Lawyer Ron working at Belmont (Sarah K. Andrew)

How odd that not one but two posts this week reminded me of Lawyer Ron. First was the sad and unexpected news of Papi Chullo’s death as Papi looked to be in great form going in to the 2007 Whitney. The second was that the Whitney will be a Breeders’ Cup W&YI race, in fact I almost used a photo of Lawyer Ron for that post.

I was lucky enough to be at the 2007 Whitney on my first trip to Saratoga when Lawyer Ron had his coming out party by way of romp and track record. Swifty, Joan and I were stunned by his performance, primarily because we all had completely dismissed him but also because his win was so emphatic.

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It’s amazing how many horses from the 2007 Whitney are no longer with us. First Wanderin’ Boy, next Papi Chullo and now Lawyer Ron…. it wasn’t THAT long ago. Let’s take a moment to be thankful for Dry Martini, shall we? Horses, like celebrities and sports figures, seem to be dying at a quicker than normal pace these days.

Lawyer Ron was no slouch as a 3yo winning the Risen Star, Rebel, Southwest and St. Louis Derby.

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But the switch to Pletcher seemed to help him bring it all together. Sure, he still had trouble settling down on occasion but he won the Whitney, Woodward and Oaklawn and ran a very game second to HOY Curlin in the Jockey Club Gold Cup.

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If you haven’t seen it already, The First Saturday in May featured Lawyer Ron and then trainer Bob Holthus on the Derby trail. Lawyer Ron’s groom Chuck Chambers was one of the more memorable characters in the film. It was clear how much he loved Lawyer Ron and I felt bad for him when Lawyer Ron got transferred to Pletcher.

Apparently the Champion Older Horse of 2007 was making quite an impression as stallion. Clark Shepherd, manager of Stonewall Farm Stallions noted.

His first foals are tremendous. When breeders call in to report their Lawyer Ron foals being born, they all have a story to tell.

Many people loved Lawyer Ron and you see plenty of great shots of him at flickr. Rest in Peace Lawyer Ron and condolences to Stonewall Farm and all of his previous connections.

Update: Steve Haskin’s tribute to Lawyer Ron is not to be missed.

Posted by dana on Jul 11 2009    
Filed Under: Farewell, Sarah K. Andrew, YouTube, Wanderin' Boy, Steve Haskin, 2009, Oaklawn, Papi Chullo, Todd Pletcher, Saratoga, Breeding, Belmont, Curlin, Race Replay, Lawyer Ron, Racing

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Wanderin’ Boy winning the 2007 Alysheba at Churchill (twinspiresdotcom)

This break in blogging is interrupted by sad news. Awful news in fact. As you might know by now, GbG fav Wanderin’ Boy broke down going into the stretch in the otherwise exciting Cigar Mile at Aqueduct, and was subsequently euthanized after being vanned off.

Just about 2 months ago Steve Haskin had a wonderful (a word I don’t use too often) profile of Wanderin’ Boy, one you should definitely read. The comments are also very touching.

At age 7, Wanderin Boy has made only 24 career starts, winning nine, with six seconds and three thirds for earnings of $1.2 million. Talk about not choosing one’s company wisely, he has finished second in grade I stakes to Curlin (Jockey Club Gold Cup), Invasor (Pimlico Special), Bernardini (Jockey Club Gold Cup), and Lawyer Ron (Whitney). He has, however, managed to win the grade II Brooklyn Handicap and the grade III Ben Ali, Alysheba, and Mineshaft.

At this point, you’re probably thinking, ‘OK, so what’s the point?’

The point is, a horse like Wanderin Boy – and I emphasize the word “horse” rather than gelding – often goes unnoticed because he’s never done anything that would cause people to pay a whole lot of attention to him, other than to say something like, “It was another good effort by Wanderin Boy, but he was no match for….”

But there often is much more to a horse than his record. In Wanderin Boy’s case, this is a horse who should be admired by all those fortunate enough to see him run his heart out race after race.

Haskin goes on to detail Wanderin’ Boy’s astonishingly resilient journey, littered with injuries and miraculous recoveries starting when he was a month old. It makes his final injury even more vexing given that he’s recovered so many times.

His last 3 efforts were very game. I saw his win opening weekend at Saratoga this summer in a 100k Optional Claimer (no replay available at YouTube) but his efforts in the Woodward and Jockey Club were just as game. He made Curlin work for that $10M in the JCGC and for a second it looked like he was gonna win.

