Trickle Me Pink!

Loopy (right) saying "Hi" to another filly

Trickle Me Good, AKA Loopy, raced today at Churchill in the 5th race.

Loopy has been back for a couple of months now since her almost year-long lay up.
After I claimed her for her new owners, she turned out to have a stress fracture in her pelvis.

So, home she went.

Loopy has raced 3 times since her return with not a single clean trip.

The first race was supposed to be on the turf, going 5F. Course it rained out and the race was moved onto the main track. Coming out of the gate, our girl got body slammed real hard from both sides and almost went down. In a 5F race, there isn't much you can do to make up ground.
There went her chances.

Second time, she broke well, ran well for about 2F and sort of backed off and quit. Jockey said she went "flat".
On the way back to the barn, she was coughing an awful lot. Vet scoped her and it turns out we have the luck of the Non-Irish. A clump of mud found its way into her nostril and all the way down into her lungs. No wonder she quit. Poor girl.

Third and much anticipated race for her- a Non-winners of 3 lifetime, fillies 3 and up, Claiming 15k going 6.5F. Perfect set up for her. This is where she can win.
It thundered so hard with such rain, the backside of Churchill flooded in places. Power went out completely. We weren't sure there would be a race at all.
Slop again- and slop is putting it mildly.
She breaks well, is in contention, running 4th. Starts gaining and lies 3rd. All of a sudden, she starts backing up again. She settles down, comes back on and beats one horse, fair and square.

Erin, our jockey tells me she felt like she perhaps took a bad step and was discouraged.

On the way back to the barn, she's coughing again. Not quite as bad as the last race, but still bad enough. Her mouth is full of mud and sand, as are her eyes and face.
Simply put, the girl doesn't like mud in her face.

While I bathe her, I get some of that sandy mud in my eye. It burns like pepper.
I don't know what's in that track surface but I can only imagine what it must feel like to have both your eyes burning on fire when you're supposed to run in a race and still see what's in front of you. I would have backed up, too.

Today, we're the second longest shot on the board. This is what happens when a horse doesn't perform well in public view- the odds get longer and longer each time a race doesn't "go well".
A friend of mine is the groom for the longest shot.

A small aside here:
Yesterday, I was pulling Doodle's mane. When I finished, I went and got the clippers to clip his bridle path. As soon as I plugged them in and turned them on, Loopy's head comes shooting out of her stall. She's looking at me and nodding her head, then pawing and pawing. I think to myself, what a weirdo- she wants to be clipped, too!

Soooooo.... when I finish clipping Doodle's bridle path, I take a bucket, set it in front of Loopy's stall, climb on and sure enough- she lowers her head just enough so I can clip that bridle path. I didn't tie her, hold her or put a lead on her.
Between the way she acted when she first arrived from the farm and was body clipped and this, I am 100% convinced that she utterly enjoys being clipped.
Where other horses run off at the sound of clippers, Loopy nickers and neighs and demands, with both front feet, to be given the opportunity at having her own clipping experience.

Now tell me that's normal horse behavior!?

In any case, armed with her brand new bridle clip, which now really makes her look like a Trojan War Horse, since the rest of her mane still sticks up like a Mohawk, she goes off at (are ya sitting down?) 76-1 odds.

76-1!!!! Who are these handicappers? What kind of weirdos are in charge of picking the odds, morning line? Morning line odds on her were 20-1. My friend Milton's horse was 30-1.
By the time the horses are heading to the gate, the odds are slowly but surely increasing on both of our fillies. Milton's filly goes off at 92-1.

Since Loopy told me last night that she was going to beat the dickens out of all those other nags in her race, I fully expected her to perform well. I was honestly convinced that she would be able to win this race.

And boy, did she try!!!!! She broke well and went to the front. She set all the fractions and was still in front coming into the stretch. A group of 4 fillies were coming on and while Loopy started tiring and falling back a good bit, Erin asked her to find another gear- just a tiny notch up and she dug back in. She was passed coming to the wire in the last few yards and absolutely had run her heart out and emptied that gas tank. I thought she may have gotten 4th, but ended up 5th by a neck. Overall, she ran a super race and was only a total of 4 lengths from the winner.

