Wandering Eyes

Peter Magnier, who ran Brittas House Stud in County Tipperary and enjoyed success as a breeder under both codes, passed away on Monday, the Racing Post reported. Magnier was the son of Tom Magnier and Evie Stockwell. He was a brother to Coolmore’s John Magnier, as well as David, who manages Castlehyde and Grange Studs and Anne O’Callaghan, who owns Tally-Ho Stud with her husband Tony. As a breeder, Magnier enjoyed his greatest success with Brigid (Irish River {Fr}), the dam of Irish highweight Sequoyah (Ire) (Sadler’s Wells), herself the producer of G1 English/Irish 2000 Guineas hero Henrythenavigator (Kingmambo) and fellow Irish highweight Listen (Ire) (Sadler’s Wells). Brigid is also the ancestress of many other high-class runners Magnier is survived by his mother and siblings, partner Annabel, family Trini, Scobie, Tash, Ed and Coco and grandchildren. A viewing will be held at his residence from 4 to 7 p.m. on Jan. 30. A requiem mass is scheduled for Thursday at 11:30 a.m. at the Church of the Assumption at Knockavilla, followed by burial at Kilcrumper New Cemetery in Fermoy. In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations should be made to the Solas Cancer Support Centre. View the full article

Leading trainer Darren Weir has been reportedly been arrested and stables raided by police in a dawn operations on Wednesday morning. View the full article

Leading trainer Darren Weir has been arrested and his stables raided by police in a dawn operations this morning. View the full article

When I went down to Gulfstream for this year's installment of the Pegasus World Cup Day, it felt as if I was seeing it for the first time. There was something off about it. Something just didn't feel right. View the full article

Belinda Stronach, widely known as an international business leader, philanthropist, and a two-term member of Parliament in Canada, met with BloodHorse correspondent Bob Ehalt Jan. 25 to discuss the growth and future of the Pegasus series. View the full article

The number of graded stakes in Canada will increase from 45 to 46 as one listed race will be upgraded to grade 3 following the Jockey Club of Canada's Graded Stakes Committee annual review of the graded and listed stakes races in Canada. View the full article

Australian champion Bint Marscay (Aus) (Marscay {Aus}–Eau d’Etoile {NZ}, by *Sir Tristram), heroine of the 1993 G1 Golden Slipper S., was euthanized Monday evening due to complications of chronic arthritis. The 28-year-old mare resided at Old Friends, the Thoroughbred Retirement Farm in Georgetown, KY. As a broodmare, Bint Marscay foaled three stakes winners, including Group 1 winner Bollinger (Aus) (Dehere). Michael Blowen, founder and president of Old Friends, made the announcement Tuesday morning. “I am saddened to hear of the passing of Bint Marscay,” longtime trainer Richard Freedman said. “She was one of the greatest 2-year-olds to race in Australia, and she remains a yardstick by which Australian 2-year-olds are still measured today. She gave me, my family, and her racing connections so much joy. “I thank Old Friends for taking such loving care of her in her retirement, she deserved no less,” Freedman added. “Her final years were happy, and her passing was peaceful. RIP old girl, you will be remembered.” View the full article

The number of graded stakes in Canada will increase from 45 to 46 as one listed race will be upgraded to grade 3 following the Jockey Club of Canada's Graded Stakes Committee annual review of the graded and listed stakes races in Canada. View the full article

The Thoroughbred Aftercare Alliance Board of Directors elected Mike Meuser as its new president and elected nine new board members. “The 2019 TAA board is an incredibly talented group of individuals from all areas of the Thoroughbred industry,” Meuser said. “I will make every effort to utilize my years of non-profit experience to lead the transition between the original founding TAA board and these worthy successors. To serve the TAA on behalf of our retired athletes is an honor” Meuser, who previously served as the TAA vice president and secretary, is a managing director of Miller, Griffin & Marks, P.S.C. in Lexington, KY, where he has practiced law for more than 35 years. He also chairs the National Equine Law Conference. “In order for the Thoroughbred Aftercare Alliance to protect our sport by protecting our retiring athletes, it takes a tremendous amount of time and dedication by staff and a board of directors,” outgoing TAA President John Phillips said. “I am thrilled to welcome a new class of board of directors to the TAA.” The TAA rotates its board of directors to have each member serve a total of three years, it also rotates its executive officers. The new board members beginning service in 2019 are: Craig Bandoroff, owner of Denali Stud; Jeff Bloom, managing director of Bloom Racing; Simon Bray, analyst for TVG; Donna Brothers, chief operating officer of Starlight Racing and analyst for NBC Sports; Boyd Browning, president and CEO of Fasig-Tipton; Case Clay, chief commercial officer of Three Chimneys Farm; Brian Graves, director of public sales at Gainesway; Chip McGaughey, sales associate at Keeneland; and Tom Ventura, president of Ocala Breeders’ Sales Company. They join current TAA board members: Dora Delgado, Mike Ernst, Sue Finley, Jim Gagliano, Susie Hart, David O’Farrell, Martin Panza, John Phillips, Walt Robertson, Yvonne Schwabe, Jen Shah, and Nicole Walker. View the full article