My heart goes out to his connections, after all that he’s been through this must have been a devastating blow. Rest in peace Wanderin’ Boy. And here’s hoping that the Demoiselle winner, Springside, recovers from her injury today as well.

2006 Brooklyn Handicap:

2007 Alysheba:

2008 Woodward:

2008 Jockey Club Gold Cup:

Posted by dana on Nov 29 2008    
Filed Under: Wanderin' Boy, Steve Haskin, Demoiselle, 2008, Aqueduct, Farewell, Race Replay, :(, YouTube, Nick Zito, Racing

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Wanderin’ Boy is a GbG fav and the equivalent of a big foot sighting in racing as a 7yo HORSE. I always wondered about that and now feel enlightened thanks to an excellent post by Steve Haskin over at his Bloodhorse blog.

It’s always refreshing to see big fancy deep pocket owners keep their horses in training, particularly when fate provided so many opportunities for retirement! Wanderin’ Boy really made big bad Curlin work for his win in the JCGC. Go on with your bad Wanderin’ self (and stay sound and healthy while you’re doin’ it)!

Also from the “right on” department, Crist has a fantastic column this week about the BC gender division tom foolery entitled “If you must fix what ain’t broken…”

Proponents of a Filly Friday and a Studly Saturday are difficult to locate outside the Breeders’ Cup offices, and most fans and pundits seem to hate the idea. The most frequent criticisms are that it is inherently sexist (and renaming the Distaff the Ladies’ Classic sure didn’t help) and that it marginalizes half of the racehorse population by relegating it to second-class status and a much smaller television audience. Shouldn’t racing be showcasing the likes of Lady’s Secret, Personal Ensign, and Azeri on its biggest day rather than on a Friday afternoon?

He goes on to propose some viable, and less alienating ways to divvy up the races over two days. Hear, hear.

Posted by dana on Oct 01 2008    
Filed Under: 2008, Take Back the Race, Impressive, Steve Haskin, Wanderin' Boy, Breeders' Cup, Injury, You Tell 'em!, Racing

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Runaway horse training at Saratoga, just another odd occurrence in an odd opening week. (Sarah K. Andrew)

Swifty and I returned from Saratoga late last night. Even though it rained almost everyday and long shots were not doing that well it was a great trip… even better than last year!

Today at Saratoga it was sunny and Tergesti & Wanderin’ Boy were the only favorites to win, with 4 of 10 winners having odds in the double digits. Now I know how Pyro feels.

It will probably take a me a couple of days to get back up to blogging speed but here are some highlights:

Papa Backstretch is my new handicapping idol, hitting 5 winners on Thursday!

As first reported at Raceday 360, there’s a roving band of pre-teen boys following Sam the Bugler around heckling “no shot” every time he talks to a woman.

I got to have dinner with these fine folks and a few others who don’t actually blog (yes, there are people who don’t blog… but not many!).

I cashed some tickets! Although I gave it all back and then some, but I did manage to make some good picks.

Swifty has now created the Adam R. Wiener patented Trifecta System, PayPal $9.99 here.

Swifty and I wore our best loud and nutty outfits on Saturday (me red plaid shorts, him bandanna pattern/madras-y pants w/elegant straw chapeau). At one point we were at the paddock and stone faced Edgar Prado rode by on his mount, looked at us and chuckled. I think this was this might have been non-betting highlight of the trip!

Swifty won the best 2 out of 3 ticket cashing contest (we had one every day starting on Friday). Congrats to Swifty!

I won the unofficial “Pastiest legs in Saratoga” contest 2 days in a row and Swifty won the “Nutty-est Male Outfit” on Saturday. We saw someone who may have had us both beat but it turned out my legs were pastier and he was a she.

There was an excellent riderless horse moment on Sunday in the 7th race when Hanginonaprayer broke through the gate and was a running the race all on her own, without a rider. A rider & pony (what are they called?) finally caught her right by the finish line and the crowd cheered her all the way!

All this and so much more, and I even took pictures this time (as requested by my mother)… stay tuned!

Posted by dana on Jul 28 2008    
Filed Under: Wanderin' Boy, 2008, Riderless Horse, Pyro, Sarah K. Andrew, Fans, Saratoga, Racing

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47-1 Fresh Episode pulling an upset at Saratoga (Sarah K. Andrew).

