting Friday and quickly gets down to serious business on Saturday with its presentation of the $500,000 Ashland Stakes for 3-year-old fillies. Just as the Blue Grass Stakes, the feature here on April 13, serves as a prelude to the Kentucky Derby, the Ashland offers a definitive look at the Kentucky Oaks, and the scene, in a word, is competitive.
ARCADIA, Calif. - There are many important milestones in P.J. Cooksey's life. August of 1979 . . . her first winner, at Waterford Park. November of 1983 . . . first woman to win a $100,000 race. May of 1984 . . . the second woman to ride in the Kentucky Derby. February of 1988 . . . passed Patti Barton as the leading female rider of all-time. June 18, 1992 . . . the birth of her daughter, Chelsea Ann.
NEW YORK - Why is everybody so grumpy about this year's 3-year-olds?
With just five weeks until the Kentucky Derby, everyone seems more eager to bury this crop than to praise it. Wise guys and simpletons alike are saying that the Derby picture is more chaotic than ever and the way to go is to find an unheralded longshot now because this is a year when any allowance horse could mature quickly enough to overtake the division's leaders. Charismatic's name is being invoked more often than when he was Horse of the Year.
WASHINGTON - Maryland's horseplayers are accustomed to ill treatment. While the management of Laurel and Pimlico focuses on its profits and horsemen strive to get as much purse money as possible, neither side thinks much about the needs, interests, or desires of the people who generate this revenue.
ARCADIA, Calif. - Horse racing and Alex Trebek could be the perfect fit. The sport is a puzzle, and the higher you go, the more difficult the challenge. Then, at the end of the day, the answers always seem to come in the form of another question.
As the impresario of the long-running "Jeopardy!" game show, Trebek has become familiar to millions of viewers as a man who can make even a dumb guess sound like a noble attempt at intellectual endeavor. His solicitous "No, sorry" soothes even the most badly bruised ego.
ARCADIA, Calif. - Bet on Sunshine and Phantom on Tour are not related. But clearly, they come from the same tribe. One was a repossession and the other became a rescue, and now they are both institutions, representing the fact that sometimes the game gets it right, either sooner or later.
A recent visit to Churchill Downs discovered the two old pros alive and well and holding down opposite ends of the track.
ARCADIA, Calif. - Clearly, time flies when you're having fun. It's the airplanes that are so darn slow. Consider this:
It was only 51 years ago that Warren Stute unleashed Great Circle to win the Santa Anita Maturity, which, with its grand purse of $205,700, made it the richest race on the planet. The 1951 Kentucky Derby, by comparison, offered a mere $126,000, plus flowers.
NEW YORK - If you were thinking about going to Aqueduct or betting its races Sunday or a week from Sunday, forget it. New York's tracks will be shuttered these two days because of an antiquated law that has become an offensive anachronism.
By statute, there can be no racing in New York on Palm Sunday or Easter Sunday. Citizens of the Empire State can do just about anything else they would do on a normal Sunday, such as drink, visit the local X-rated cinema, or play the slots at the upstate Native American casino, but racing is forbidden.
