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    • 5th-CD, $120k, Msw, 3yo/up, f, 1mT, 2:46p.m. ET OLYMPIC DAME (Medaglia d'Oro) will break from the rail here wearing the colors of Qatar Racing for trainer Brendan Walsh. A $385,000 FTSAUG purchase in 2023, the price looked like a steal three months later when her half-brother Honor Marie (Honor Code) brought home the trophy for the GII Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes in late November, and kept himself in the headlines from there, running through the 2024 Kentucky Derby trail by route of Louisiana and eventually finishing eighth in the big dance. He went on the shelf after trailing along in eighth in the GI Travers Stakes but has since redeemed himself. He was last seen winning the Listed Isaac Murphy Marathon Stakes beneath these same Twin Spires as his sister will begin her career. The pair also claims GSP Abarta (Into Mischief) as a half-sibling. Their dam, Dame Marie (Smart Strike), is a half-sister to G1 Betfair St. Leger hero Rule of Law (Kingmambo). This is the extended family of G1 Prix de Paris victor Feed the Flame (GB) (Kingman {GB}), who joined the stallion ranks in France this year after multiple placings at the elite level last season. TJCIS PPs 6th-SA, $60k, Msw, 3-5yo, 6 1/2f, 6:38p.m. ET It's the battle of the high six-figure auction horses in this maiden special weight, and Florida-bred Southern Gentleman (Mitole) takes first prize in that department at a princely $725,000 when he changed hands at OBSMAR last year to Speedway Stables. In the barn of Bob Baffert, this son of Mitole is a half-brother to GSW Midnight Stroll (Not This Time) and SP Atthecrossroads (Practical Joke). Their dam Midnight Magic (Midnight Lute) is a half-sister to GSW Coalport (Kitten's Joy) and that one's dull-brother, French Listed winner Jolly Good Kitten. This is the immediate family of GI Santa Maria Handicap victress Favorite Funtime (Seeking the Gold). Two spots to his inside is Cheever (Into Mischief) for owners Muir Hut Stables and trainer Mark Glatt. The Stonestreet-bred was a $700,000 acquisition from the same OBSMAR auction, and hails from an accomplished female family as the son of GSW Electric Forest (Curlin), herself a daughter of MGSW & MGISP Forest Music (Unbridled's Song). The dam's half-siblings include GSW Kentuckian (Tiznow) as well as GSW Uncle Chuck (Uncle Mo). Breaking farthest out in the field is Legal Heir (Nyquist), a $550,000 OBSAPR purchase and now racing for the partnership of MKW Racing and Spendthrift Farm. In the barn of Richard Mandella, the Maryland-bred is a half-brother to SW & GSP Monday Morning QB (Imagining). Their dam How My Heart Works (Not For Love) is a half-sister to MSW & MGSP Awesome Flower (Flower Alley), who would achieve fame by way of her son, MGISW Cyberknife (Gun Runner). This is the female line of SW Well Dressed (Notebook), who is best known for her world-beating son, multiple Group 1 winner Well Armed (Tiznow). That gelding needs little to no introduction to most racing fans. Well Dressed's line branches out in many directions via her daughters and has produced many graded and group winners at every level.  TJCIS PPs The post May 10 Insights: Half to Honor Marie Debuts at Churchill, California Hosts Big Ticket Maidens appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions. View the full article
    • Wood Memorial Stakes (G2) winner Rodriguez will miss the May 17 Preakness Stakes (G1) because of a foot issue, but his connections have another colt in mind for the second leg of the Triple Crown, undefeated Goal Oriented.View the full article
    • Meeting News Rotorua Track – Saturday Update   A further inspection of the Rotorua track early Saturday morning has shown it fit for racing. Heavy rain eased around 9pm Friday and despite being a Heavy10 the track is good order for racing after not being used on raceday for over four months.
    • So Riccarton Turf gets transferred to Riccarton Poly due to heavy rain and a heavy 10. Some Owners and Trainers moan.  Fair enough. Rotorua heavy rain and a heavy 10 today. Fields have good numbers and scratchings minimal yet some people are complaining that the track will be stuffed.  