The number of graded stakes in Canada will increase from 45 to 46 as one listed race will be upgraded to grade 3 following the Jockey Club of Canada's Graded Stakes Committee annual review of the graded and listed stakes races in Canada. View the full article

Registration is now open for three new classes presented by The Elite Program, Inc., home of Groom Elite education programs. View the full article

Hollywood Casino at Charles Town Races will welcome back and honor Barbara Jo Rubin Feb. 22, the 50th anniversary of when she became the first female rider to win a race against men at a nationally recognized racetrack in the United States. View the full article

European Exports is a series where we catch up with people who have left their home countries to make a new life in racing in America. Today we speak with Airdrie Stud’s Cormac Breathnach. TDN: Where are you originally from? CB: I’m from Galway in Ireland. It’s a medium-sized town in the west of Ireland with a famous racing festival in July. I grew up a racing fan from the time I was basically an infant, according to my parents. My father was a teacher there. I went to university in Galway, and then I moved over to Kentucky in 1996. I had spent the summer here in 1995 as an intern at Alltech, and then went to Graduate School at the University of Kentucky, starting in 1996, and I’ve been here ever since. TDN: Was your family involved in racing? CB: Not directly. We were fans, and my father and I would go racing all the time; we’d go to Leopardstown and The Curragh and all over the country. So we watched it and read the racing papers at the time, religiously, but we weren’t directly involved. Which for me was part of the reason I moved here; it was easier to get established over here, and find a career in the industry over here. TDN: So you find there are more opportunities in the racing industry in the U.S.? CB: There are more opportunities when you’re willing to work hard. You can get a foot in the door here early. I worked the September sale in 1995 for Jackie Ramos at Ashleigh Stud, for her consignment, and that was the first thing I’d done directly in the industry over here, and it just kind of went from there. When I moved here in 1996 it was to go to grad school, so I did a PhD at the Gluck Center starting in 1996 and graduating in 2001. And then I did some postdocs for about six more years in Wisconsin, and then back at UK. Part of the reason I was in academia and research for so long was for visa reasons. My visa was tied to that career path, and then with marriage and everything came a green card eventually, and so in 2007 I made a leap out of the research field to just get fully immersed in the Thoroughbred industry. I worked for myself for a couple of years, and did some matings analysis, and bought a few horses; I had a few horses in training in Ireland and so on. And then I got hired by Adena Springs in 2009, and was there for several years doing nominations. And then this opportunity at Airdrie came up, and it’s fantastic to be part of the team here. That was a year and a half ago. TDN: How does your background in academia help you now? CB: There are so many factors that go into how to make a good mating, and I think with that background in genetics you get a handle on maybe where the decisions are best made and what to focus on and maybe what to ignore. There are some theories out there that I wouldn’t ascribe to at all in terms of what makes a good mating and they’re commonly held, but they are things that I don’t think have much bearing on the outcome. So I try to look at it from a pretty practical point of view. Look at the foal being a product of its parents first and foremost, not necessarily something that’s six or seven generations deep, that may come through or in most cases will not. So, there are different approaches that I can try to take from that background. TDN: Is there anything you miss about Ireland? CB: Growing up in Ireland in the ’80s was sort of a slower pace of life and things. I do miss the neighborhood, and the friends, and the social circles and things that came through that period of growing up and through college. But it’s a very exciting, vibrant place to be over here; there’s just so many more opportunities, and really you can spread your wings and do maybe more what you want to do. Lexington is a fantastic place to live, in terms of getting around and having opportunities and things to do, and the new food cultures and everything else that are happening. View the full article

Clifford Lines, who has been in the sport for almost 70 years, saddles Catapult (GB) (Equiano {Fr}), his final runner, in the sunracing.co.uk H. at Lingfield on Wednesday. As a work rider for top trainers such as Sir Noel Murless and Sir Michael Stoute, Lines sat on some of the legends of the turf–including Shergar, Shareef Dancer, Sonic Lady and J O Tobin. Training in his own right from his base at Newmarket, Lines has decided the time is right to call it a day after he started as an apprentice in 1949. “At 84 it’s time to pack up,” he told Sky Sports Racing. “I’ve been training for the last eight years. I didn’t start until my mid 70s. I had stables next door and I used to pre-train up to 20 horses for Sir Michael Stoute for a few years, and then I decided to sell my stables and built my own place, and then I thought I’d train a few horses. I’ve loved it. We’ve had our bits of good luck and our bits of bad luck–but on the whole it’s been good. We’ve had a few winners and enjoyed every minute.” View the full article

