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00:00:00They say, the harder the work, the greater the reward.
00:00:18This is our life's work.
00:00:21Good morning, it is 924 Wednesday, August 10th.
00:00:27This is the TDN Writer's Room presented by Keeneland.
00:00:30My name is Joe Bianca, I'm the Associate Editor of the Thoroughbred Daily News, and I was
00:00:34up until 2 a.m. last night covering the sale, so if I fall asleep during the show, during
00:00:38one of Bill's Red Sox monologues, or one of John's stump speeches to get on the latest
00:00:43board, it's not because I'm bored of their talking, it's just, you know.
00:00:49Joe, good morning, I'm Bill Finlay, Correspondent with Thoroughbred Daily News, and yes, you
00:00:53nailed it, I'm ready to talk Red Sox.
00:00:56Don't fall asleep.
00:00:57Here's why, Seth Klarman, are you watching this?
00:01:00I sure hope so, or are viewing it.
00:01:03You guys probably don't know, Seth Klarman owns a little piece of the Red Sox.
00:01:07Red Sox are a clown show, an absolute disgrace, an absolute fiasco, they won't spend any money
00:01:12to get new players, they traded away a beloved catcher for a broken fungo bat.
00:01:16The fans are irate, Seth, you gotta do something, you gotta tell these owners, shut up John,
00:01:21you gotta tell these owners, shut up figuratively or whatever, you gotta tell these owners,
00:01:25start spending some goddamn money, thank you, Seth.
00:01:30That rant brought to you by Jonathan Green, Gentleman, what, Joe, what?
00:01:36Brought to you by NyQuil.
00:01:37By NyQuil, exactly, thank you.
00:01:40Jonathan Green, General Manager of DJ Stable, and don't change your computer settings, yes,
00:01:45I did shave, and it was primarily because my Q rating was so high in comparison to you
00:01:49guys, I had to get it, I had to like dumb it down a little bit, so we're going with
00:01:53this for the time being.
00:01:55I thought it was because your beard wasn't talking to your hair, it was gray and your
00:01:59hair is black, I thought that was why, it was a little incongruous.
00:02:04No question about it, I gotta get the, I'm gonna have to get the, you know, the coloring
00:02:09stick.
00:02:10Just for men.
00:02:11Just for men, just like Bill does for his hair, I gotta get it for my beard, so, anyway,
00:02:17that's it for the show, thank you for joining us at the Writers Room Insult Comedy Hour.
00:02:23The TDN Writers Room is brought to you by Keeneland, home of the World's Yearling Sale.
00:02:27Make plans to attend the Keeneland September Yearling Sale beginning Monday, September
00:02:3112th.
00:02:32The catalog is now available at theworldyearlingsale.com.
00:02:35Okay, so we're gonna do a little combo week in review segment here with some of the racing
00:02:41and some of the sales news, because there's a lot to talk about on both fronts.
00:02:45We'll start with the Whitney, that was the big race of the weekend, and that was the
00:02:49big showdown that we were expecting between Life is Good and Olympiad.
00:02:53Never really materialized, because Olympiad did not show up and was a well-beaten fourth.
00:02:58I was on better things last week, I picked against him, just because I thought that he
00:03:02was gonna get, you know, get a little tired trying to chase Life is Good early.
00:03:06Just so, it's dangerous for horses, not physically dangerous, but just in terms of winning a
00:03:11race, for horses who are usually kind of used to pressing the pace, and Olympiad has had
00:03:14the same trip every single time this year, they're used to chasing horses from the two
00:03:20path, you know, close second, to try to chase horses that have that runaway speed.
00:03:25And man, does Life is Good have runaway speed.
00:03:26I just saw a great quote from Irad Ortiz, that two jumps, he just took off down the
00:03:31back stretch, looked like they were gonna try to control the pace early, and then it
00:03:35was just, I'm going, you know, catch me if you can.
00:03:38And they almost did, Happy Saver and Hot Rod Charlie especially, I thought ran really good
00:03:43races to be second and third, Todd Pletcher, Xacta, but Life is Good in the end was too
00:03:48fast, there was a little controversy about Irad's ride, you know, Life is Good likes to
00:03:53meander as it is, and Irad helped him along by jerking him to the inside into Happy Saver's
00:03:57path. I don't think that was particularly dangerous or anything, I think he was clear.
00:04:01But listen, Life is Good is one of the fastest horses we've seen in years, but does he want
00:04:06to go mile and a quarter?
00:04:08That's the main question.
00:04:09And it just seems like a mile and a eighth is the absolute max that he wants to go.
00:04:14What do you guys think?
00:04:15Joe, I guess I'm a little bit in the minority here, because you know what I'm reading on
00:04:19social media, what people react otherwise, I was not super impressed by his race.
00:04:24And now, and this is unfair, but I think I've been spoiled by Jackie's Warrior and
00:04:29Flightline and some of these just absolutely brilliant performances we've seen this year,
00:04:33even Epicenter in the Jim Dandy.
00:04:36Yeah, he won, he looked good, but he didn't take your breath away, he didn't blow you
00:04:40away. And also keep in mind if, you know, with Olympiad just not showing up, you know,
00:04:46what was the competition behind him?
00:04:48You know, American Revolution was scratched, Happy Saver just keeps running second all
00:04:52the time, Hot Red Charlie's a good horse, but you know, not up to that.
00:04:56So, you know, he won, it was never really in doubt, but he just he didn't wow me in
00:05:02this. And I think you hit the nail on the head.
00:05:05I think one of the reasons why is going the mile an eighth is his absolute limit.
00:05:10And, you know, if the race were seven furlongs or a mile, I think he would have looked a
00:05:14lot differently. And I wrote in Week in Review, I mean, obviously they're going to go to
00:05:18the Breeders' Cup Classic.
00:05:19I understand that. But right now, at a mile and a quarter and the key being that
00:05:24distance, a mile and a quarter against the likes of Flightline and some others are
00:05:27going to show up, I think you have a hard chance, a tough chance of winning that race.
00:05:31I really do. And, you know, that's not taking anything away from him.
00:05:34He's a tremendous horse.
00:05:35He's going to be a very valuable and likely successful sire.
00:05:39You know, he's checked a lot of boxes.
00:05:40He won the Whitney. I mean, the Whitney's a great race.
00:05:43But, you know, I think going forward, you know, they say they might run him in the
00:05:47Woodward at Aqueduct. That's a mile and an eighth.
00:05:49That's fine. We'll see what happens.
00:05:50But, you know, I don't know.
00:05:52I was a little bit underwhelmed.
00:05:55I think I agree with you guys as far as, you know, the underwhelming part and a little
00:06:01disappointed, especially when you look at the time.
00:06:02When you look at the winning time of, you know, of almost 149, the track record is 146
00:06:09and change. You know, so they were they really weren't from a stopwatch standpoint.
00:06:14They weren't impressive. From an eyeball test, I thought Life is Good was really
00:06:18impressive for the first eight furlongs.
00:06:21And then, you know, he kind of wrapped up, you know, I wrapped up on him a little bit,
00:06:25did his little, you know, Jimmy, Jimmy down the stretch and that didn't look good.
00:06:31But, you know, I don't know if it was a if it was that the horse was getting tired or the
00:06:35horse, you know, was just getting disinterested or if Hot Rod Charlie and Happy Saver,
00:06:40especially who came up on the rail, were really, you know, eating up ground and catching up
00:06:45to Life is Good. Or if if everyone just thought, you know, I read and the horse Life is
00:06:49Good, just thought this race is won.
00:06:51I'm just going to wrap it up and be done.
00:06:53But, you know, the 107 buyer actually is a bounce.
00:06:56And Joe, I'm going to be interested to hear what you have to say about this from a
00:06:58handicapping standpoint.
00:07:00But you look at a horse like Life is Good and yeah, nine furlongs is probably at a grade
00:07:05one level. Nine furlongs is probably the furthest that he can go.
00:07:08And he showed that when he ran kind of a disinterested fourth in the Dubai World Cup,
00:07:14going a mile and a quarter, just it's not his cup of tea.
00:07:16It's just not that good. But a 107 after posting, 107 buyer after posting 112, 110, 109
00:07:22respectively for his previous three races, it technically is a bounce if you think about it.
00:07:27And that's what it looked like on the eye test.
00:07:28It definitely looks like a bounce.
00:07:31I also want to just, you know, focus a little bit on Happy Saver.
00:07:35This poor son of a gun has run second now to Life is Good, Flightline, Olympiad and
00:07:41Maxfield in his past four races.
00:07:43I mean, other than Nick's Go, I think we'd be hard pressed to find a handicapped horse
00:07:48that's better than those four that Happy Saver just keeps being the bridesmaid to.
00:07:52I mean, this is a horse that tries every time and just isn't at that grade one winning
00:07:56level. But, man, he just he just keeps getting put up against all these great horses and
00:08:02generational horses, you know, at least with Flightline and Life is Good.
00:08:05And you can maybe make a case for Olympiad because he had won five races in a row coming
00:08:09into, you know, five Grated Steak races in a row coming into, you know, into the Whitney.
00:08:13So it's it was a small field.
00:08:16It wasn't, you know, it wasn't a great eye popping, you know, watch to watch race.
00:08:21But I still think that we're going to see Life is Good, Happy Saver, Hot Rod, Charlie
00:08:25and Olympiad, the first four horses and even American Revolution, the horse gets scratched.
00:08:30We're going to see all those horses competing in the in the classics.
00:08:34So I think we're going to look back at this Whitney and say, yeah, maybe it was a one
00:08:37off, but it was still a grade one championship race for Life is Good.
00:08:41And Bill, like you said before, he is a generational talent.
00:08:44I mean, he is just that good.
00:08:46And last year, we were all excited about Max, excuse me, Maxfield and Nick's Go going head
00:08:52to head this race coming up.
00:08:54The classic is setting up where there's four or five betting horses in the race that you
00:08:59think on their best day could could be standing in the winner's circle.
00:09:02And Joe, I'd be interested to hear about about your bounce, about what you think about the
00:09:05bounce theory for Life is Good.
00:09:08Yeah, I mean, I think I think Bill's being a little harsh.
00:09:11I think the track had a lot to do with it because it got that midday rain.
00:09:15And I think the track slowed down, became a lot more tiring after they sealed it.
00:09:19I think you saw that a little bit in the test.
00:09:21We're shy.
00:09:22That lady came from absolutely nowhere to run down Madara and hot peppers.
00:09:28You know, I think on a faster track, I think Life is Good would have had a little bit more
00:09:32chance to have that brilliant blowout win that I think some people might have been expecting
00:09:37from him.
00:09:37But like John says, this was this was a legitimate grade one field.
00:09:41And I think one of the keys for Life is Good is just how well he breaks.