When we first arrived in the hotel room I exclaimed “Ah, the handicapping palace!”. By the second day we were joking that it felt like cramming for exam week. On the third day we were calling it the handicapping torture chamber.

Neither of us had handicapped full cards more than one day in a row so we were a bit surprised by how draining it was. Surprised isn’t exactly right, we were so excited that we just didn’t factor it in. By Saturday night I couldn’t look at a menu and make a decision… I had been making decisions for 2 days straight, just put some food in front of me!

We quickly started to take a pass on some 20K claimers and a few allowance races… those 2 year old races were so much quicker to get through! “Races for horse at least 7 years old who haven’t won a race other than a maiden and run every other week” Swifty joked.

There were points when we got so over tired and giddy that Swifty asked, “when did we smoke a dube?”. Of particular interest was how the trouble lines, when read with the right inflection, could be narration for high school dates. Did I mention we’re in our (early) 40s?

Back to the races. We both really liked Sharp Susan in the Lake George. I had her boxed with Good Mood & Red Birkin in addition to Dashes & Dots & Miss Tizzynow across the board. I also liked Lady Attack (not to mention how much I like her name, insert giddy laughter) and Rutherienne. This is the second time I didn’t incorporate her only to have her run a really strong race. Perhaps next time.

At this point the Saturday Breeder’s Cup challenge races seem like a blur of races where I didn’t cash any tickets. As expected, I liked Papi Chullo in the Whitney. I’m still trying to figure out what happened. The track report of “Papi Chullo saved ground to no avail” seemed particularly spare to me, mind you I think those guys do a great job and I’m extremely grateful for their write-ups. I also had him tri boxed with Flashy Bull & Diamond Stripes in addition to having Wanderin’ Boy across the board (one of the precious few tickets I cashed). I’ve always liked Wanderin’ Boy and was glad to see him step up. Lawyer Ron really kicked it in the end and it was thrilling to see him (now offically) “DEE-MOLISH the track record” (a la Tom Durkin).

Joan made a great point about Lawyer Ron being yet another compelling argument for racing past 3 years old. Compare his 3 year old and 4 year old campaign. He’s maturing very nicely and it seems like the best might be yet to come. More than likely I’ll make an entire post about this but couldn’t wait to point it out.

Did I mention the huge payouts? They made playing trifectas hard to resist. As I mentioned before some folks behind us hit a $2000+ tri playing their hotel room number. I love to play exactas and occasionally play tris but I stepped it up with the tris. Every time I played a tri instead of boxing all of my picks some other horse got in the mix. Ah Saratoga… how you kicked my horses ass.

I also did a lot of WPS bets on long shots, however did not have the pictured long shot of Fresh Episode. I liked the other Freud offspring, Pressing Issue a little better and was gonna do a Freudian box with them because I loved their names, however Pressing Issue scratched. Another good name was Second Marriage by Not for Love out of Impulse Shopper… well done!

As for biases… stalkers crushed on Saturday winning 9 out of 11 races!! The combo of Clemente & Gomez won 2 on Friday, while Gomez had 4 wins total. Saturday saw 2 wins for the combo of Klesaris and Pino, while Mott had two wins as did both Cornelio & John Velasquez & Eddie Castro. Sunday was even for trainers and jocks but still favoring stalkers.

Regardless of our performance at windows (Swifty was doing well for a while, up a couple of hundred bucks), we both gave ourselves points for money management. Neither of us had to do the walk of shame to the ATM and we both literally spent our last buck on the Jim Dandy. In full disclosure I was fully prepared to go the ATM because I wanted to do a $20 exacta of Street Sense over Tiz Wonderful but only had $11. The fates were with me that the ATMs weren’t working (however that seemed a little… I don’t know, unprofessional?) so I did an $10 exacta and tipped the lady in the restroom my final dollar.

Thank you Saratoga, for a long fun weekend that kicked my ass… in a good way! I’ll be back.

Posted by dana on Jul 31 2007    
Filed Under: Exacta, Money Management, Papi Chullo, Bill Mott, Trifecta, Sarah K. Andrew, Wanderin' Boy, Rutherienne, Sharp Susan, Wrap Up, John Velazquez, Flashy Bull, Street Sense, Saratoga, Gambling, That's Why They Call it Gambling, Lawyer Ron, Mario Pino, Tom Durkin, 2007, Cornelio Velazquez, Garrett Gomez, Racing

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