Extreme cold leads to cancellation of Wednesday card. View the full article

After an early childhood when the radio was the prime source of entertainment, I have plenty of vintage songs imprinted on my memory, including Bing Crosby and the Andrews Sisters urging me to ac-cent-u-ate the positive, e-lim-in-ate the negative and latch on to the affirmative. I wish I could do so following the inaugural running of the GI Pegasus World Cup Turf Invitational S., but unfortunately it left me feeling rather underwhelmed. Perhaps I would have felt differently had the finish been fought out by the four previous Grade I winners in the ten-horse field, but none of them made the first four. Instead, the bulk of the nearly $7 million in prize money went to a 5-year-old, a 4-year-old and two 6-year-olds, none of which had previously won anything better than a Grade II. In other words, the prize money seemed to be out of proportion to the talent on show. Let’s hope that future editions attract more strength in depth, but to do so, the race probably needs to attract some top-class colts from Europe and Japan (this year’s only overseas challengers were an Irish filly and a Japanese mare). I wonder whether it will be able to do so in its current position in the calendar. It is surely too close to the breeding season for any European colt whose stallion debut is imminent. And colts which are set to continue racing have the carrot of the Dubai World Cup Festival dangling before them, with the $6 million Dubai Sheema Classic and the $4 million Dubai Turf among the possible targets. I would like to be proved wrong, and it is going to be interesting to see whether the decisive inaugural winner Bricks and Mortar (Giant’s Causeway) can develop into another turf champion for Chad Brown. It’s far from impossible that he will. Although he recently turned five, the son of Giant’s Causeway has raced only eight times and he has the proud record of having won six of them. He appeared poised to reach the big time when he defeated Yoshida (Heart’s Cry {Jpn}) in the GIII National Museum of Racing Hall of Fame S. in August 2017, to gain his fourth win from as many starts, but that win was followed by two defeats and an injury-induced absence from the track of more than 14 months. Incidentally, I suppose that I shouldn’t be too surprised that the connections of Bricks and Mortar and his fellow Grade I winners Yoshida and Next Shares were among those who turned down Gulfstream’s admirable offer of a 7lb allowance for horses running without Lasix. Bricks and Mortar’s latest success makes him the 28th Grade I winner by Giant’s Causeway. It will be interesting to see whether this former champion sire can add many more Grade I winners to his tally, despite a recent lack of ammunition. Although he is credited with 91 live foals in 2015 and 77 in 2016, the son of Storm Cat had only 38 live foals in 2017 and 15 in 2018. He covered just nine mares last year before dying at the age of 21 in April. Bricks and Mortar is inbred 3 x 3 to the champion European 2-year-old Storm Bird through his sons Storm Cat and Ocean Crest. While Storm Cat is a household name, the same cannot be said of Bricks and Mortar’s broodmare sire Ocean Crest. His finest moment during his ten-race career came when he landed the GII Del Mar Derby Invitational on turf in 1994. After failing to make it to the races as a 4-year-old, Ocean Crest began his stallion career at Prestonwood Farm in 1996, at a fee of only $5,000. He wasn’t a great success, but his first crop contained Bricks and Mortar’s dam Beyond The Waves, who proved to be a very consistent stakes performer in France. She won the Listed Prix des Tourelles over a mile and a half and was runner-up in the G2 Prix de Royallieu and in a couple of Group 3s. She was also second in the GIII Bewitch S. when returned to the U.S. Only a handful of Ocean Crest’s broodmare daughters enjoyed graded success, but two of them did very well. One of them, Surf Club, produced the Grade I winner Emcee and Grade II scorer Surfer. Beyond The Waves was the other good broodmare. In addition to Bricks and Mortar, she has produced the Grade III winner Emerald Beech to Maria’s Mon, the Listed winner Beyond Smart to Smart Strike and the Group 3-placed Sir Ector to Dynaformer. One of Beyond The Waves’s half-sisters, Miss Excitement, also enjoyed Grade I success as a broodmare thanks to her son Bordonaro, winner of the Ancient Title S. over six furlongs. Bricks and Mortar is by no means the first high-class performer closely inbred to Storm Bird. Summer Bird, a Grade I winner of the Belmont S., Travers S. and Jockey Club Gold Cup, was another inbred 3 x 3, while the three-time Australian Group 1 winner Trapeze Artist, the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile winner Tamarkuz and the Australasian Oaks winner Maybe Discreet are all inbred 4 x 3. Then there’s Mind Control, last year’s winner of the GI Hopeful S., who is inbred 3 x 4. Mention of Storm Bird reminds me that he clearly wasn’t a favourite of my esteemed colleague Tony Morris. In his book, Thoroughbred Stallions, Morris commented that “Storm Bird’s name will always be closely identified with the 1980s madness in the Thoroughbred business.” He illustrated this claim, saying that “in January, fit and well and hot favourite for both the 2000 Guineas and the Derby, he was worth $15 million. In July, having not turned out for either classic–or any other race that year–and obviously not exactly in the pink of condition, he was worth $30 million.” Morris also mentioned that some of Storm Bird’s stock had wind problems, but there is no getting away from the fact that Storm Bird hit the heights both as a racehorse and a stallion. Unbeaten in five juvenile starts, including the National S. and the Dewhurst S., the son of Northern Dancer earned the lofty Timeform rating of 134. His greatest achievement as a stallion was surely the dual champion sire Storm Cat, but he also gave us the Preakness winner Summer Squall, the outstanding European mare Indian Skimmer and the Oaks winner Balanchine, who was good enough to beat the colts in the Irish Derby. View the full article