00:09:45I mean, he you could not break better than he broke in that race.
00:09:48And of course, is I think horses were like football players and you get to watch tape.
00:09:53I think like traders would would tell their horses to watch how Life is Good breaks because
00:09:58it's it's absolutely incredible.
00:09:59And it's such an advantage because he has to expend so little energy to get to where
00:10:04he wants to be in a race.
00:10:06You know, and it's just every single time he's just rocket out of the gate, rocket out
00:10:10of the gate.
00:10:10And he really puts the pressure on other horses in the race, especially other speed horses
00:10:15to be sent and to, you know, have to break well to keep up with him early.
00:10:19And I thought it was a great training job by Ty Pletcher, too, because if you if you
00:10:22looked at his work tab on paper, it didn't look that special, like four furlongs and
00:10:2748 and three and like five furlongs and 101.
00:10:30He wasn't blazing up the track like you see Bob Baffert horses do.
00:10:34But if you watch those works on XBTV, those were like mile works.
00:10:39You know, the the gallop out was the part of the work.
00:10:42It was, you know, the the actual time diversion was really just a warm up because he was galloping
00:10:47out like strong miles in that right in that in those workouts.
00:10:51But you have to have a horse, I think, who's willing to train like that, who's who's a
00:10:55forward trainer and really wants to get cut loose even in the mornings.
00:10:59And I think he's a remarkable horse.
00:11:02Honestly, I do not want him to classic.
00:11:04You know, I think he ran pretty much the same race that he'll always run in a mile
00:11:09and eight.
00:11:10So I don't think it was it was necessarily a bounce.
00:11:12I just think that's the apps.
00:11:14That's the cap as far as how far he wants to go.
00:11:18And that just reminds me of they have the Breeders' Cup classic future pool for the
00:11:22first time this year.
00:11:24Flight line is two to one, two to one on flight line.
00:11:28What are we still three months from the race, which is just staggering to me?
00:11:32I'm curious what Bill has to say about that, because like, you know, at best, at worst,
00:11:39he's going to be like six to five or seven to five in the classic.
00:11:42You know, people show up American Revolution.
00:11:44I was disappointed, scratched.
00:11:45He was my pick on better things.
00:11:47He's thirty two to one in the Breeders' Cup classic.
00:11:49You talk about the difference in value.
00:11:52You know, American Revolution is way better value than flight line.
00:11:56And we still got questions about flight line, too.
00:11:58He's never been beyond a mile.
00:12:00Life is good.
00:12:00He's done it a mile and an eighth now twice.
00:12:03Flight line is still never meant to be on a mile.
00:12:05We expect him to cruise in the Pacific classic, but we don't know that until he actually does it.
00:12:09And just one last thing I want to say on the Whitney before I wrap my thoughts is I got
00:12:15to give a hat tip to Hot Rod Charlie.
00:12:16He's just one of those horses who doesn't have a lot of wins on his resume due to bad
00:12:22luck and circumstances.
00:12:23But he shows up and tries every single time.
00:12:27You know, he's probably going to be a bit of a forgotten horse of this generation because
00:12:31he doesn't have all those wins.
00:12:32But I think he deserves a lot of credit and a lot of love for the heart that he has.
00:12:36You think about the Belmont when you read that tremendous second to essential quality,
00:12:41you ran a good fourth in the classic last year chasing Nick's goal when nobody else
00:12:45wanted to.
00:12:46This was a tremendous effort to be because he had to chase what was good and then make
00:12:50another bid at him on the far turn.
00:12:52I just wanted to give a little bit of love to Hot Rod Charlie, who I think is a super
00:12:56underrated horse.
00:13:02The future of the Derby, it's a bad bet.
00:13:04I don't know why anybody bets it.
00:13:06Two to one is a ridiculous price on flight line, and I'm a huge flight line fan.
00:13:10First of all, if the race will run tomorrow, I think you're right.
00:13:13It'll probably only be about six to five.
00:13:15So it's not like you're getting two to one on a one to five shot.
00:13:17And also, any horse is what is the percentages they get sidelined between now and the Breeders
00:13:25Cup time.
00:13:25That's no reflection on flight line or I'm saying he's on sound or anything like that.
00:13:28It's just that's the nature of the game.
00:13:30Keep him healthy for another two months is very difficult.
00:13:33But I want to throw the conversation back to John, because I think you're the one of
00:13:36the three of us that I don't think really touched on the germane topic here.
00:13:41Can you see this horse winning the Breeders Cup Classic at that level of competition at
00:13:47a mile and a quarter?
00:13:48I can't.
00:13:49Yeah, Bill, I would agree with you.
00:13:51I would think that that's going to be just outside the scope of his abilities at the
00:13:55grade one level.
00:13:56If he was running at a mile and a quarter against grade three horses, absolutely.
00:14:01But not with this crop of older horses.
00:14:05I mean, this is really a unique year, I think.
00:14:08If all of them stay healthy, like we said before, there's gonna be half a dozen horses
00:14:12that you can really make a legitimate case for.
00:14:14And there's going to be a horse that's going to jump up between now and the Breeders Cup
00:14:18that's going to make us kind of pause and say, where was this horse before?
00:14:21You know, and kind of toiling and maybe some of these grade three races and looking to
00:14:26step up, you know, almost like Rich Strike did in the Breeders, excuse me, in the Kentucky
00:14:30Derby, where you go, this horse doesn't really belong.
00:14:33And all of a sudden, after they win, you go, hmm, maybe I should have looked a little closer
00:14:37at some of the prep races.
00:14:39But as far as cementing life as good as a future stallion, there's no question that
00:14:45once he won the Breeders Cup mile and some of the race results that he's put in, some
00:14:51of the performance he's put in, cements him as a legitimate sire.
00:14:56You know, and he's probably he's not going to stand for as much as justify who won the
00:15:00Triple Crown.
00:15:00But I would venture to guess that even if he doesn't win the Breeders Cup Classic, being
00:15:05a son of intimacy out of the strong family that he has, a strong female family, he's
00:15:09going to be a $75,000 to $100,000 stallion.
00:15:13And he'll get booked up.
00:15:14You know, 300 mares will will apply for him, especially when you look at how well some
00:15:18of these young sires like Justify and Gunrunner, how their progeny have done at the sales.
00:15:23I mean, it's at $100,000.
00:15:25I hate to say it's a shit ton amount of money, but it's almost a bargain.
00:15:30Yeah, Judd is already selling those stallion shares.
00:15:34The life is good.
00:15:34Atta boy.
00:15:39But yeah, he's obviously going to be a very attractive prospect.
00:15:42Just to wrap that up, I do think it's an interesting classic this year because I do
00:15:46think there are legitimate questions about him.
00:15:48And maybe Flightline will just win the Pacific Classic by 15 likes with 130 buyer.
00:15:52And well, you know, it'll be a foregone conclusion that he wins the Breeders Cup if he gets there.
00:15:56But, you know, until it happens, I think that it's a really interesting classic field
00:16:01looking at it now.
00:16:02And I think that there will be there will be some chances in that race.
00:16:05Whereas last year, I thought it was a little bit of a ho-hum.
00:16:08But even though the horses were pretty nice, I thought betting wise, it just wasn't
00:16:12really that interesting.
00:16:13But I just wanted to shift gears a little bit to the fireworks last night up in Saratoga,
00:16:17because, you know, especially with John here, I'm interested to get his thoughts.
00:16:21There were 10, 10 seven-figure yearlings last night at the Fasig Saratoga sale and the sale,
00:16:28you know, smashed records all over the place.
00:16:31And I, you know, especially we're going to talk about this a little later.
00:16:34We got a new sponsor, Three Chimneys, about the continued explosion of success of Gunrunner.
00:16:39He had the topper in the entire sale for $2.3 million.
00:16:44So it's sold to the friends at Coolmore, as well as Peter Brandt.
00:16:48But, you know, I hear a lot from people about like, oh, well, there's a recession coming,
00:16:53and we need a soft landing and all this and all that.
00:16:55Maybe that's right.
00:16:57But it seems to me like the 0.01% of the world are doing pretty well to be spending record
00:17:03breaking numbers at these horse sales.
00:17:06And, you know, this week's sale, like I said, it shattered all the records.
00:17:10And I think it bodes well, of course, for King Island September, which is coming up
00:17:14now in just over a month.
00:17:15King Island September catalog came out yesterday, 4,147 yearlings cataloged.
00:17:22But John, I mean, what do you make of this?
00:17:24I felt like earlier in the year, there was a lot of talk about, you know, a little bit
00:17:28of weariness in the market and whether or not there was going to be a recession coming.
00:17:32There was no sign of that this week in Saratoga.
00:17:35Yeah.
00:17:36And Joe and Bill, one of the things I can tell you as somebody that follows finances
00:17:41and the horse industry, the thoroughbred industry, especially the sales industry,
00:17:46sales part of it, has always been a laggard indicator.
00:17:50So in other words, if we're in a recession, if our recession technically started this
00:17:55quarter, the effects of it wouldn't be felt in the horse industry for six to nine months
00:18:01later.
00:18:02So that's why even if we're technically in a recession right now as an economy or
00:18:06as a country, you're not going to see that play out until probably next summer's yearling
00:18:11sales.
00:18:13So it doesn't surprise me.
00:18:14Some of the things that did surprise me were, you know, 14 horses that sold for over a million
00:18:19dollars.
00:18:20That just shows you that the cream of the crop is people are still chasing those horses.
00:18:25And of the $14 million yearlings, 13 different groups bought a horse.
00:18:31So Joe, if you want to say, well, maybe the recession is hitting a little bit in that
00:18:36sense.
00:18:36Yeah, it used to be where you had three or four of these guys getting together or buying
00:18:42individually on their own, these million-dollar horses.
00:18:44But now it's almost like two people are gunning for one horse and one gets it.
00:18:49And then that person who didn't win goes to the next one for two.
00:18:53There's two people that kind of run it up to evaluate what they see.
00:18:57You don't see the multiple purchases like you used to.
00:19:00You are seeing more and more partnership purchases.
00:19:03Our friends at West Point bought a couple of parts of a couple of horses for over a
00:19:07million dollars.
00:19:08Same thing with Magner.
00:19:10And when you look at smart people in the industry like West Point and like Coolmore, you have
00:19:15to kind of sit and take notice that they are still buying expensive yearlings, expensive
00:19:21colts for the most part.
00:19:22But West Point bought in partnership with Curling Philly for $2 million.
00:19:26So for the most part, it was the boys.
00:19:29But there were some fillies that sold for a lot of money.
00:19:33And again, you look at probably the most important indicator to me was that there was an 80%
00:19:39clearance rate.
00:19:40So that means 80% of the horses that went through the ring sold, which is just a phenomenal
00:19:46number.
