JC / Railbird

Turf Writing

Reading Palmer

On the Second Pass, John Williams resurrects Joe Palmer for a new audience:

I don’t want to give the impression that an interest in the sport, or a knowledge of its history, is entirely unnecessary to an enjoyment of This Was Racing. But it’s easy enough to skim any confounding details and focus on the more universal sentiments. Like many great writers and conversationalists, Palmer mostly circled his ostensible subject, rarely landing on it. The most memorable stretches of the book aren’t about racing at all. They’re about recipes for jellied whiskey or the Australian hobby of “kangaroo chasing” or listening to a band torture “My Old Kentucky Home.” (”I could have played it better on a comb.”)

More than half a century removed from his work, it is good to be reminded of what a master turf writer Palmer was. Read the complete review (and then, if you haven’t, “This Was Racing”).

From the archives: An excerpt from “This Was Racing” about trainers Duval and Hal Price Headley, Menow, and the 1938 MassCap.

Posted in Readings on February 4, 2010 / Tagged Joe Palmer, Racing History, This Was Racing, Turf Writers, Turf Writing

The Must-Reads, 2009

The year almost past was rich in surprises and storylines, making 2009 not only a superb year in racing, but a good year in turf writing, a reminder that although the industry may be struggling and there may be fewer correspondents on the beat, greatness remains as possible on track as keen reporting does in print (even if only online). Amid the abundance of the last 12 months, here are 10 pieces that shouldn’t be missed:

Balance’s Little Sister (Steve Andersen/DRF Inside Post)
“Her career will end soon. She may not start again. Shirreffs knows that.”

Death of a Horseman (Bill Christine/Horserace Insider)
“You got it wrong … I’ve never fired Frankel. He’s always firing me. We don’t call him George Steinbrenner for nothing.”

Rubin Recalls Her Tough Ride to the Finish Line (Bill Finley/New York Times)
“I think they felt there would be a stigma if a woman rode, that if a woman could ride, how hard could it possibly be?”

Where Calvin Learned to Ride (Matthew Futterman/Wall Street Journal)
“At the bush tracks in Cajun country where Calvin Borel learned to ride horses for $4 a mount, standards weren’t much higher than the pay.” [A fine complement last spring to Maryjean Wall’s reminiscence, “Calvin Borel: The Early Years,” which appeared on May 15 and is unfortunately no longer online. “Long before Borel became the go-to jockey of this Triple Crown season, I came across him quite by happenstance at the bush races in Louisiana. He was not yet a licensed jockey. He was 14 years old.”]

On Zenyatta, Rachel Alexandra, and Memory (Lisa Grimm/Superfecta)
“… our collective memory will do them a better sort of justice …”

A Glorious Reminder (Paul Hayward/Guardian)
“This was not a bloodstock deal, a betting coup or a prize-money grab. It was flesh and blood and beauty.”

Horse Slaughter: Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell (Matt Hegarty/Daily Racing Form)
“On the issue of horse slaughter, few people take the middle ground …”

High Noon for the Gunslingers (Chris McGrath/The Independent)
“Sheikh Mohammed must have looked at these deadpan men, up from the banks of the Rio Grande, and pondered his own, unrequited craving for this prize. Who are those guys?”

Old School (Claire Novak/ESPN)
“The legend schools the rookie on a cloudy day at Churchill Downs.”

The Final Furlong (Seth Wickersham/ESPN Magazine)
“She took off on foot, walking the track with her medical tool kit, squinting through the mist until she saw a shadowy figure, already a ghost …”

Do you have a favorite piece of turf writing from 2009 not included above? Please share: Leave a comment (and a link, if available) below.

Posted in Media on December 22, 2009 / Tagged Lists, Rachel Alexandra, Sea the Stars, Turf Writing, Writing, Year-End-2009, Zenyatta