Anodor (Fr) (Anodin {Ire}), who won the G3 Prix des Chenes last September, may have a prep run in ParisLongchamp’s G3 Prix de Fontainebleau before going for the G1 Poule d’Essai Des Poulains. Trainer Freddy Head will consider the 1600-metre feature in April before going back there in search of Classic success in the French 2000 Guineas a month later. “He’s doing very well–he is in full training,” said Head of the colt, who ran third in the G1 Qatar Prix Jean-Luc Lagardere in the wake of Royal Marine (Ire) (Raven’s Pass) on Oct. 7. “The French Guineas, that will be the aim for the moment. I think maybe he will have a prep race in the Fontainebleau.” Head is looking to give G1 Qatar Prix du Cadran hero Call The Wind (GB) (Frankel {GB}) a run on home soil first, before sending him to Meydan for the G2 Dubai Gold Cup on Mar. 30. “He’s due to run in Dubai in the Gold Cup,” added the trainer. “He could run before that in France. I’m very happy with him.” Another Head-trained Group 1 winner, G1 Prix Maurice de Gheest heroine Polydream (Ire) (Oasis Dream {GB}), is returning next week after a winter break. She was scratched from the GI Breeders’ Cup Mile on the order of the state veterinarians in November. “She is still on her holidays. I am expecting her back next week,” he said of the Wertheimer & Frere homebred. “I don’t know what we will do with her yet. As far as I know, she is very well.” View the full article