00:19:47Because that means that not only were the prices exceeding expectations, but that they
00:19:51were exceeding everyone's thoughts going into the sale as far as how much they'd be
00:19:56willing to keep their horse for.
00:19:57So when you have an 80% clearance rate at an overall sale, that's just a phenomenal,
00:20:03phenomenal number.
00:20:04So it looks like our industry, at least at the top market, is very, very strong.
00:20:09That'll carry over in my estimation to book one and book two of Keeneland, which are coming
00:20:13up.
00:20:14And then we'll see.
00:20:14Then we'll see the recession kind of start to seep in to some of the lower priced horses.
00:20:20And you may see a lot of horses in book five or six that don't sell or sell for very little
00:20:26because there just isn't that kind of follow-up market.
00:20:28But the top of the market is exceedingly strong.
00:20:31Yeah, it was a wild sale because a lot of times we cover it at the TDN extensively,
00:20:36obviously.
00:20:37Usually we get down to like the $750,000, $700,000 horses.
00:20:42There were just so many million dollar horses that you could sell a horse for $800,000 last
00:20:47night and wouldn't even crack the paper because there were just so many seven-figure yearlings.
00:20:53So I wonder if that maybe makes it not great value, John, because I don't know if you guys
00:20:59shopped this sale at all, but it seems like the demand was just absolutely through the
00:21:06roof.
00:21:06And it's just so hard to believe just from a layman's perspective, watching racing, how
00:21:12many million dollar yearlings do you see become multiple grade one winners and stallion
00:21:17prospects?
00:21:17It just doesn't happen all that often.
00:21:20So I wonder what your thoughts are if the demand blows everything out of the water so
00:21:25much that there becomes no value at these sales sometimes.
00:21:30What do you think, John?
00:21:30Yeah, Joe, we didn't even go to the Saratoga sale because we anticipated that the prices
00:21:36were going to be so far above normal.
00:21:39Now, we did not expect it to be this strong, but that's one of the reasons why I'm in New
00:21:44Jersey versus in Saratoga this week.
00:21:46We did sell a filly, a Distorted Humor filly at the tail end of last night, again, for
00:21:51almost twice as much as what we anticipated before when she left Kentucky.
00:21:55So we were really pleased with that.
00:21:57I think people are also emboldened a little bit about, with the success of Gamine and
00:22:02Flightline and Corniche, these seven-figure horses that are super expensive horses that
00:22:07are having success on the racetrack.
00:22:09It used to be where, other than a handful of times, these seven-figure horses never
00:22:15really got to that level.
00:22:17They were worth the most when they went through the sales rank that day.
00:22:21But now you're starting to see some of these really expensive horses perform on the racetrack.
00:22:25And when they perform on the racetrack, they exponentially are worth so much more in the
00:22:30breeding shed down the road.
00:22:31Yeah, I mean, I think Flightline in particular is an example of that because I still think
00:22:36overall 80%, 90% horses above $700,000 don't become superstars and you don't make money
00:22:43on them.
00:22:44But yeah, I think having those high-profile horses in the last couple of years who did
00:22:48do well and become valuable and maybe even more valuable than their purchase price, definitely
00:22:52in the case of Flightline, I think does, you're right, embolden people.
00:22:56But yeah, it was crazy two nights in Saratoga.
00:22:59And like you said, that momentum is sure to carry over into Keeneland in September in
00:23:03about a month's time.
00:23:05The TDN Writers Room was brought to you by Keeneland.
00:23:07Whitney Winner, life is good as a graduate of Book One at the Keeneland September Sale.
00:23:11Son of Intimus Shift, was purchased for $525,000 by China Horse Club and Maverick Racing in
00:23:172019.
00:23:18Grade Two Glens Falls Winner, forgot to mention her, but how about Warlike Goddess coming
00:23:22back and defending her title in the Glens Falls?
00:23:24Might go after the boys next in the Sword Dancer, Bill Mott mentioned.
00:23:28She also went through the ring at the Keeneland September Sale.
00:23:31Your next opportunity awaits at this year's Keeneland September Sale, which starts Monday,
00:23:35September 12th.
00:23:36Catalog is now live and features 4,147 yearlings.
00:23:40Book One includes yearlings out of 89 graded stakes winners and 36 grade one winners plus
00:23:47siblings to beat grade one winners.
00:23:50So you can't beat that kind of quality.
00:23:51And we're all looking forward to that sale just over a month from now.
00:23:54We'll be right back after this message from Keeneland.
00:23:58When the thoroughbred world descends upon Lexington this November, there is one place
00:24:04you need to be.
00:24:05The place where history comes alive with every championship victory.
00:24:09He's authentic indeed!
00:24:11The place where the future is built with the fall of a gavel.
00:24:16The place that exists to be the heart of this industry.
00:24:19The center of it all.
00:24:21Home to the November Breeding Stock Sale and the 2022 Breeders' Cup.
00:24:27Keeneland.
00:24:29Spiketown.
00:24:32Munning.
00:24:35Echotown.
00:24:39It's Echotown for Joe Talamo.
00:24:41And Echotown rips away.
00:24:44And Echotown is drawing away in the stretch.
00:24:46Echotown wins the Alan Turkin Stakes.
00:24:49A sire line so prolific it repeats itself.
00:24:54Echotown.
00:25:19Mendelssohn had his first TDN Rising Star on Sunday with Pink Hue.
00:25:23Looked very, very good for Chad Brown.
00:25:26Mendelssohn now has seven winners with five of those coming in the past two weeks,
00:25:30including two at Saratoga.
00:25:31So he's really starting to catch fire with his first crop.
00:25:34Congratulations as well to everybody at Coolmore for Golden Pal's latest win at the SPA
00:25:38in the Grade 3 Troy Stakes.
00:25:40Future Coolmore stallion and son of current Ashford resident Uncle Moe was winning his
00:25:45seventh career race and second of the year after his Shaker Town win in April.
00:25:50I read cut it a little bit close in that race.
00:25:53Sure had a lot of people sweating, especially with the horse being one to five.
00:25:57But it was great to see Golden Pal back on these shores.
00:25:59Hope he stays in America the rest of this year and see him hopefully repeat his feet
00:26:05in the Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint.
00:26:07It'll be his third Breeders' Cup run in a row, which I don't know if any horses have
00:26:13accomplished that.
00:26:13It's off the top of my head.
00:26:14But yeah, great to see Golden Pal back on the track as well.
00:26:17And Coolmore, of course, very busy last night in Saratoga as well.
00:26:21All right.
00:26:21So we're going to stand up for our fellow media members here.
00:26:25This is a big story this week.
00:26:26I'm going to leave it mostly to Bill here.
00:26:28John said he wasn't going to say anything, but he always says that.
00:26:31And then he comes in and talks for like five minutes.
00:26:33So I'll hold my breath on that one.
00:26:35But it was a big story in the past week that the California Horse Racing Board now is trying
00:26:42to institute a rule that media members have to be licensed to go onto the back stretches
00:26:48of California tracks.
00:26:49You have to pay a $75 fee.
00:26:51You got to get fingerprinted.
00:26:53You got to get a background check done, which is obviously ridiculous and spells bad things
00:26:59for racing and the way racing media is allowed to cover the sport.
00:27:04So some people suggesting that this was a HISA thing, which I mean, obviously, I haven't
00:27:08read the HISA regulations top to bottom.
00:27:10But A, why would CHRB not mention that in their press release?
00:27:15And B, why wouldn't other tracks also be announcing similar policies if this was a HISA thing?
00:27:20Obviously, this is ridiculous.
00:27:22And the most worrying part, I think, that some people have brought up is that this could
00:27:27lead to the CHRB and California tracks being more easily able to revoke credentials.
00:27:33And at a time when the sport, if anything, needs more scrutiny, that's part of the reason
00:27:38we do this show, is that the sport needs scrutiny like it's never had before because
00:27:43of all the messiness going on in the last decade, especially.
00:27:47It's the exact opposite way that people who run racetracks and run racing jurisdictions
00:27:53should be acting.
00:27:54And it's never good when people try to restrict media in any sport.
00:27:59And this has failed.
00:28:01This kind of policy has failed in other major sports.
00:28:04And I think it's doomed to fail in racing because of the big uproar that has come out
00:28:09of this.
00:28:09And I would love to hear the California Horse Racing Board really explain themselves as
00:28:14to why this was necessary.
00:28:16Bill?
00:28:17Yeah, I mean, this is some serious Big Brother stuff here.
00:28:19And so many points have been made.
00:28:21The first one is, why?
00:28:23Who saw the need for this?
00:28:25Did something happen that we don't know about?
00:28:27Why did the California Horse Racing Board, after all this time and all these years, where
00:28:32since the beginning of time, credentials are handled by the racetracks, decide to come
00:28:35in and say, no, you've got to get a license from us?
00:28:39And this creates so many problems.
00:28:41And first of all, this just flies in the face of the First Amendment and freedom of speech.
00:28:46And again, why was this necessary?
00:28:49The fee for the license is only $75.
00:28:52But it doesn't matter if it's $75 or $750 or $1.
00:28:56You can't have the media having to pay money for essentially the right to do their job.
00:29:02And Joe, you really hit the nail on the head.
00:29:04But the biggest issue here is that now that if a media person is going to be licensed,
00:29:09they are under the control of CHRB, just like if John Green gets an owner's license out
00:29:15in California.
00:29:16So clearly, they have the right to find somebody, to suspend somebody.
00:29:21And suppose somebody writes a story that the CHRB is a bunch of buffoons and they did
00:29:27this all wrong.
00:29:28Are they going to suspend their license?
00:29:30I mean, you hope that they won't.
00:29:32But just the fact that they have that power or could have that power to do something like
00:29:37that, yeah.
00:29:37I mean, we talk about un-American.
00:29:39That just flies in the face of everything that we know and love about our country and
00:29:44how the First Amendment and the rights of the media and the press.
00:29:48Here's another problem, too.
00:29:50Next year, the Breeders' Cup is at Santa Anita.
00:29:53You've got to have hundreds of journalists coming in from all over the world.
00:29:56You can ask some guy coming in from Japan to cover the Breeders' Cup.
00:29:59Oh, excuse me, Mr. So-and-so.
00:30:01Before you can cover the Breeders' Cup, you've got to come in at Santa Anita a week early
00:30:05and get fingerprinted to cover the race.
00:30:08I mean, it's just so outlandish and so unnecessary.
00:30:12The CHRB, hopefully, they're listening to the blowback.
00:30:15Hopefully, they'll understand that this was just not a good idea.
00:30:19They'll say, never mind.
00:30:21But on the surface right now, it's really—and one more point.
00:30:25Horse racing is dying for more media coverage, particularly from the mainstream media.
