Thursday, September 30, 2010

Real Quiet

1998 Three year-old Champion and closest almost winner of the Triple Crown, Real Quiet, passed this previous Monday after a fall in his paddock.

Winner of 6 races. Five of which included the Hollywood Futurity in '97, The Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes in '98 (losing the Belmont by barely a nose) and the Hollywood Gold Cup and Pimlico Special in '99.

He was an amazing horse and good stallion.

RIP Real Quiet, the racing world will miss your power.

(Picture from the picture tribute of this amazing horse: http://community.tvg.com/t5/The-Grandstand/real-quiet-picture-tribute/td-p/111039)

Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Oh Dear, Rachel's Retired

Well, it happened. Reining horse of the year Rachel Alexandra has been retired.
That's the bad news. The GOOD news is it wasn't injury related. When I saw the head line...I was "Oh dear, what happened to the poor gal?" But luckily (as lucky as one can get when retired) she's still as healthy as ever. Her racing form, however, simply never returned to the bang up filly she was last year.For the record, I don't like her trainer...I don't think he quite knows how to keep horses in their prime, because once he gets them it seems that they drop from fame fast. But, I'm sure he knows more than me on the subject! It's just something to chew over. At least he was patient with her and gave her the chance to be the best she could be!

So now Rachel leaves the track to a "less stressful" life of breeding (other than the pregnancy, birthing, and pain the the a** colts, it's pretty easy =P ) and her first match.....*drum roll* Two time HOY Curlin. Yea, that's right. I don't know about you, but I think this could be an interesting match. I hope all goes well with RA and her colts will forever make a ruckus on the tracks!

Cheers Rachel Alexandra, if nothing else, you gave us a few amazing performances to remember!

(Thank you Google for having a good collection and these sites for having good pictures)

In order of their appearance:
http://www.racingpost.com/
http://rachelalexandrafan.blogspot.com/
http://www.nydailynews.com/
http://www.nydailynews.com/
http://www.nj.com/sports/
http://rachelalexandrafan.com/