It is the length of the road that makes you truly appreciate the view from the summit. Strictly, yes, you would get exactly the same panorama if you just got yourself dropped up there by helicopter. Conceivably you could win an Eclipse Award with the first 2-year-old you ever bought, and feel due excitement about maybe going on to the GI Kentucky Derby. But it just means so much more if, like Ben Glass and his patrons Gary and Mary West, you have been on this journey together for four decades. They have shared other wonderful moments on the way–but it’s actually the countless tougher days, in between, that permit them such satisfaction in their newly anointed champion Game Winner (Candy Ride). For the past 25 years, Glass has served the Wests as racing manager; for 13 years before that, he was their trainer. “When we first started, we were claiming horses for $2,500 in places like Grand Island, Nebraska,” he remembers. “And you know what, there’s nobody better for the racing game than Gary and Mary West. They are the best. Gary’s like a brother to me. You’re not going to surprise him with anything. If it can happen, it’s happened to them. I’m telling you, they’ve had some bad luck and some good luck, and they take it all on the chin.” In 2002 they had the second favorite for the Derby in Buddha (Unbridled’s Song), who had beaten Medaglia d’Oro (El Prado {Ire}) in the GI Wood Memorial S. “We got to the barn at five in the morning, to watch him gallop, and they said he was hurt,” Glass recalls. “And Gary just said, ‘Well, I’m going back to bed.’ I could tell you so many heartaches they’ve had, and they’re just good people. When it says West behind a horse, that horse is in good hands, believe me. We had a horse in New York one time who had a double compound fracture. They were told to put him down, but Gary said, ‘Well, can he be saved?’ I said, ‘Let me find out.’ And they did save him, they spent all that money so that they could give him away to some guy in Washington.” Glass and the Wests have literally seen it all. When Mongoose (Broad Brush) won the GI Donn H., also in 2002, they were having their picture taken in the winner’s circle when Glass looked down the track to see what had happened to their other runner. “And he’s lying down on the turn, he’s had heat stroke,” Glass recalls. “So we stood smiling for the win picture, and then I took off running. The game is full of ups and downs but that was the most up-to-down I’ve ever had. One horse taking the picture in the Grade I, other horse laying on the track. He did get up. But I mean, it’s a crazy business we live in.” As the Wests became able to invest more and more in their stable–alongside, that is, over $200 million committed to a charitable foundation–Glass discovered a fresh frustration to the racing of Thoroughbreds. “When Gary started buying the better horses I thought, man, these are beautiful horses, we can’t lose,” he reflects. “But Gary kept telling me, ‘Ben,’ he said, ‘if you get one graded stakes winner among all these horses, you’re beating the odds.’ And I finally realized he was right, that for some reason most of them won’t be runners–and that just breaks my heart. Such big, beautiful horses! It’s so tough to figure out. I guess they can’t all run, but it really bothered me for a long time, knowing you’re spending all that money and that most of them won’t make it. But I’ve learned to take it now.” In naming Dollar Bill (Peaks And Valleys) as his favorite to date–quite an accolade, considering that the Wests have just retired a previous Eclipse champion in West Coast (Flatter) to Lane’s End–Glass discloses both what he most admires in a horse, and also what potentially sets Game Winner on another plane. “Yes, Dollar Bill was kind of a hard-luck horse,” Glass says. “But he had a heart of gold. I mean, West Coast was a racehorse and a half, just wasn’t quite the same when he came back from Dubai. But Dollar Bill always was a trier. It was just that when he got in trouble or got bumped, he couldn’t quite get going again.” So while his trainer Bob Baffert rewrote the Triple Crown rulebook with the overnight sensation that was Justify (Scat Daddy), Glass likes the way Game Winner satisfies the conventional criteria of race seasoning. Because when backed into a corner, unlike Dollar Bill, he has shown the class to get back into top gear. “You know, in the Breeders’ Cup I thought he was going to get beat down the backside,” Glass confesses. “I didn’t think he had any prayer, as wide as he was; and then when he got bumped coming down there, I thought: ‘Oh man, everything in the world’s against us.’ But it didn’t bother him: he just shrugged his shoulders, kept on running. So we found out he can take a beating and keep on ticking. “And the fact he lost a lot of ground is good for us, because he looks like the farther they go, the happier he is. He’s a big, powerful, strong-built horse, and I think he’s got a big heart–which is what you need most in this game. That desire to win is half the battle. Seeing him bounced around in a rough trip like that, and keeping on going, I think he has the heart it takes to be a champion.” Certainly Game Winner was tailor-made for the Wests, who send Glass and his team to the yearling sales with a very specific brief. The two races they most covet are the Kentucky Derby and the GI Travers S., so they only want two-turn prospects with Classic dirt pedigrees. Various elements go into that mix: a heavy emphasis on dosage, for instance; and an aversion to mares who fail to produce a stakes winner in her first five foals, or to older mares period. Nor do they have any need for fillies, with enough already coming through the breeding program. West doesn’t want turf blood, either, albeit Glass contends that it can bring with it the required stamina. “We take all that into consideration before we buy a horse,” he says. “So really it eliminates a lot of horses I don’t even have to look at. Makes my job a lot easier. I know