00:30:30I mean, the day and age where the mainstream media pays attention to the sport are over,
00:30:34but maybe they would come out to the Breeders' Cup.
00:30:36So why are you going to do something to discourage mainstream media and the media as a whole
00:30:41from covering your event?
00:30:43I mean, nobody's saying to the New York Times they've got to pay $100 to send their
00:30:48riders to the Super Bowl.
00:30:50That's exactly what it would be like.
00:30:52It's just unfathomable.
00:30:53It's nonsense.
00:30:56Yeah, I mean, I honestly think it's—I don't know what the motivation specifically was
00:31:02for this, but I think it's emblematic of kind of this anti-press sentiment that's
00:31:09bubbled up in the past five years or so, particularly because of Trump.
00:31:13There's a documentary recently that Ronan Farrow produced that's on HBO.
00:31:17I think it's called Endangered.
00:31:19It's really worth watching, and it's interesting.
00:31:20And it follows four journalists around the world whose ability to practice their craft
00:31:27and to cover things and scrutinize things is being threatened, and sometimes physically
00:31:32with violence.
00:31:33Obviously, racing media, we don't face even close to that level of pushback.
00:31:40But the concept is the same, that I think a lot of people feel comfortable and emboldened
00:31:45these days to have this very blanket, like anti-media, anti-press sentiments.
00:31:52The media is the enemy of the people and all that stuff.
00:31:54And I don't know that in a past time where that didn't really exist, at least on the
00:31:58surface, that CHRB would have been comfortable coming out with a policy like that.
00:32:03And I think kudos to the racing journalists who have made such a big stink about this.
00:32:08I think of Jay Pridman and Teresa Gennaro and Jeremy Ballin.
00:32:11I think we do have a lot of good reporters in this sport who are rightly drawing a line
00:32:17in the sand and saying, no way, this is not going to stand.
00:32:20And yeah, I think Bill makes the correct point that this is a fundamental thing.
00:32:24This is a fundamental right of the press thing, a freedom of the press thing, where once the
00:32:30entity starts controlling who can come cover the sport and essentially who can say what
00:32:35if they're in charge of revoking licenses, then you no longer have freedom of the press.
00:32:40And Bill makes another great point that we should be begging people.
00:32:43We should be begging people to come to the track and cover the sport and give us a little
00:32:48bit of shine, especially now in California.
00:32:50You know, I think about this, too, because California and the CHRB definitely deserve
00:32:53some credit for this.
00:32:54All the good stories that have come out of California in the last couple of years with
00:32:58the vastly improved safety record and drug record.
00:33:01And there is a lot of good news to report on.
00:33:03And now is when you decide you're going to kick the media members out or at least make
00:33:07them pay for the privilege of covering the sport.
00:33:10It's just it's ass backwards in every single way.
00:33:13And I would just I would have loved to been a fly on the wall in the CHRB deliberations
00:33:19on whether or not they were going to do this and the statement they were going to put out,
00:33:22because it just it seems like there should have been one person with some common sense
00:33:26in the room that said, you know, guys, this might not look great.
00:33:29This might you know, even if you felt like this was a necessary step, you think about
00:33:34the optics and be like, you know, is it really a good idea to be restricting media access
00:33:39on the backstretch at our tracks, especially when the sport is, you know, withering a little
00:33:44bit as it is?
00:33:45And it's especially when there have been so many stories worth covering in the last couple
00:33:49of years.
00:33:49It's just it's mind boggling.
00:33:52I hope that they backtrack on this.
00:33:54I think people need to keep the pressure on them for sure.
00:33:57And I don't know whether that's, you know, boycotting covering the Pacific Classic or
00:34:02Santa Anita or any of these things.
00:34:04But it's just someone someone needs to take a real about face on this and apologize, frankly,
00:34:11I think, to racing and racing media, because this is this is authoritarian stuff.
00:34:17And like Bill says, it doesn't matter.
00:34:18That's not about the price of the license.
00:34:20Like the license could be a dollar.
00:34:22It's the fact that now the CHRB is going to control who can cover their sport and then
00:34:27consequentially who can say what about their sport.
00:34:31And that should be unacceptable to everybody in America.
00:34:34So I agree with everything you guys are saying.
00:34:36Can I just be devil's advocate and ask you guys a question as media?
00:34:40When was the last honestly, when was the last time either of you were on the backstretch
00:34:43of a racetrack?
00:34:44Yeah, but I mean, I I'm sorry, we're not talking about Joe Bianca and Bill Finley.
00:34:48We're talking more about the people like Jay Bridman, the boots on the ground at these
00:34:52racetracks.
00:34:52So it doesn't matter if this effect to me doesn't matter if this affects 200 riders
00:34:57or three riders.
00:34:59It's the principle behind this.
00:35:01No, it doesn't affect me.
00:35:02I have no there's no chance in between now and maybe next year's Breeders' Cup.
00:35:07And I even doubt that that I'm showing up on the backstretch of a California track.
00:35:10But there are people that want to do that.
00:35:13And in particularly back, you know, let's take the San Diego paper there that maybe
00:35:17would come out opening day and Pacific Classic Day or something like that.
00:35:22You know, maybe now they just say, no, we're not going to do it.
00:35:24And, you know, how does that affect and impact the sport that is looking for all that kind
00:35:28of exposure?
00:35:29So, I mean, I don't think this is a Bill Finley and Joe Bianca issue by any stretch of the
00:35:33imagination, but it's a larger issue for, you know, while we may not be there, there
00:35:38are dozens of other people that need access to the backstretch at these racetracks.
00:35:45And, you know, they're still get it.
00:35:46But now they get it with a caveat or with a restriction placed, you know, on what they
00:35:51can and cannot do.
00:35:53And look, you know, the first maybe the CHRB is more reasonable than we're giving them
00:35:58credit for.
00:35:59But, you know, let's take, you know, a writer X and he shows up and, you know, like I said,
00:36:04write something derogatory about the CHRB.
00:36:08How are they going to respond to that?
00:36:09You know, and it's trending.
00:36:12It's one of the top 10 stories on Twitter right now, which is really surprising because
00:36:18obviously a lot of the media is picking it up and guys, correct me if I'm wrong, but
00:36:21isn't this like the second slap in the face of a racetrack or a racing jurisdiction against
00:36:27writers?
00:36:28I remember when Arlington Park was closing, didn't they like didn't they just kick everybody
00:36:32out of the press booth?
00:36:34They're like, get out of here now.
00:36:35Like it wasn't it wasn't.
00:36:36I mean, that was like more.
00:36:37I think that was like a more of a petty thing because, you know, everybody was was waxing
00:36:41poetic about the track closing.
00:36:43I thought that was like, you know, I don't think that was like a it wasn't like a policy.
00:36:47I think that was just one guy being a dick.
00:36:49And, you know, I and to your question, John, no, like I'm not on the backstretch all that
00:36:54often.
00:36:55The next time I'll be on the backstretch is to feed writers room a peppermint this weekend
00:36:59at Saratoga.
00:37:00So, no, it doesn't it doesn't affect me all that much, but it leads to the point.
00:37:05I think the logical conclusion of this is if fewer and fewer people start covering California
00:37:11racing because of this, then California racing can control the narrative and just put out
00:37:16press releases.
00:37:17And there'll be really no reporting other than what the CHRB decides is, you know, consumable
00:37:23for the public.
00:37:23And that's a terrible spot for anybody to be at.
00:37:26Like, that's that's, you know, that's what I always think about when people are like,
00:37:29oh, fake news and media is the enemy and blah, blah, blah.
00:37:31It's like, OK, so let's follow that.
00:37:33Do you want to get to the point where the leaders will just tell you what to think and
00:37:38tell you what they want you to consume and believe?
00:37:43Like, you don't want any kind of reporting whatsoever to get to the truth.
00:37:46You're just OK with the president saying, here's how it is.
00:37:49Here's what's happening.
00:37:50No questions, please.
00:37:51You're OK with that.
00:37:52If you're one of these media is the enemy of the people, you know, it's just it blows
00:37:57my mind.
00:37:57Like, just because people people are upset that, like, the media is like will report
00:38:02negative stories on a politician.
00:38:03They like they don't want any journalism anymore whatsoever.
00:38:06Just daddy, tell me what to believe and I'll believe it.
00:38:09So that that's like I said, I think that's kind of undergirding.
00:38:12This is that anti-media sentiment that's going through the world and especially America right
00:38:17now.
00:38:18But I think, like I said, it's been good that there has been such fierce pushback about
00:38:23this in the racing media with a lot of good journalists speaking up about it.
00:38:26And I think CHRB will have to reverse course eventually.
00:38:31The TDN Writer's Room is brought to you by the Pennsylvania Horse Breeders Association
00:38:34After late nominations for the first leg of the two-year-old P.A.
00:38:38Sired P.A.
00:38:38Bread Series, 44 nominations are in for the Whistlepig Stakes and 53 for the Miss Blue
00:38:44Tie-Dye.
00:38:45The second leg of the series, which consists of two $200,000 stakes, will be run on Pennsylvania
00:38:50Derby Day at Parks, which is September 24th.
00:38:53Nominations close on September 6th.
00:38:55Pennsylvania Day at the Races is now less than two weeks away.
00:38:58On August 22nd at Parks, there'll be over a million dollars in purses with seven $100,000
00:39:04stakes.
00:39:05If you own a P.A.
00:39:06Bread or P.A.
00:39:07Sired horse, you'd be silly not to show up on those two days.
00:39:11Definitely a good program that the PHBA runs, and we look forward to those races at Parks.
00:39:16We'll be right back after this message from the PHBA.
00:39:20The P.A.
00:39:20Horse Breeders Association introduces the Pennsylvania Stallion Series.
00:39:24Four brand new races to be run at Parks for P.A.
00:39:27Sired P.A.
00:39:28Bread two-year-olds.
00:39:29There are two $100,000 contests on August 22nd.
00:39:33P.A.
00:39:34Day at the Races.
00:39:35September 24th, P.A.
00:39:36Derby Day, has two more races, each with a $200,000 purse.
00:39:41The P.A.
00:39:41Stallion Series, yet another reason why Pennsylvania is the premier place to breed and race.
00:39:47For more, please visit pabread.com.
00:40:03The
00:40:20Green Group Guest of the Week is sponsored by The Green Group, an accounting, tax, consulting,
00:40:24and advisory firm specializing in the thoroughbred industry.
00:40:27With over 500 clients in the horse business, they have proven strategies to save you taxes.
00:40:31Learn more about how they can help you at www.greenco.com.
00:40:36So we're thrilled to welcome on this week.
00:40:37We're thrilled to learn something this week on The Writer's Room.
00:40:40Professor Ernie Bailey from the UK Gluck Center's Research Center.
00:40:45Welcome to the show.