She was mighty mighty proud of herself, as was I and Erin was so pleased with her.

The distance was probably a bit far for the pace she set but she ran one heckuva race and came out of it without a single cough, no dirt in her face.
The fact that the weather was blistering hot and inhumanly humid and she was still able to perform at such a rate- I can't begin to tell you guys how very very happy I am with this girl!

She cooled out well and here is another thing I haven't mentioned about her before: Loopy is a water horse. She LOVES playing with water. She loves water on her face. She tries to play with the hose every day at bath time.

So, while I had no help bathing her, I was able to take a photo of her putting her face right under the stream of water.



Her race information for those of you who would like to see the replay is:
Churchill Downs
June 27, 2009
Race 5
Horse/Post position 9 (Turquoise saddle towel and she is wearing red and black blinkers)

The race is available for viewing, free of charge at Churchilldowns.com (you just have to create a free account, no strings attached) and then follow the video link across the top of the inner frame.

Once the replay is available on youtube, I will edit this post and embed the video itself below.

I hope you guys enjoy her exciting performance in this race as much as I did!

If the Shoe (doesn't) Fit

A couple of months ago, I finally broke down and decided to put shoes on Doodle.

He was going well barefoot, mind you, with a little problem here and there. After a year of hemming and hawing, I thought, ok, let's give this a try.

Doodle getting one of his foot rubs in the morning

You might ask why do this if the horse is going well.

Couple of reasons. Doodle's feet are high maintenance. He bruises easily around the toes. He tends to get heel sore if he's not completely balanced, which tends to happen after a few weeks of training following his trim.

On the fateful day of shoeing, Doodle acts like an ass. Mr. Laid-back and Happy is giving us a hard time. Well, let's get this over with so we can move on and get racing. Right?

Wrong!

The moment the shoes are on, the horse goes DEAD LAME.

A few days later, he seems better. There might be an adjustment period.

He never comes back out of it.

Change shoes. Pads. A slight improvement.

2 weeks later, again he is DEAD LAME.

In the meantime, I've moved to the Churchill Downs Training Center (also called Spectrum or Trackside). Cindirelli has retired. Spicey has ankle issues. They're going home. Piranha, who finally had a work, comes back not so good on that bow.

I've held that boy's tendons together for going on a year. He's not going to hold up to racing.

I call his owner and tell her she needs to bring him home.

Down to 2 horses in the barn. Doodle and Loopy.

While Loopy has raced a couple of times, she's been in over her head. Every time I enter her for a race, the race doesn't go. The track calls and asks if I want to if her into a different race. The girl needs to run, so I agree.

Her last race was right up her alley. In the slop, no less, but still. She lies in contention, moving up the rail when her head bobs up and she starts backing off. Come back on strong and beats one horse fair and square with tons of fuel left to burn. A mile race would have gotten her 3rd place. The 6 1/2 furlongs got her 5th place. Cools down in 10 minutes, coughing, her face covered in mud. Her mouth is full of dirt in spite of the Figure Eight.

Second time she backed off like this. Both in muddy or sloppy conditions. Both times she comes back coughing- scope reveals a ton of dirt down her windpipe.

The girl doesn't like getting mud in the face.

Doodle in the meantime is full of energy and pissed about not training. I get a blacksmith to pull his shoes off. Send him to the track the next day. Different horse.

He's been going better and better each time I send him. In the meantime, Stephanie, my miracle hoof expert, has trimmed him back into balance. When she showed up, Doodle sighed and put his head on her chest.

We're back to barefoot with him and he feels like a million dollars.

The shoes set us back a good month or more, probably.

Prospects of making a race at Churchill with him have dwindled out completely at this point.

Ellis Park's meet is coming up but there are no races on the card for him there that I can see.

Maybe they'll write some extras.