exactly what Gary wants, and there’s no sense looking at anything else because he’s going to nix it. He’s the boss! But I know he’s right. We’ve been doing this for a long time. We’ve bought a lot of horses and, with those that didn’t turn out, we went back and looked and tried to figure out why. You put that in the memory bank, and you end up with a program that works for you. For a long time, for instance, we tried to buy freshman sires. And boy, we were getting burned so bad. If only one out of 25 sires can stay in Kentucky, that tells you right there how lucky you got to be with those.” In the case of Game Winner, Glass was astonished to learn from his consignors that not one other person had scoped the horse. Sure enough, he was able to pick him up for $110,000 at the Keeneland September Yearling Sale. “Evidently he had something other people couldn’t live with,” he says with a shrug. “I have no clue what that might have been. But that’s the way it works. Everybody looks at a horse differently. Unless you get the spectacular standout everybody’s found, and you’re going to have to give a million.” After passing the first sieve of the Wests’ paper prescription, yearlings have to pass muster with their inspection team. Glass is accompanied by Des Ryan, who manages the Wests’ broodmares at Dell Ridge Farm; Ocala breaker and pre-trainer Jeff Kirk; and veterinarian Dr Doug Brunk, who like Glass hails from Nebraska. And then they have to pass Dr. Craig Van Balen, who scopes them and reads the X-rays. “So it’s a team effort,” Glass stresses. “We all work good together, there’s no ego trips here. Most times we’re all on board. They lead the horse out and we’ll all be looking at each other like, oh boy. So if somebody is worried about a funny-looking tendon or something, we’ll have that ultra-sounded to make sure nobody’s making a mistake, and we’re glad that one person on the team saw it. Then we come back and all go through it together, and try to put a number to a horse; and then Mr. West will put the final number to it. “But the truth is that I have to really, really love a horse before I want to buy him. Because when they’re selling 5,000 head [at one sale], you can buy what you love. Of course a vet can say no, or you can be outbid by Sheikh Mohammed. But we don’t ever try to talk ourselves into one. Because I found that’s the surest way to buy a bad horse. I hear that stuff all the time: ‘Oh, he can live with that, it’s just baby bone or whatever.’ When I was young I probably thought I can do this, I can conquer the world. But now it’s there we take them off the list. We’re pretty critical.” Glass loves the way Bob Baffert and Wayne Lukas know whether or not they like a horse the moment it is led from the barn, and similarly heeds his own gut instinct. Specifically, he likes a deep chest and stifle; a bit of length; and a big overstep. All lore he absorbed in youth, when issued his first licence aged just 16 at Arlington Park. By then he had absorbed a great deal from his uncle in California–a gifted horseman, never quite able to fulfil his talent in his own name, but valued by several big trainers–while his father always had a string of horses as a sideline. Yet Glass was immersed as a psychology major at college, intending to become a youth counsellor, when the call came. “I had two trimesters left when my dad’s trainer messed up,” he remembers. “So I told my wife, ‘I’ll just run down to Hot Springs and help my dad out with these horses and then I’ll come back and finish college.’ But when I came back I got my wife, loaded her up, we went to the racetrack and never went back.” Then one day Gary West, who had recently cashed in one of his first big businesses, was told by a friend about a nice filly Glass was breaking. And when West came to see her, he liked the filly–but loved the horseman. Soon West established that Glass was as skilled as he was honest: he claimed a horse named Joe Blow for $13,500 and, training at Ak-Sar-Ben, Glass kept him going for another five seasons and 23 wins. A few years later he saddled the Wests’ first graded stakes winner, Rockamundo (Key To The Mint), in the GII Arkansas Derby at 108-1. It was only when his sons were approaching the age to leave home that Glass, eager to spend time with them while he could, resolved to quit training. He was going to raise cattle, but West asked him to come back aboard as racing manager. “Training horses, I loved that life: couldn’t wait for that alarm to go off at four in the morning,” Glass admits. “But family’s got to come first. And I’m too old now. A trainer’s life is rough. Seven days a week, they don’t know if it’s Christmas or Thanksgiving.” As it is, he enjoys the privilege of seeing how a man like Baffert operates. “All good trainers develop their horses,” Glass says. “For Bob, there’s no [adequate] superlatives. He can just watch horses train and know what they need. But every trainer has his own theory, trains his own way. Some work them fast, some don’t; some work close to the race, some don’t. There’s no set-in-stone way to train a horse. “You can’t talk to horses. You got to know how to read them, how to listen when they’re telling you something. I used to have horses I’d take out and gallop the morning of the race; I had others, you did that they wouldn’t run a jump. It’s crazy. Each horse is different. There’s no manual. So it’s quite a humbling experience to get one to the winner’s circle, knowing you helped develop that horse. “And like I was saying with Game Winner, I really believe that the good ones, down the lane, they want to beat those other horses. I had horses, they didn’t win, they’d sulk. And when they won, they thought they were king of the world. Horses are a lot smarter than most people allow. Pigs are supposed to be smart, but I don’t know if a pig would know if he won a race or not. But horses, they have great personalities. I know they’re happy when they get into that winner’s circle.” View the full article