00:40:47Good to be here.
00:40:48Great to have you.
00:40:49And so you guys have been in the news a little bit recently because at the end of June, you
00:40:53released the first part of the results of the geneticism study and the study of thoroughbred
00:40:59genetics.
00:41:00And it's a big, obviously, hot topic in racing because there was proposed 140 mare cap for
00:41:06stallions.
00:41:07And the concern behind that was supposedly that we're weakening the breed and it's becoming
00:41:12less diverse, the thoroughbred genes, over time.
00:41:15You guys found that, at least through part one, that that's not the case.
00:41:18Can you talk about the research that you undertook and the conclusions that you came to?
00:41:23Sure.
00:41:24I mean, the premise for the study was the backtalk about diversity.
00:41:30Thoroughbreds have been selected for 300 years.
00:41:32There's been a small population it started from.
00:41:34And so people are justifiably concerned that maybe diversity is being bred out.
00:41:41The tools that we've had to look at that have been incomplete.
00:41:44We've used blood groups.
00:41:46We've used biochemical markers, microsatellite DNA, and lately SNP markers.
00:41:51And all of those markers sample a small part of the genome.
00:41:56The best one that we've got is picking up 0.02% of the genome.
00:42:01And we now have a really great tool.
00:42:02We can do whole genome sequencing.
00:42:04We can sequence every single base, every single piece of DNA in a horse.
00:42:09And so that's the complete assessment of diversity that one can do.
00:42:14And so we thought that with all these questions that were circulating around,
00:42:17why don't we use this particular tool?
00:42:20The costs of doing sequencing have been dropping precipitously over the last 10 years.
00:42:26It's just come to the point where it is feasible for us in research to do that.
00:42:31So I've got three colleagues, two other colleagues, Ted Kelmflies here at the University of Kentucky
00:42:36and Jessica Peterson at the University of Nebraska.
00:42:41And the three of us set out to sequence 100 thoroughbred horses to assess the diversity
00:42:46that exists.
00:42:47And the way that we did that was we went out and solicited samples from over 1,000 thoroughbred
00:42:54horses.
00:42:56And the breeders were very responsive, very helpful for that.
00:43:00From that, we looked at the pedigree.
00:43:01So we picked the 100 horses amongst the 1,000 that appeared to be the most diverse.
00:43:07And our goal was really to capture all of the common genetic variants that exist in
00:43:12the thoroughbred and a lot of the variants that are fairly rare.
00:43:16Less than half of a percent.
00:43:18So that was our goal, was to basically get a snapshot today of what the thoroughbred
00:43:23looks like.
00:43:25The results that we had were interesting.
00:43:31We're not the first to have done this.
00:43:32There are two other studies that have done it before.
00:43:34This is the largest study that's done it.
00:43:36And all of us have found that there's considerable genetic diversity in the thoroughbred.
00:43:41The other laboratories have sequenced horses of a variety of different breeds,
00:43:45warmbloods, quarter horses, Andalusians.
00:43:49And when you look at the diversity that exists in these different breeds, we find that the
00:43:53thoroughbred, the diversity in the thoroughbred overlaps that.
00:43:57This means that the thoroughbred breeders have done a good job over 300 years of continuing
00:44:02to maintain the diversity in the breed.
00:44:05That's not to say that there isn't a decrease.
00:44:08When breeders are selecting for horses, inbreeding is a constant part of it.
00:44:12And so inbreeding is going to gradually increase over time.
00:44:17And so what we want to do is to be in a position to monitor the changes in the genetic diversity.
00:44:25Ernie, thanks for that explanation.
00:44:26And, you know, you know, the debate on one side led by the Jockey Club are saying that
00:44:30there is a problem here.
00:44:31We need to limit the size of books that a stallion is bred to 140.
00:44:37The other side, led by some of the big stud farms, say that's not right.
00:44:40There's no problem here and you can't limit our business.
00:44:43So far as answering that question, whether limiting the book to 140 is a good idea, really
00:44:49not necessary, or maybe, you know, something else.
00:44:52How would you answer that question after the study?
00:44:55There isn't any academic information that says 140 is a magic number as to protecting
00:45:03the integrity of the breed.
00:45:06I'm not sure where the number came from.
00:45:09And it's one of the things that we would like to do is to be able to look at the diversity,
00:45:14model the breeding, and make a recommendation as to what is the proper approach.
00:45:19I'm somewhat personally skeptical that 140 is an issue.
00:45:25There is, as this study has shown, a lot of genetic diversity that exists in the thoroughbred.
00:45:30It's common sense that if you reduce the number of stallions that you use, that you would
00:45:35restrict diversity, you would restrict inbreeding.
00:45:38But the study that we did shows that there's a lot of genetic diversity.
00:45:42And so this is a really small effect.
00:45:45There's perhaps 100,000 mares that exist, brood mares that are out there, and they basically
00:45:50contain most of the diversity that exists in the thoroughbred.
00:45:53And so it's likely that the restricting the book size for a small number of stallions
00:46:03is going to have a very minimal effect.
00:46:05It would be a bit like trying to turn an oil tanker around in the middle of the ocean.
00:46:10If you have a rowboat that is pushing on the bow, you're not going to have a very large
00:46:16effect on it.
00:46:18I don't know what the answer is.
00:46:20I'm skeptical about 140.
00:46:22But I think that when we have the numbers about the diversity, we can then model and
00:46:26make a prediction of here is the best way to manage it.
00:46:29And it may not be restricting the book, and it may not be a matter of making changes now.
00:46:35The real question that exists is there's a lot of diversity today.
00:46:39We are continuing to inbreed the horse.
00:46:42That is part of improvement.
00:46:43You're trying to get rid of the bad genes, and you're trying to concentrate the good
00:46:46genes.
00:46:47This is a good thing.
00:46:48Inbreeding can be beneficial.
00:46:51But at some point, we don't want the horse to become a clone.
00:46:54And when will this happen?
00:46:55Is it going to be in 20 years or in 60 years or in 100 years?
00:46:59And we can use modeling to do that and give advice to breeders based on these real numbers.
00:47:08That's a great answer, Dr. Bailey.
00:47:10As somebody who's been very outspoken against the 140 mare cap, I'm glad that there's
00:47:15some genuine science behind that stance.
00:47:18One of the things that I think the reason why they came up with the 140 mare number
00:47:23had to do with a study of standard breads that was done by the standard bread industry.
00:47:29And again, I think our understanding is that thoroughbreds have a lot more genetic
00:47:34diversity than the standard breads do.
00:47:36But I think that's where they came up with the original 140 number.
00:47:41When you look at the way that people are breeding mares to certain stallions, a lot of breeders
00:47:48are doing it based on what the hypothetical mating grade is.
00:47:53I'm sure you're familiar with those ratings and NICs and those programs.
00:47:59Could you tell our audience a little bit about if it makes sense or if it's not enough
00:48:05information to make a huge investment based on a work NIC or on a true NIC grade?
00:48:15You're getting outside of our area of expertise.
00:48:18Academics, we require having huge amounts of information in order to make decisions.
00:48:24And I'm somewhat, I admire breeders because they have much more limited information and they're
00:48:30making these choices and making the plans.
00:48:33They have very special skills that are quite different from what we're doing.
00:48:36For me to do the same thing, I would have to have 100 times more information than the
00:48:41breeders are doing.
00:48:42So I admire what they do.
00:48:44I have no comment about it.
00:48:47It falls outside of my expertise.
00:48:50Dr. Bailey, I asked this, I mentioned this in my first question, this was part one of
00:48:54the UK Glock Center study and part two is coming up.
00:48:57Can you talk about how part two will differ from part one, how it'll pick up on the same
00:49:01research and kind of what you're trying to find out in part two?
00:49:05Well, what we had reported earlier was simply the numbers because we had just gotten the
00:49:11sequences.
00:49:12It was quite exciting to see the extent of diversity.
00:49:15It matched that in previous studies.
00:49:18And so that was the information.
00:49:20It was simply the raw number of genetic variants that we found.
00:49:27What we're hoping to do is to publish a complete paper this fall and it will include
00:49:33looking at some of the structural variants because in the genome there are inversions,
00:49:37there's copy number variants, there's a number of different types of variation that exist.
00:49:42We want to look at, there are measures of inbreeding that are called regions of homozygosity
00:49:48and while breeders look at the pedigrees and they can calculate inbreeding from that, we
00:49:53can look at the DNA and ask how many regions of the DNA are actually showing this type
00:49:58of homozygosity.
00:49:59So a lot of it is pretty wonky, but we're hoping that it will provide a nice picture
00:50:09of the thoroughbred genome today, the status of diversity.
00:50:13And we can use that, say, five years, 10 years from now to assess what changes have come
00:50:19about.
00:50:20I mean, one of the problems that exists right now is we don't have a standard from 10 years
00:50:24ago or 20 years or 30 years ago.
00:50:26This technology is quite new.
00:50:28And so we could go back and look at 40 years ago blood groups, but we don't do blood groups
00:50:35anymore and they are fairly limited.
00:50:37So this, I think, is going to be the standard going forward.
00:50:40Ernie, thank you for not being too wonky.
00:50:43I think you've done a real good job of explaining this to the layman, but let's go right back
00:50:46to the very basics of this.
00:50:48We keep throwing this word around diversity and we talk about it being important, but
00:50:54why is diversity in a breed so important?
00:50:58Well, I mean, diversity is the raw material that breeders are using for getting the performance.
00:51:04There's probably different ways to have a successful racehorse.
00:51:09I mean, there are tall horses and short horses and distance horses and sprinters.
00:51:15And so the breeder has a palette.
00:51:19I mean, there isn't a perfect genome that exists, but there's a palette of colors that
00:51:23the breeder is using in order to try to create or choose a valuable racehorse.
00:51:30And the diversity is responsible for that.
00:51:33And I don't want to overemphasize that because what we know about genetics is that the genetics
00:51:37plays a significant role.
00:51:39But after that, the management and the trainer are hugely important.
00:51:44But the starting point really is this palette of colors that you use, and that is the diversity
00:51:49that exists.
00:51:52The other issue is that diversity is also important for health.
00:51:56And we know from looking at some small wild populations where the numbers of individuals
00:52:03get down, they lose genetic diversity, they lose the ability.
00:52:07Their immune systems become more restricted.
00:52:10They're less able to respond to infectious diseases, to pathogens because of that loss
00:52:17of diversity.
00:52:17So we want to maintain diversity in order to maintain the health as well.
00:52:22And I think there's a third aspect, which is suppose a novel pathogen comes in.
00:52:29We just experienced it with COVID-19.
00:52:31COVID-19 didn't wipe out the population, fortunately, but say something comes in that
00:52:38had a serious high level of mortality in the population, it's the genetic diversity we
00:52:46hope that will protect the population from being wiped out.