Last year, I was pointing him to Kentucky Downs in September. It looks like that's where he's going to end up racing, after all.

There is a lesson to be learned here. One that I've learned a thousand times over from horses.

Follow your gut. Always follow your gut.

Because when you start listening to outside voices, or you think your inner voice may not be right, after all, well, that shoe might not fit.

Literally.

Doodle in the cold water therapy spa enjoying his treatment

And She Lived Happily Ever After....

Cindirelli at Churchill Downs in the receiving barn awaiting her race

Once upon a time...
... there was a beautiful grey filly born in Florida. She was tall and gangly and there was great promise in her birth.
Her sire was a great horse named Capote. Her dam was a mare named Fundraising, whose sire was even more well known than Capote. His name was Black Tie Affair.
The meeting of these genes was no coincidence. The people who decided on creating this filly put great thought into her breeding.

The filly grew taller and bigger and went into race training. The man who bought her felt there was something not quite right with the way she was "going" and so, having a great many young horses in training, decided to cull her from his racing stock and put her into one of the great Thoroughbred Auctions in the country to sell as a broodmare prospect.

The sale was set up such that every horse was x-rayed and its health thus documented to prospective buyers. Even with whatever funny way of going the man saw, the filly's x-rays were completely clean.

She sold for very little money to another man, a man who would forever decide this filly's fate and soundness.

Two years after this auction, the filly had raced extensively but not well.
She broke her maiden in a $10,000 Claiming Race for maidens, after several tries at higher levels. This is not unusual and no one was probably the wiser....
Unless they were closely involved with the filly.

You see, she never got to train daily the way that other horses did. The new man, an old man set in old not so good race-track ways realized that something was not quite right with the way she was going. So instead of training her on the racetrack, he decided that she would swim twice a week.

While swimming is a great way to rehab a horse, it can't be used as a training tool exclusively. A horses' bones are only as dense as the exercise it is used to remodels them to be. Swimming does not strengthen bones. It helps muscles and soft tissue but not bones.

So, the grey filly swam twice a week and then would get to the track to either officially work or run in a race. She started having some problems.
Some serious problems.
After she won her maiden race, she really hurt herself. Between the months of June 2007 and May 2008, the grey filly broke her sesamoid bone in her right front leg.
During the same time frame, she also broke her knee in the same leg.

Yet she never had any time off from racing. Her record shows one race where she came in last by 105 lengths. Yet she raced again just two weeks later.
She was running for the cheapest tag there was- $4,000 claiming.
She didn't run very well anymore. The grey filly was broken.
And now she wasn't making money for the man anymore.

The man decided to take her home to his farm. He tossed her out into a great big pasture with 30 other horses. There was a pond in the pasture. The grass wasn't growing very well and there were lots of weeds. But the stupid man thought:

"That's ok, there is green stuff out there, they can eat that".

But they couldn't. Quickly, the grey filly lost weight.

A girl who trades and sells horses in the same neighborhood arranged to become the man's agent to sell his horses, who were becoming skinnier by the day. He wouldn't give them feed, hay, or water.
"They ain't making no money for me, so I ain't puttin' no money in them."

Across the country in a far away state was a nice lady who had lots of race horses. She was always looking out for new horses to add to her broodmare band. She always loved Capote.

The nice lady saw an ad on the internet for some horses for sale and that they were in trouble because the man who owned them couldn't take care of them anymore.
The grey filly was listed as one of the ones for sale. They wanted $4,500 for her.
There was a photo of the grey filly and she looked a bit skinny, but she was walking away from the camera so the viewer didn't really have a good angle to get a good look.
The nice lady called her trainer in Kentucky and said:
"Look, what do you think of this filly?"
The trainer didn't think much of the filly and told the owner that probably the filly had talent but probably she had bad training or maybe an injury.

But the agent girl told the nice lady that the filly had just raced two months before and was completely racing sound. She was just a little underweight, maybe 100-150 lbs.

