JC / Railbird

Summer Bird

Clarifying

Take care, race promoters, Steve Crist has a peeve:

The word “champion” has a very specific meaning in Thoroughbred racing: The winner of a year-end divisional championship. The Breeders’ Cup has done its best to devalue the word by referring to any winner of a Breeders’ Cup race as a “Breeders’ Cup champion” whether or not that horse also wins a championship. Now Monmouth Park is also misusing the word in promoting the principals in the Aug. 2 Haskell as “Preakness Champion Rachel Alexandra” and “Belmont Stakes Champion Summer Bird.”

Rachel Alexandra is 1-to-100 to be the champion 3-year-old filly of 2009, and Summer Bird is a possible contender for the male version of that award, but until the Eclipse Awards are announced next January, neither should be called a champion.

While on the topic of language usage, how about banishing the phrase “taking on the boys” (and its variations, “running against the boys,” “battling the boys,” “facing the boys,” etc.) from turf writing? It was a hoary phrase before the “Year Era of the Chick” began, but with Rachel Alexandra making a habit of stepping outside her division, and a number of other distaffers doing the same recently, its use has tipped from colloquial cutesiness into egregious abuse. I know it can be tough to write about a subject repeatedly without resorting to cliché — how many ways are there, really, to talk about a female horse racing in open company? — but this is one that needs a rest.

Related (if you’re into such things): A bracing excerpt from Kingsley Amis’ “The King’s English.”

Posted in Racing on July 26, 2009 / Tagged Champions, Language, Monmouth Park, Rachel Alexandra, Summer Bird

Monday Notes

– Preakness winner Rachel Alexandra breezed six furlongs in 1:13.80 this morning at Churchill Downs, galloping out seven furlongs in 1:28. “She went beautiful, like she always does,” said trainer Steve Asmussen. “She’s in a nice rhythm and seems very happy right now.” No decision yet on where she might start next. Owner Jess Jackson has mentioned the June 27 Mother Goose at Belmont as a possibility, but the racetrack rumor much-repeated over the weekend, including from those who had seen her recently at Churchill, was that the filly is not training well and may be away from the races longer than her connections publicly anticipate. Of course, while it’s true that her work times have been less zippy since the Preakness (in her final breeze before that race, she went four furlongs in :48.40 versus the :50.20 she posted in the first work after; in her one five furlong breeze before the Oaks, she went the distance in :59.40 compared to the 1:01.60 of her work the first week of June), it should be noted that she has kept to her training schedule without apparent incident, working three Mondays straight for her new barn.

– Tweeted @EJXD2 on Sunday, in reference to Birdstone’s successful Triple Crown season as a young sire:

The last time [a] sire was represented by two different classic winners in his first crop was Count Fleet in 1951.

For the trivia-interested, there’s some additional historical similarity between the two sires and their winners in that, like Birdstone, Count Fleet’s first classic winner was a little regarded Kentucky Derby longshot, Count Turf, who beat another Count Fleet colt entered in the Derby, the favored Counterpoint. He went on to win the Peter Pan in record time and then the Belmont Stakes as the third favorite. According to the Belmont chart comments, “Counterpoint permitted … Count Turf to go to lead … regained the lead when the latter gave way.” Sounds a bit like what we saw on Saturday …

– There may be layoffs at Blood-Horse and Thoroughbred Times, and the newspaper industry in general may be imploding, but Daily Racing Form is doing fine, reports the New York Times.

– After the race: Visiting Summer Bird in his barn after the Belmont Stakes.

Posted in Racing on June 8, 2009 / Tagged Belmont Stakes, Daily Racing Form, Rachel Alexandra, Racing History, Summer Bird

After the Race

Two hours after winning the Belmont Stakes, Summer Bird was in his stall, taking in the small crowd gathered to admire him.

There was trainer Tim Ice, asking people to keep it down — “The horse is starting to get worked up” — and owner Dr. K. K. Jayaraman, beaming at every congratulations offered. Jockey Kent Desormeaux swept in, accompanied by his family, to shake hands and stroke the winner’s nose. Summer Bird turned and posed — snap, flash, went a camera — turned again and paused, his ears pricked.

Across the way, the blanket of carnations hung over a barn windowsill, representing not only the colt’s first stakes win, but his owner-breeders’ first Classic victory.

“This was the best to win,” said Jayaraman, who — with his wife, Devi — has been breeding and racing horses since 1983. “We had one other, 20 years ago …” That one other was Irish Actor, winner of the 1988 G1 Young America Stakes. Reminiscing with another well-wisher, Jayaraman recalled the horse had finished seventh in the 1989 Kentucky Derby, eighth in the Belmont.

It was time to leave, for most. But not the Jayaramans. The couple remained with their homebred winner as the shedrow crowd cleared out. It had taken them two decades to return to Belmont, and they were in no rush to go.

(Originally posted on Raceday 360, June 7, 2009)

Posted in Racing on June 7, 2009 / Tagged Belmont Stakes, Celebrations, Jayaramans, Summer Bird, Tim Ice