00:52:49And that's not something I think that we want to see with the thoroughbred, but that
00:52:55is another aspect is to have the diversity.
00:52:57Say a pathogen comes through a barn.
00:53:00Some of the horses will become ill.
00:53:02Some of the horses will resist it.
00:53:04The horses that resist it are barriers to transferring the disease further on.
00:53:08So it's important at the population level for diversity to exist.
00:53:13Dr. Bailey, if you will, I have two questions for you.
00:53:16The first one is, you walk around the sales and people talk about, well, I'll only buy
00:53:23a daughter of Bernardini or only buy a gray tappet.
00:53:27And they feel like that there's a genetic reason why, even though it's probably anecdotal.
00:53:33Can you tell the audience if there's really racing potential that can be linked to sex
00:53:38or color?
00:53:39I mean, I'm not a breeder, but I mean, at this point, we have looked and tried to find
00:53:45evidence for that, and we've not.
00:53:47I mean, in terms of sex, there is a sexual dimorphism in horses, as in most mammals,
00:53:55where males tend to be larger and more muscular, and so they may perform well.
00:54:01And so we see this in horse racing because there are races that are restricted to females
00:54:07and races that are predominantly males.
00:54:10Color, nobody's found any association of color.
00:54:13And the thing is, what we know now about genetics is that there will be a single base
00:54:19change that will alter the binding of a receptor that leads to the production of melanin.
00:54:27It's hard to imagine how that has anything to do with racing prowess.
00:54:32Great.
00:54:32No, I appreciate that.
00:54:34I appreciate that.
00:54:35And my final question to you is, with all the genetic studies that you're doing, and
00:54:40I know that genetics is an ongoing and fluid kind of science, are we, in our lifetime,
00:54:48going to get to the point where we can see cloning in thoroughbreds?
00:54:52Like if somebody has a hair of Secretariat that they'll be able to basically regenerate,
00:54:57for lack of a better term, another Secretariat?
00:55:01You know, the thing that made Secretariat a great racehorse was a variety of things.
00:55:07And one of them certainly was its genetics that were unique.
00:55:10Another was management.
00:55:12Another was the training.
00:55:17At a meeting once, there was a farm manager who came up to me.
00:55:21It was just after someone had come through and just said, genetics is only 30% of the
00:55:26performance of a racehorse.
00:55:28Management is 60%.
00:55:29So don't worry about the genetics.
00:55:31And so I was kind of discouraged.
00:55:32I'm a geneticist.
00:55:33You know, I wanted to clamp the genetics.
00:55:35And this guy came up to me.
00:55:36And I was walking out.
00:55:37My head was kind of down because the speaker had kind of dissed my discipline.
00:55:42The breeder came up and he just said, you know, tell me about this genetics.
00:55:46I'm really fascinated with it.
00:55:47I said, why do you want to know?
00:55:49Why do you want to know?
00:55:49Because the guy just said there it wasn't important.
00:55:52He says, no, no.
00:55:53I'm the manager.
00:55:54I do everything perfect.
00:55:56The management, the training, all of that I control.
00:55:59And it is perfect.
00:55:59The only thing out of my control is the genetics.
00:56:02So I've got to know more about the genetics.
00:56:04So you come back to what are the things that are out there?
00:56:07So you've got genetics.
00:56:08You've got the management.
00:56:09You've got the training.
00:56:09But there's one other thing.
00:56:11You know, even if you cloned Secretariat and had all the same training procedures,
00:56:17we don't know in development what events happened.
00:56:21You know, for a particular muscle cell, how many times did it divide?
00:56:26How far did a neuron migrate and so on?
00:56:29These are things that are random, truly random events.
00:56:33And the thing that happened with Secretariat was that he was the best example of his genetics.
00:56:37He was the best example of his training.
00:56:40So if you had a race and you had 10 Secretariats that were running,
00:56:44the original would be the one that would win.
00:56:45I have no doubt about that because he was truly unique.
00:56:49And many of the things were outside of our understanding.
00:56:53John's trying to create the new Jurassic Park of old retired Hall of Fame thoroughbreds,
00:56:58it sounds like.
00:56:58So last question for me, and this is more of a conceptual question,
00:57:01because there's been a lot of talk recently about how infrequently horses run these days.
00:57:06And I think a lot of it is training methods.
00:57:08But there is a school of thought in racing that it's because we're selecting horses who
00:57:12have not run as often to become stallions.
00:57:15They're not as sturdy.
00:57:16They don't have the longevity that previous stallions had.
00:57:19And it goes for mares as well, but not as much.
00:57:22But not as much as stallions.
00:57:24Not asking you to comment on whether that's happening and that's weakening the breed,
00:57:27but conceptually, is that a possibility?
00:57:30Is that something that could happen over time where you pick horses that don't run as frequently
00:57:34and you breed them and then the progeny don't run as frequently and that could just kind
00:57:37of snowballs?
00:57:38Is that possible?
00:57:40There are.
00:57:41I just come from a Havermeyer Horse Genome Workshop and a number of people are actively
00:57:46investigating it.
00:57:47I mean, that is a real question, but we don't know the answer to that.
00:57:51That is a reasonable thing, and there are studies underway, and I encourage people that
00:57:55if they are invited to participate in them to do so.
00:57:59The scientists, when they do these studies, the information is kept confidential.
00:58:05That is really a standard in science.
00:58:08There have been regrettable instances where the names of horses have been published in
00:58:12studies, and we have punished our colleagues that have done that.
00:58:15But we have a standard, really, of keeping the information anonymous when it comes out.
00:58:21That is something that we would like to handle.
00:58:24One of the things, the thoroughbred is really an amazing athlete.
00:58:28He is an amazing athlete, and that is one of the things that brings people to the racetrack
00:58:33to see them.
00:58:33I mean, we like to see Olympians, we like to see football players, we like to see basketball
00:58:38players and great racehorses because they are just exceptional individuals.
00:58:43I think that when you disparage the breed and you disparage the genetics of the breed,
00:58:48you are going to discourage racing enthusiasts from participating.
00:58:56I think we need to find out.
00:58:57I think we need to ask real questions, and I think we need to have real data to back
00:59:02up the claims as to what is going on.
00:59:04I would like to know, are horses becoming genetically unsound?
00:59:09What can we do about it?
00:59:11All right, Dr. Bailey, thank you so much for coming on.
00:59:13We really appreciate the work you guys are doing.
00:59:15It's so important, especially in this hot debate about stallions, mare caps, and geneticism.
00:59:21You guys are doing great work.
00:59:22Thanks so much for the time and explaining it to us.
00:59:25Bye-bye.
00:59:25Great to talk to you.
00:59:27The Green Group Guest of the Week is sponsored by The Green Group, an accounting, tax, consulting,
00:59:31and advisory firm specializing in the thoroughbred industry.
00:59:33As this week's Green Group Guest of the Week, Dr. Ernie Bailey will receive a free one-hour
00:59:38tax consultation.
00:59:39Learn more at greenco.com.
00:59:41We'll be right back after this message from The Green Group.
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01:00:38The TDN Writer's Room is brought to you by XPTV.
01:00:53This week's XPTV Workout of the Week, which you can see on the screen right now, is Mo
01:00:57Strike, who worked four furlongs and 49.65 at Saratoga on Sunday.
01:01:03Bradcock's trained Sanford winner is now pointing towards the September 5th hopeful
01:01:08stakes.
01:01:08Gotta think he's one of the main contenders for that.
01:01:10And then the XPTV Workout's always a great resource for the Saratoga and Delmar meets.
01:01:16So Flightline getting back on the work tab and really stepping it up for the Pacific
01:01:20Classic coming up.
01:01:21Got all those two-year-olds works, all those stakes works.
01:01:24Go check out XPTV if you're watching Saratoga or Delmar at all this summer.
01:01:29Helps out from a handicapping perspective, really helps you get the jump on some of those
01:01:32babies.
01:01:33We're going to get to see in the second half of the meet.
01:01:36Everybody ready for the Weekend Preview segment, which is now sponsored.
01:01:39We are now sponsored by Three Chimneys for the Weekend Preview segment.
01:01:42So hit that tip to Three Chimneys.
01:01:44A lot of exciting things going on over there that we're going to talk about in just a little
01:01:48bit.
01:01:48But we got, you know, we have some action at Saratoga that we're going to get to.
01:01:51We're going to have some action at Delmar that we might get to.
01:01:54But the big action this weekend in the middle of August is that Churchill Downs.
01:01:58I almost forgot about this until I saw the PPs and the entries come out.
01:02:02Saturday, they're going to run the Arlington Million and the Beverly D at Churchill Downs.
01:02:07Obviously, those were heretofore run at Arlington Park, and we all miss Arlington already.
01:02:12And I don't want to give Churchill too much credit because they are taking the wrecking
01:02:16ball to Arlington Park.
01:02:18But it's at least nice that they're keeping up the tradition of these races and picking
01:02:22out a day on the calendar to run them.
01:02:25Those are going to be the two great ones.
01:02:27Saturday at Churchill is an 11 race card.
01:02:29The Arlington Million, not all that interesting.
01:02:32I think the interesting part is Smooth Like Straight, who's going to have to stretch out
01:02:36a little bit to a mile and an eighth.
01:02:38It's not a mile and a quarter anymore because Churchill can't run a mile and a quarter.
01:02:42Turf races, Santan, who won the Turf Classic earlier this year at Churchill, is back in
01:02:47this race.
01:02:48So it's a little bit interesting.
01:02:50Beverly D is a short field, five-horse field.
01:02:52The subplot of all of this, unfortunately, I think, is the Churchill turf course.
01:02:57They haven't run any turf races at Churchill since June.
01:03:00They were supposed to run races early in June, too.
01:03:04They were supposed to run races on the July 4th weekend on the turf.
01:03:07They had to cancel those.
01:03:08They had to cancel turf racing for several weeks at Churchill because there were problems
01:03:11with this new turf course, the brand new turf course that was built over the off-season
01:03:17that they debuted this year at the Churchill Spring Meet.
01:03:20Fingers crossed for safe racing and all that.
01:03:25I've never really seen this scenario or thought of this scenario where there hadn't been turf
01:03:30racing for months, and you come back for one day and run two great ones on it.
01:03:35It's a little bit scary, but hopefully they've gotten the issues worked out and turf racing
01:03:41can be back full-time in the fall at Churchill.
01:03:45Any thoughts from you guys on the Arlington Million or the Beverly D?
01:03:47Yeah, a couple of things.
01:03:48Joe, I agree with you.
01:03:49Churchill is the outfit that everybody loves to hate.
01:03:52They didn't have to do this, and I do think they deserve some credit.
01:03:56I'm trying to think why.