The nice lady couldn't get the filly out of her head. She went back and forth with her trainer and some of her friends. Her friends all told her not to buy the filly.
But she just couldn't forget about the filly.

So she and her trainer went back and forth with the agent girl and negotiated her price down to $2,500.
They arranged for the filly to be moved to the agent girl's farm. She was going to await a transport to take her up to Kentucky.

When the trainer was able to find a van ride for the filly at a fair price, she called the agent girl and asked that the filly be readied to put on the van. The agent girl acted very upset that the filly was leaving so soon.
"What's the big hurry all of a sudden?" she asked.

Thinking nothing of it, the trainer arranged everything for the nice lady's new filly to arrive early one Saturday morning.

You have all read "A Cindirelli Story".
Above is the beginning of her fairy tale.

This is the ending.

The filly was feeling so much better since she had been with the trainer. The wanted to run. She wanted to run every day, all day. She could run really well when she was pretending she was in a race. Her crippled knee and ankle didn't hurt her when she was pretending she was racing.
She would look over at the track and her mind and thoughts would float far far away. She would stand and stare until the trainer would make her move on to another spot.
She was in good shape. She was fit. It was time for her to race and she knew it.

Her trainer and the nice lady decided the filly should run on the turf. After all, she was bred for the turf. They found her a race at the historic race track Churchill Downs. This was where she should have been all along. This was where she belonged, with all the other great horses and all the history of famous races. Her heart was bigger than any other horses' heart that ever saw a race track. She just wanted to run.

The day came for the filly's big race.
This race was a bigger race than any she had ever been in.
It was still a claiming race but it was a $50,000 claiming race. At Churchill Downs! On the turf.
Everyone thought that the trainer and the nice lady were crazy to put the filly in this race.

The day and night before the race, it rained and stormed so hard, that the last 3 races at Churchill Downs were canceled due to weather. The trainer wondered if the race would remain on the turf the next day.

Early that next morning the trainer found out that the race was off the turf. They would be running on the main track, the dirt.

The trainer worried that the filly wouldn't run well on the dirt. But the filly wanted to run.
So the trainer told the jockey that he should take good care of her. Don't let her do something she doesn't want to do. Just let her run and finish her race. Because the trainer and the nice lady both knew that no matter what happened, the filly had to finish her race or she would never have peace.



The jockey promised to take great care of the filly.
As the filly was prancing around the paddock, excitement and joy filled the air around her. She was the 50-1 morning line long shot. But everyone could see how great she was feeling. She had to be saddled on the walk because she wouldn't keep still in the paddock stall.
She was ready. She was going to show the world how much she loved racing. And people could tell. Her odds went down to 5-1.

As the jockey rode her out of the tunnel onto the race track, the trainer gave her last instructions to him:
"Safe and Sound!"
The jockey smiled, reached down and touched the trainer's hand and said:
"No worries!"
(With his British accent, it sounded very official and reassuring.)

They went to the gate. The filly was horse #4.
The gates opened. She didn't break too well.

She was running against some very expensive and classy fillies.
By the first quarter, the filly had gone to the front. She remained there through half the race. Then she started backing off and slowing down.
She didn't quit. She finished her race. She showed those other fillies and the rest of the world how much faster she was.

She ran 4th.

Everyone was very proud of the filly. The nice lady was overjoyed. The filly just ran in the toughest race of her life and came in 4th.
4th place actually pays a part of the purse to the horse- 5%.
The purse on the race was $41,000.

Later on that evening, the nice lady and the trainer agreed that it was time for the filly to retire. They both knew she had to run this last race or she would never find peace.
And so she did.

And in her own way, she won. She walked with her head held high, looking down at the rest of the much shorter than herself world and proudly strutted as if to say:
"YOU cannot tell me I cannot run."

The filly is now going to get bred and go to her new home with the nice lady out in California,

where she will live happily ever after.....

Just between us... no one has to know it was only a 4 horse field due to 3 scratches ;o)

Some Spice in the Mix

Spicey had a good first race.