A second all-female syndicate group, christened Phoenix Ladies Two, is being developed, Phoenix Thoroughbreds announced on Tuesday. Emarati-based Phoenix Ladies Syndicate, whose flagbearer to date has been the undefeated Walking Thunder (Violence), has sold all of its shares, and horses are already being sourced for the second all-female syndicate. “By setting up Phoenix Ladies Two we can give even more women a chance to come on this winning journey with us,” said syndicate principle Pamela Cordina. “We hope that eventually we will have a regular presence outside the Emirates and I recently spent some time at the Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale researching on how they run, market and operate all-female syndicates in Australia. It’s much more part of the racing fabric down there and they have some great incentives in place to encourage this sort of ownership. It’s something we’d like to be involved in and explore further.” Walking Thunder, acquired for $42,000 as an OBSAPR 2-year-old Stateside, has won his first three starts by a combined 18 3/4 lengths in the orange and white Phoenix Ladies colours. Trained by Ahmad bin Harmash, the bay broke his maiden at first asking at Meydan over 1400 metres on Nov. 11, and followed up in a pair of 1600-metre conditions tallys on Dec. 6 and Jan. 10, respectively. He is pointing to the G3 UAE 2000 Guineas on Feb. 7. “He’ll run in the UAE 2000 Guineas before heading to the UAE Derby on World Cup night,” said Cordina of the son of Street Show (Street Boss). “We’ve not yet discussed having a go at the [GI] Kentucky Derby, but I guess it would be the logical step if all goes to plan. From the beginning, we said we wanted the Syndicate to take our members to some of the biggest racing events in the world and it doesn’t get bigger than ‘the Derby’ so we’ll see.” View the full article