01:03:57It seems everything they do is just bottom-line oriented.
01:04:00I don't know how they're going to make any extra money off this or anything like this.
01:04:03They're paying out the big purses.
01:04:06On the other side of the coin, these fields for the Arlington Million and Beverly D are
01:04:10not particularly strong.
01:04:11There's no doubt about that.
01:04:13Only five in the Beverly D. The Arlington Million, you had a few more, but between the
01:04:18two races, only one foreign runner, Aiden O'Brien, brings in a horse for the Beverly
01:04:23D and not a single foreign horse in the Arlington Million.
01:04:27I'm wondering if some trainers were a little bit hesitant.
01:04:30We're uncertain about the turf course at Churchill.
01:04:32Let's pick another spot.
01:04:34I also think the mile and an eighth might have hurt them a little bit too because the
01:04:38mile and a quarter versus a mile and an eighth are two very different races, and the mile
01:04:42and an eighth is now going up against the four-star Dave at a mile on the turf at Saratoga.
01:04:47I think that's part of the equation in here.
01:04:51I don't think there's any reason to believe that it won't be a safe day of racing.
01:04:54The turf course won't hold up.
01:04:56But it's also, I don't think you mentioned, Joe, the fact that there were two other turf
01:04:59stakes on the card, the Secretariat and another one, I don't remember the name of the other
01:05:04one, that they actually canceled.
01:05:05So they're not going to take a chance to run more than the two.
01:05:10Not great fields, not races that you're getting too excited for, but yes, it's good to see
01:05:14the Arlington Million and the Beverly Beach still out there, and that tradition is being
01:05:18upheld.
01:05:20I think that when these races run, there's going to be a lot of people holding their
01:05:24breath for that minute and 50 seconds each that these races are because they're going
01:05:28to be holding their breath, hoping that every single horse that runs finishes safely more
01:05:33so than they're hoping for an exciting finish.
01:05:36You're right, Bill.
01:05:36They don't have to do this, and it's really weird the way that they set it up to have
01:05:40basically this short meet.
01:05:42I know people usually love these boutique days and boutique weekends or anything like
01:05:46that, but I just don't know how it's going to be received.
01:05:50I'm glad that Churchill Downs is honoring the fact that they're running these two grade
01:05:54one races because grade one races are still grade ones, and they're really difficult to
01:05:59get back once you lose that status.
01:06:02But when I went through the PPs, yeah, I was disappointed also.
01:06:06It's just not a great field.
01:06:08Then I went back to look historically at the last couple of Arlington Millions.
01:06:12Guys, this is my humble opinion, but this race hasn't been that great for a while.
01:06:17Brixton Mortar won it in 19, but I'd be hard-pressed for either of you to name a winner
01:06:22in the past five Arlington Millions unless you bet on them.
01:06:27It's not that great of a field.
01:06:29You don't look back on this race in particular when come Breeders' Cup time and say,
01:06:33who won the Arlington Million because that's a key race.
01:06:36This race has really lost its luster as far as entries for a long time, and I'm just
01:06:41wondering if Churchill is holding on to it with the hopes that they're going to be able
01:06:46to reconfigure it and repackage it and make it a different kind of race and a more spectacular
01:06:51race, either earlier in the year, maybe when they have their usual meet, or something.
01:06:58These two races in particular have lost their luster and their excitement, at least for
01:07:05from a betting and from an owner's standpoint.
01:07:08Yeah.
01:07:09Also, I'm interested to see what kind of handle they get on the card because, like I said,
01:07:13I'm sure I'm not the only person who forgot that these races were being run at Churchill
01:07:17in the middle of the summer.
01:07:19They're going up against Saratoga.
01:07:21Arlington usually had pretty good handle on that card, but Arlington was a track that
01:07:25got a lot of great on-track handle as well, which I don't think Churchill is necessarily
01:07:29going to have this Saturday.
01:07:31You guys are right, and Bill makes a good point that at a mile and an eighth, it's competing
01:07:34a lot more with the four-star Dave than it would have been if it were still at a mile
01:07:39and a quarter, maybe in the fall, maybe if they want to go up against the Joe Hirsch
01:07:43or something.
01:07:44Also now, Kentucky Downs is not that far away.
01:07:46We're only about three weeks away from Kentucky Downs, so I think that those races have become
01:07:50more marquee races on the calendar that people might be overlooking.
01:07:54Even though these are great ones, they might be overlooking these spots for the big purses
01:07:58at Kentucky Downs.
01:08:00Yeah, like you guys are saying, on the one hand, it's nice to see the tradition of these
01:08:04races kept up, but on the other hand, middle of August, mile and an eighth, Arlington Million
01:08:10with smooth like straight is going to be the favorite.
01:08:12I don't know that that's going to get it done going forward, and it's going to be worth
01:08:16keeping these races, at least on this part of the calendar.
01:08:19We're going to take a quick break and toss the three chimneys out, and we're going to
01:08:23come back and talk a little bit of the Saratoga races because we've got the four-star Dave
01:08:26and the Saratoga special Saturday, and I'll be there.
01:08:30It should be a great day of racing, but three chimneys in a very interesting and great spot
01:08:37right now.
01:08:37They have the number one right now first crop and second crop sires, which is not often,
01:08:42especially for three chimneys.
01:08:44Obviously, it's not a small operation, but compared to some of the other gigantic international
01:08:48operations, they're not quite at that size, so for them to have the top two sires in the
01:08:52last two crops, at least right now, is pretty amazing.
01:08:55We're going to talk about Sean Rastecca after the break because he's been a revelation,
01:08:58but Gunrunner, obviously, has been the revelation of the past year plus.
01:09:02We saw it last night, the $2.3 million Gunrunner called.
01:09:06Everybody is jumping in to get a piece of Gunrunner.
01:09:09It was reported last week that Cyberknife's stallion rights have been sold to Spendthrift,
01:09:14so the stallion farms are already trying to get in on the ground floor of those Gunrunner
01:09:18grade one winners.
01:09:19Who's going to stand the first grade one winner by Gunrunner?
01:09:22John, you're a breeding and sales guy.
01:09:25I'm hesitant to think of a horse that's gotten off to this kind of start in recent years.
01:09:32Obviously, American Pharoah and Justify have had great starts for Coolmore.
01:09:35I think of Nyquist a little bit, although he's kind of, I'm not going to say fizzled
01:09:39out, but he's come down a little bit from that big high.
01:09:41Who's the last horse you saw, John, that came out this strong in their first two crops?
01:09:45Boy, that'd be really hard to come up with one.
01:09:49I mean, you can say maybe American Pharoah, but American Pharoah, because he came out
01:09:53so strong with his first crop, and his second crop just wasn't up to that level,
01:09:57who was still a very good group.
01:10:00He's the first one that kind of comes to mind when you talk about the first two crops
01:10:04hitting the ground running like the way Gunrunner is.
01:10:06But just the fact that, and Joe, you weren't here on that one show when we were talking
01:10:11about the Haskell, but the fact that it was a Gunrunner Exacta, and three of the top four
01:10:15horses that finished were Gunrunners.
01:10:18Gunite, who won the grade two Amsterdam within the same week, it was amazing that Gunrunner
01:10:26had so many horses that were not only running in the big races, but hitting the board in
01:10:31the big races and winning the big races.
01:10:34So it's been a little bit of a surprise, I think, for most people in the industry.
01:10:38I mean, look, the horse stood for $75,000 his first crop for a reason, because he was
01:10:42a great runner, son of Candy Ride, and had confirmation out the wazoo.
01:10:47He's very well conformed.
01:10:48So it wasn't that he was a superstar surprise that his horses are running this well.
01:10:53But I think to a person in the breeding industry, if you said to them, is Gunrunner going to
01:11:00have the success, the initial success that he's been having, I don't think people would
01:11:04have expected that his foals would have been this precocious, number one, and that they
01:11:09would continue to run in all these grade one races and grade two races and just be astonishing.
01:11:16And that's why he had two yearlings that sold for seven figures, because his foals
01:11:21are proven to be runners.
01:11:22Albeit, I probably had the only Gunrunner that can't run, but that's no big deal.
01:11:27But the main thing is, don't focus on me, please.
01:11:30The main thing is that Gunrunners are running all over the place.
01:11:34And we couldn't even get a Gunrunner season for our mare population last year.
01:11:39That's how strong of a first crop group he had.
01:11:42Yeah.
01:11:43You're looking at the numbers.
01:11:44I'm looking at the TD and Sire list now, the second crop runners.
01:11:47He's got nine black-type winners.
01:11:49The next closest one, I believe, has five, which is a Classic Empire.
01:11:54Shout out to Koolmark for Classic Empire.
01:11:55But he's got nine black-type winners, 20 black-type horses, five grade stakes winners,
01:11:5914 grade stakes horses, three grade one winners, and four grade one stakes horses, which is
01:12:04just mind-boggling that he's that far ahead of his intake right now.
01:12:10We'll be right back, and we're going to talk a little bit about
01:12:12Sharpest Tech after this message from Three Chimneys.
01:12:40Gunrunners on top of the world!
01:12:43Come dream with us at Three Chimneys.
01:12:51And it's all Tyler's Tribe to the final furlong.
01:12:54He's putting on another show tonight.
01:12:56He is eight lengths in front.
01:12:58Now it's 10.
01:12:59Now it's 12.
01:13:01Tyler's Tribe pouring it on as they come down to the line.
01:13:04He's going to win by double digits, and he stops the clock in 104.
01:13:11I mentioned before the break that Three Chimneys has the top first crop and second crop sires
01:13:21right now, which is a remarkable accomplishment.
01:13:23It's obviously early in the first crop season, but Sharpest Tech is kind of lapping the field
01:13:28the way that Gunrunner is lapping the field with his first and second crop runners.
01:13:32Sharpest Tech has 16 winners so far in his freshman season.
01:13:36There's a lot of stallions that don't even have 16 starters yet on the track.
01:13:39He's seven ahead of the next horse on the list, which is Bolt Doro with nine.
01:13:44So he has been a revelation, especially for a horse that only stands for $5,000 right
01:13:48now.
01:13:48I'm sure that fee is going to go up just based on what he's done so far.
01:13:52And especially as we get later in the year and these horses start running in grade one
01:13:55races, they're just going to make him even more and more valuable.
01:13:58And I like Sharpest Tech for one particular reason.
01:14:01Son of Freud.
01:14:02I love having that New York breeding influence continue because Freud has been a terrific
01:14:08New York sire and sire of New York bred.
01:14:10So like I said, he's been a revelation at only $5,000 at Three Chimneys.
01:14:14So get in while you can now with Sharpest Tech because if his horses keep running like
01:14:18this, that fee is going to double, triple, quadruple, quintuple.