    • Kathy Walsh, who started training as an interloper among the nation's almost hermetically-sealed male ranks and who pursued her career with a rare combination of grit, guts, gumption and generosity, passed quietly in her sleep at the age of 85. A consummate horsewoman, Walsh brooked no fools and minced no words, yet garnered the kind of deeply held reverence and affection typically extended to those of royal lineage. There's a reason she was nicknamed The Queen. “She probably hired and fired me more times than she changed her underwear, I used to tell her,” said jockey Mike Smith. “She could be tough on you–but once you were part of the family, buddy, you were part of the family, man.” Walsh was born into racing. Her father James trained. She cultivated great taste in mentors. Walsh spent the formative years of her equine education mining nuggets of wisdom from the likes Allen Jerkens, Charlie Whittingham and Buster Millerick, who she viewed as her “adoptive grandfather.” Walsh started training in the early 1970s, taking over her father's stable upon his death. She soon hung out her shingle as a trainer to note, winning multiple titles at Longacres in Washington State and Canterbury Downs in Minnesota. “We go way back, me and Kathy, back to the old Canterbury Downs days,” said Smith. “She's a great horsewoman. She had a strong stable back then. She was someone you wanted to ride for all the time.” Once becoming a permanent fixture of the California circuit, so the overall quality of her stock improved in leaps. She won 15 graded stakes during a career comprising 1231 individual wins. This includes the 2001 GI Santa Monica Handicap with Nany's Sweep. Walsh's moon shot came in 2007, and the arrival in her barn of Cal-bred Georgie Boy (Tribal Rule), who took that year's GI Del Mar Futurity. The following spring, Georgie Boy claimed wins in the GII San Vicente Stakes and San Felipe Stakes, on the way to what was expected to be a bold tilt at the Kentucky Derby. He missed the race, however, with pulled muscles in his back, but he returned to action later that year before claiming the GII San Carlos Stakes, his final race. As a two-year-old still learning his craft, Georgie Boy was headstrong, a real bruiser. “But we knew he could run,” said Smith, who rode the horse to second in the GII Best Pal Stakes, a prep for his next race, the Del Mar Futurity. “He was so aggressive with the blinkers on when we finished second. And she was pretty aggravated because we'd gone pretty quick. And I said 'Kathy, he doesn't need these blinkers anymore. I know he did when he was young, bless him, but he needs to relax. Take them off,” Smith recalled. “Well, she took the blinkers off but she took me off with them!” said Smith. “Of course, the horse relaxed beautifully in the Futurity and won it. “I ran into her the next day and I said, 'Well, first of all congratulations. But if I knew I was attached to those damned blinkers, I would never have told you to take them off!' That's just the game, isn't it,” said Smith. “And you know, we were having dinner together two nights after that.” Walsh was a pioneer among female trainers–a distinction she would begrudgingly acknowledge but more readily downplay. “So many other people are deserving to be here, men and women,” Walsh told the LA Times in 1988, before her trainee, Hanuman Highway, took a shot at the Kentucky Derby. He finished seventh. “But really, this horse doesn't know me as a woman or a man. He just knows me as an individual. I don't mean this as a put-down on women, but I think the respect I might get has more to do with getting a horse to the Derby than what sex I am.” Former trainer Mike Puhich, now trainer and director of horse operations at the Pegasus Training and Rehabilitation Center in Redmond, Washington, knew Walsh since he was knee-high to a pastern. She was Puhich's godmother. “My dad's the one who gave her the nickname The Queen,” said Puhich, of his father, Nick. “She was a great horseperson and a great person. It's hard to think she's gone.” Marietta Gelalich was a long-time owner with Walsh, and one of her closest friends. “Not only was she good with the horses and honest with me about when they should run and shouldn't run, but when my husband ['Tiny'] died–and she loved my husband–she stayed with me 24-7 to help me get back on my feet. She was a true, true friend,” said Gelalich. “I miss her and I love her and she was a true friend and a good trainer. And she did not like a lot of women, you know. You had to cuddle up to her to make her like you. She'd been a woman in a man's world for so long,” said Gelalich. “They broke the mold–thank god–when they made The Queen. She was made of cast iron,” said XBTV and TDN Writers Room presenter Zoe Cadman, who became close friends with Walsh after working for her as a freelance exercise rider. “She loved her horses, cussed like a sailor and tolerated people. She tried for years to get me to work for her full-time but would never acquiesce to giving me a day off. She said I could sleep when I was dead. I declined! Sleep tight, Queen.” Said Smith, “She led a wonderful life. She wouldn't have traded her life for anybody. I can guarantee you that.” The post The Queen Of Racing Kathy Walsh Passes At 85 appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions. View the full article
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