The owner of undefeated Walking Thunder, Phoenix Ladies Thoroughbreds, will consider a start in the Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve (G1) should the Dubai-based 3-year-old continue to progress. View the full article

The rule adopted by the New York State Gaming Commission permits a larger purse-to-price ratio in claiming races. The state has required the minimum price for horses entered in Thoroughbred races be at least 50% of the value of a race's purse level. View the full article

The three names etched onto brass plaques alongside one particular stable at Fitzroy House are enough to cause a passer-by to pause for a moment to reflect on glorious summers gone. Sariska (GB), Red Evie (Ire), Margot Did (Ire): from the Classic summit to scorching a strip along the turf of York’s Knavesmire, the trio left a significant imprint at Michael Bell’s yard. Their successor has already proved a worthy inhabitant of this hallowed box, however, as housed within is Europe’s champion 2-year-old filly, Pretty Pollyanna (GB) (Oasis Dream {GB}). There’s none of the grandeur, either physical or mental, one might expect of a filly of her acknowledged stature on the racecourse. As her daily rider, stable apprentice Cameron Noble, tacks her up for her morning’s exercise, Pretty Pollyanna, recently returned from her winter holiday, turns kindly to him, not minding the intrusion of her trainer and a journalist standing and chatting in her doorway. Doubtless this no-nonsense attitude has helped in her notable achievements to date. “She’s been very easy to train from day one,” says Bell as he casts an eye over the medium-sized bay filly who, in his 30th year of training, will carry the stable’s hopes of adding the G1 1000 Guineas to the Classic roll of honour. That list already includes the 2005 Derby for Motivator (GB) followed by the Oaks and Irish Oaks in 2009 for Sariska. “She’s never missed a dance that we wanted her to take part in. She’s very uncomplicated and talented. She’s not terribly big but she’s a good model and she has strengthened over the winter,” he adds. Pretty Pollyanna is not the only one who has received a boost in recent months. Bell’s string is now in three figures. “It’s the first time we’ve had over 100 horses for quite a few years,” he says. “We have some really nice 2-year-olds this year.” However talented they turn out to be, the current crop will do well to match strides with the example set by Bill and Tim Gredley’s homebred Pretty Pollyanna last season. A winner on debut at Yarmouth, she was just over two lengths behind victrix Main Edition (Ire) (Zoffany {Ire}) when fifth in the G3 Albany S. at Royal Ascot before blazing a trail to win the G2 Duchess of Cambridge S. on her home track at Newmarket by seven lengths. She and Signora Cabello (Ire) (Camacho {GB}) then left the colts trailing in the G1 Prix Morny, with Pretty Pollyanna finishing three-quarters of a length to the good to set the seal on the championship in Deauville in August. Two subsequent appearances saw her finish fourth in the G1 Cheveley Park S. and third in the G1 Fillies’ Mile when tackling that distance for the first time. “To have a champion 2-year-old is pretty special–the last one we had was Hoh Magic (GB), who also won the Morny,” says Bell. “Pretty Pollyanna was spectacular on a couple of occasions last year. Things didn’t go right in the Cheveley Park through no fault of her own, and equally in the Fillies’ Mile, Danny [Tudhope] rode her as instructed but I think if we were to do it again, in order to get the mile we’d try to get a lead. I’m very hopeful that she’ll get the mile.” Having returned three weeks ago from her holiday at the Gredleys’ Stetchworth Park Stud where she was born, Pretty Pollyanna is still on daily trotting duties while she builds up to her seasonal reappearance in a Classic trial. “The plan at the moment is to go for a trial,” says her trainer. “Seven furlongs will possibly prove her optimum trip in the future but we’ll go for a trial and hopefully she’ll come through that and take her place in the Guineas.” Though both her dam and grandam were unraced, Pretty Pollyanna emanates from a family which has already bought Classic glory in abundance for Bill Gredley through arguably Stetchworth Park Stud’s most famous graduate, User Friendly (GB). The daughter of Derby winner Slip Anchor (GB) sailed unbeaten through the first six races of her life, the last four of that extraordinary sequence being the Oaks, Irish Oaks, Yorkshire Oaks and St Leger. She was then beaten just a neck in the Arc by Subotica (Fr) (Pampabird {GB}). User Friendly’s half-sister Friendlier (GB) (Zafonic) made up for her lack of racing career by producing the black-type trio of Unex El Greco (GB) and Gender Agenda (GB), both by Holy Roman Emperor (Ire), and Madame Defarge (GB) (Motivator {GB}), while Pretty Pollyanna’s dam Unex Mona Lisa (GB) was the result of her 2008 mating with Shamardal. Despite her Classic pretensions, Pretty Pollyanna has to share the title of stable star at Fitzroy House with another Gredley homebred. At eight years of age, Big Orange (GB) (Duke Of Marmalade {Ire}) is the elder statesman of the stable and, closing in on 17 hands, is certainly the largest inhabitant. He, too, has recently returned from Stetchworth Park, but his stay was a lot longer than Pretty Pollyanna’s owing to an injury to a suspensory ligament which meant an enforced lay-off since last spring. As long as there is no recurrence of this issue, there will be no more joyous reception given to any horse this season than that which will greet the much-loved stayer on his eventual return to the races. Indeed, he has already brought cheer to his home town of Newmarket during the bleak midwinter. “Big Orange is such a recognisable horse and the first day he was out on the Heath again between Christmas and New Year everyone was asking after him,” says Bell. “One of the reasons he’s so popular is his style of racing. He is a big physical presence but the way he sticks his head and neck out is such a good quality and it endears him to the public. It’s a pleasure to have him in the yard. He eats twice as much as most horses but it’s wonderful to have him back.” After a solitary start in the G2 Dubai Gold Cup in 2018, Big Orange was being prepared for the G2 Henry II S. at Sandown when his injury was detected, and it is in this race which Bell hopes he will make his resumption this May. “I’d say we’ll aim him at Sandown but he’ll have to come through a couple of scans first,” he notes. “I’m hopeful that we’ll get him back into full work. Once he starts galloping it becomes a bit more nerve-wracking but given that the injury was caught so early, I’m hopeful. Speaking as a horseman I feel positive–it is slightly walking on eggshells but we’ll tread carefully.” He continues, “We’re really happy with the scans so far and fingers crossed we’ll get the green light to start cantering after he’s done six weeks of trotting. I think we have to be hopeful. He’s had PRP [platelet rich plasma] treatment and whether it works or not remains to be seen but all the signs are good. I think it was the great Arthur Stephenson who said ‘there’s no such thing as a bit of a leg’, but we really did catch him extremely early. It was a small bit of damage to his suspensory and on the scale of tendon damage I would say it was probably three out of 10.” Having been based at his Stetchworth Park Estate just three miles outside Newmarket for almost 40 years, Bill Gredley, now 85, is every bit as well known in the headquarters of British horseracing as his giant Ascot Gold Cup hero. His legacy in the racing and breeding world will be continued by his son Tim, a former member of the British showjumping team and useful point-to-point rider who is now fully immersed in the operation of the stud. Bell, a long-term trainer for the Gredleys whose former assistant and now fellow Newmarket trainer George Scott is married to Bill’s daughter Polly, says, “It’s lovely to train for owner-breeders, and especially local owner-breeders who have such a huge interest in their horses. Bill has been at the game a very long time and it has given him, particularly, enormous pleasure. And for Tim, who is now based back at Stetchworth and really focused on it, you can’t ask for much more than to breed and own Group 1 winners.” View the full article

Six-time Hong Kong Derby winner John Moore is hoping for an eleventh hour entrance into the prestigious contest with his untried colt Sunny Speed, but knows he is in a race against time. The master trainer has won three of the past five Derbies but looks to have slim chances of winning in 2019, however he could have a trick up his sleeve with his 85-rated European import. Sunny Speed failed his first barrier trial last week and was beaten by almost 15 lengths on Tuesday morning, but Moore is... View the full article

13:55 Newcastle Today looks to be the day that the Brian Ellison trained Sam’s Adventure can finally bag a first victory over obstacles. The Ellison yard are going very well at the moment with a very promising 30% strike rate with their recent runners and this seven year old could well add to the stables […] The post Picks From The Paddock Best Bet – Tuesday 29th January appeared first on RaceBets Blog EN. View the full article

Hong Kong legend Douglas Whyte will ride at Happy Valley for the last time on Wednesday as the curtain on his illustrious riding career begins to fall. The 47-year-old’s contract does not expire until February 10, but Whyte’s last ride at the famous city track will be on the Tony Cruz-trained California Gungho in the Class Three Club Street Handicap (1,000m), with only Sha Tin meetings remaining due to Lunar New Year. Whyte will take up training at the start of the 2019-20 season.... View the full article