01:14:22You know the deal.
01:14:23It's definitely the time to get in.
01:14:25So we got a couple other races to mention.
01:14:27Not a gigantic weekend of racing in Saratoga, but we do have two grading stakes.
01:14:31We got the grade one four-star Dave and the grade two Saratoga Special.
01:14:36Looks like a nice weekend of racing overall.
01:14:38Four-star Dave looks like it's going to get a pretty short field.
01:14:42We got Gotts Smoking in there.
01:14:43It looks like Casa Creed.
01:14:45Looks like Regal Glory might try the boys in the four-star Dave.
01:14:48We don't have the entries just yet, but trying to follow in the footsteps of Gotts Stormy
01:14:52last year.
01:14:53And she's obviously has put her name in the record books with her four-star Dave Heroics.
01:14:58So it looks like we're going to have about six horse field.
01:15:01Over-under, whether Chad is going to have more than three of the six horses in there.
01:15:05And then in the Saratoga Special, we're probably going to have a short field also,
01:15:09but that's because of the presence of Gulfport, who, and there's been a lot of nice two-year-olds
01:15:13who have run so far this year, but I have yet to see a race that measures up the Gulfport's
01:15:17win.
01:15:18And as John would say, the bashful manner stakes, where he ran off and won by a dozen
01:15:22lengths in a total canter.
01:15:24And he's just a super, super powerful looking horse.
01:15:27Son of Uncle Moe, I believe from the friends at Coolmore.
01:15:30I'm really looking forward to seeing him.
01:15:32I don't think it's going to be a great betting race because he's going to be one to five
01:15:35or two to five or thereabouts, but I'm really looking forward to seeing him on the track.
01:15:38Anything else from you guys on the Saratoga races?
01:15:41Yeah.
01:15:41First of all, believe it or not, Chad Brown has never won the four-star Dave.
01:15:45Can you imagine a grade one turf stakes race in New York?
01:15:49He's never won it, but he's going after it with regal glory.
01:15:51The boys in there and Mr. Cassie sure proved that that's done, can be done.
01:15:57Got Stormy won this race twice in recent years for that.
01:16:00And I want to, on Gulfport, let's look at you.
01:16:04He won by 12 and a quarter lengths and must be a superstar because in that race was no
01:16:09other than stay on the good side, John.
01:16:12That's exactly right.
01:16:13We can honestly say that we were one of the horses that got trounced by that superstar.
01:16:18It was an honor.
01:16:19It was an honor and privilege.
01:16:21All I can tell you is that Gulfport has the best hind end quarters that I've ever seen
01:16:26because I've seen a lot of it.
01:16:30That being said, guys, you guys touched on all the important parts of the races, but
01:16:35you mentioned Chad Brown and this is a stake race, the four-star Dave that he hasn't won.
01:16:40How about it looks like he's only going to have one horse in that race.
01:16:43And there's two great ones up at Churchill that we just talked about.
01:16:48And he's only got one entry in one of those two races too.
01:16:51Where the hell are all Chad's good turf horses?
01:16:55Why aren't they running in the Beverly D and why doesn't he have more than one horse
01:16:58in the Arlington Millionaire?
01:16:59How come he's only going to have one horse in the four-star day for the love of God,
01:17:02man?
01:17:02Where are his turf horses?
01:17:04I mean, he's ran one, two, three, four, the Diana a couple of weeks ago.
01:17:08I think he might have two in the four-star Dave.
01:17:09I think he's going to have Masson in there too.
01:17:11One, the Forbidden Apple, but maybe not.
01:17:13I'm just looking at the probables right now.
01:17:15But John, I think Chad's going to be all right.
01:17:18You know, it's just going to be all right.
01:17:20But here's a guy that really controls that sector of racing.
01:17:24Well, and also, his thing is, I feel like more turf fillies and mares than the boys.
01:17:31So he's got, yeah, he's got nothing in the Beverly D.
01:17:34Yeah.
01:17:35Which Chad, step it up.
01:17:36You heard it from John Green.
01:17:37Chad, step it up.
01:17:38You're slacking.
01:17:39You know, you're falling off.
01:17:41John Green said it.
01:17:42John, he does have Rougiere in the Beverly D, which is his 11th best filly mare turf horse.
01:17:48He's got the one.
01:17:50Exactly.
01:17:50Exactly.
01:17:51I know.
01:17:52That is the truth.
01:17:53That is the truth.
01:17:54I was interested to see that in the Beverly D, there was a three-year-old filly that's
01:17:57coming over that Aiden O'Brien's bringing over, actually.
01:17:59Yes, really fun.
01:18:01Yeah, which is interesting also.
01:18:02But anyway, we've already talked about this race.
01:18:05Anyway, come on, Chad.
01:18:06Where are those runners?
01:18:07We want to see you in the winner's circle, buddy.
01:18:10That's it.
01:18:11We'd like to see your smiling face in the winner's circle.
01:18:13Tough crowd.
01:18:14Tough crowd.
01:18:14The guy's got like 30 winners already at the Saratoga mate.
01:18:17But yeah.
01:18:18I'm not criticizing him.
01:18:19I'm just asking.
01:18:20I don't want to have my California license revoked.
01:18:26The TDN Writer's Room is brought to you by West Point Thoroughbreds.
01:18:29Joining a West Point Thoroughbreds partnership involves you into the world of instant camaraderie
01:18:33among people surrounding high-class horses and stakes action for a fraction of the cost
01:18:37by trying to do it on your own.
01:18:38You can learn more at westpointtb.com.
01:18:41West Point was busy at the Fasig Saratoga sale.
01:18:43That's an understatement.
01:18:44Coming home with three yearlings, including the full sister to their greatest stakes winner,
01:18:48first captain for $2 million and the day one session-topping Uncle Mo colt that brought
01:18:54$1.5 million.
01:18:55Huge weekend for West Point two-year-olds as well.
01:18:57Last weekend, three winners and a close second from four starters.
01:19:01First winner of the day, Battle of Normandy, was really impressive.
01:19:05She looked really good for Shug McGahee in the opener on Whitney Day.
01:19:09Looked very, very strong.
01:19:11At Ellis, Jace's Rogue got the win and earned a TDN Rising Star honor.
01:19:15He's trained by Brad Cox, owned by West Point in partnership with the Albaugh family.
01:19:19And finally, Perfect Prank by Ashford Sire Practical Joke broke his maiden at Horseshoe,
01:19:25Indianapolis.
01:19:25So the West Point two-year-olds showing up and showing out all over the country as you
01:19:29would expect.
01:19:30I think that two-year-old success is only going to ramp up as we get later in the summer
01:19:35and into the fall.
01:19:35So we'll be right back after this message from West Point Thoroughbreds.
01:19:41All the thrills.
01:19:43Fraction of the bills.
01:19:47Experience the power of the partnership.
01:19:53Change your life, make new friends, and compete at the highest level of thoroughbred racing.
01:20:00West Point Thoroughbreds, the gold standard in racing partnerships.
01:20:04Visit westpointtb.com.
01:20:07Being a small family business, I guess we're part of it.
01:20:10Being a small family business, I guess we're part of a dying breed.
01:20:13We're really grateful for the people that entrust us.
01:20:15We know it's a huge responsibility.
01:20:17We're always with your horse every step of the way.
01:20:21When it comes to being at the sales ground, showing your horses, we are with your horse.
01:20:26Just driving up and down the road every day.
01:20:28There's not a time that I don't look out and feel a responsibility to the sport, the
01:20:31animal, the people that come to invest in the game.
01:20:34I want to see as many people enjoy this sport as they possibly can because we do have the
01:20:37most beautiful sport in the world.
01:20:39TDN Riders Room is brought to you by Legacy Bloodstock.
01:20:44If you think that 50 years combined experience in the horse business could benefit your program,
01:20:48give Tommy or Wendy a call.
01:20:50They personally advise on each horse as if they were their own.
01:20:53Legacy graduate Sharp-Ass Attack, who I mentioned in the Sharp-Ass Tech a bit.
01:20:58Should have mentioned him specifically because he looked very, very good winning the Tyro
01:21:02recently for Doug O'Neill.
01:21:03He owns the highest two-year-old turf fire speed figure of 2022, scoring an 85 in that
01:21:09Troy win at Monmouth.
01:21:10He'll be pointing towards the $500,000 Juvenile Sprint at Kentucky Downs on September 8th,
01:21:15while his yearling half-sister prepares to sell with Legacy at Keeneland in September.
01:21:19Obviously, yearling sale season is in full swing right now, so go hit up Tommy or Wendy.
01:21:24They'll take good care of you.
01:21:26Joe, can I just add in that they have a really interesting looking Baltimore cult in the
01:21:30New York Red Sale coming up.
01:21:32Hit 571, who is a son of a stake-winning, unbridled song mayor and a half to two other
01:21:38stake horses, and again, a New York Red to boot.
01:21:42So Bolt DeOro, another up-and-coming young sire and out of just a black-type female family.
01:21:48So I wish Legacy and their clients the best with that Bolt DeOro New York Red.
01:21:52Hit 571.
01:21:53Hear that, people?
01:21:54John Green is on it.
01:21:56John Green is on that horse, and you know how he likes to take it to the mat.
01:21:59So definitely go take a peek at that horse on the sales grounds with Legacy.
01:22:04This week's Remy cartoon.
01:22:06I feel like these are getting better every single week, and I'm not going to take all
01:22:08the credit that he knows he has to step up his game because the cartoons are going to
01:22:12be shown on the preeminent racing podcast in America.
01:22:15But I love this one, especially this week from Remy.
01:22:18It's a rich woman in the back of a limousine with a champagne bubbling and a really nice
01:22:23setup that says, driver, take me shopping.
01:22:25The usual.
01:22:26Saks, Bergdorf, and facing Tipton.
01:22:28That's what it was like last night.
01:22:31All of the glitterati were out last night and throwing down crazy sums of money.
01:22:36It was an incredible night, and we're looking forward to that continuing later this year
01:22:41at Keeneland September.
01:22:42All right.
01:22:42So with that, that's going to do it for this week's edition of the TDN Writer's Room presented
01:22:46by Keeneland.
01:22:46Don't forget that Keeneland September sale starts Monday, September 12th.
01:22:49Catalog is now live with 4,147 yearlings.
01:22:54You can check it out at theworldyearlingsale.com.
01:22:57I want to thank Bill Finley, John Green, our Green Group guest of the week, Ernie Bailey,
01:23:01our producer, Patty Wolfe, our associate producer, Katie Petruniak, and our editors,
01:23:05Anthony LaRocca, Aaliyah LaRocca, Nathan Wilkinson.
01:23:08Thank you so much for watching.
01:23:09Maybe see some of you at Saratoga this weekend, and we'll see you next week on the show.