Course the events of the morning leading up to the race weren't so good.

Little Miss Spice had to get her lip tattoo. I really don't like doing this on raceday but we didn't have much choice. I figured she would either act like it's no big deal or she would really hate it.

Well, she tried to kill the tattoo guy, me and Bull (hotwalker that helps me out sometimes during races). She wasn't having it. She threw me into the wall three times while I still had the lip tongs attached to her lip. We had to do one number at a time and keep telling her good girl, good girl. In the end, the last number didn't get to be stamped twice and the poor tattoo man looked at me and said: Good enough! I'm done!

Having her lip checked in the paddock for the race was quite fun again, ugh!

She was a good girl for everything else, her nonchalant self.

Below is the video of her race. She is post position 2- the second horse from the rail. Her saddle towel is white with a black number 2.




Dean (jockey) was very pleased with her. She ran 6th.
Here is his report:
(Insert British accent here, so it sounds that much more impressive)
"She is brilliant at the gate! Absolutely brilliant! Matter of fact, she was almost too relaxed. When the gate opened, she went to jump and then hesitated. She saw the other horses go and took off to go after them.
She didn't like the track conditions (which I knew she wouldn't, it was nothing but water and slop on that track) and had a time trying to find her footing.
Once she settled she started coming on pretty strong and I really thought she would run 3rd or 4th at least.
But when we came out of the turn, she hit a wall and got really really tired.
I didn't see a point in beating the shit out of her so I just let her gallop out.
One of the horses behind us was coming up to pass us at the wire but she stuck her little nose out and wouldn't get passed.

She'll do well next time!"

The track was very nasty that day. When I was watching the tractors trying to seal the track, all they were doing was moving around waves of water. It was horrible. Spicey likes a firm, more flat track. We didn't get what we ideally would have wanted that day.

But she came out of the race great, ate her feed with her usual shovel method (she opens her mouth wide, digs into the tub and chomps down. She doesn't eat feed with her lips the way other horses do).

She's full of herself and ready to try again next week if I can find a race for her.

It's always quite an accomplishment when first time starters have a good first race experience. The knowledge they gain is invaluable to help them next time out.

We were all very pleased with her.

The "wall" that Dean was referring to is quite common when you train at a smaller track and ship in to a large track. We have a 1/2 mile track at the training center. Churchill Downs is a 1 mile track. That stretch to the finish line coming out of that turn can absolutely kill a horse's air when it isn't used to it. Now that she's overcome that first race, she'll be much better able to make it through her next one.

The Spice Meister is officially a racehorse!

Spicey in the receiving barn waiting for her race

Racing on Wednesday

Spicey got in! Here is our entry:

Churchill Downs - May 6th, 2009 - Race 4 Estimated Local Post Time: 2:21 PM
Race Type: Maiden Claiming Breed: Thoroughbred Age Restriction: Three Year Old and Upward Sex: Fillies and Mares				Purse: $14,000 Distance: Six Furlongs Surface: Dirt
Post	Horse Name	Age	Sex	Weight	Jockey Name	Claiming Price
1	Morning Magic (KY)	3	Filly	118	Julien R. Leparoux	$15,000
2	Spice So Nice (KY)	3	Filly	118	Dean Mernagh	$15,000
3	Emily D. (KY)	4	Filly	124	Larry J. Sterling, Jr.	$15,000
4	Betty de Boop (NY)	3	Filly	118	Aldo Canchano	$15,000
5	Five Star Sweetie (KY)	3	Filly	118	Corey J. Lanerie	$15,000
6	Riviera Cafe (KY)	4	Filly	124	Jon Kenton Court	$15,000
7	Silie (KY)	4	Filly	122	Miguel Mena	$12,500
8	Yankee Player (KY)	3	Filly	118	Jamie Theriot	$15,000
9	Eye of the Tigress (KY)	3	Filly	118	Jesus Lopez Castanon	$15,000

Gate Madness

Moments out of sitcoms seem to happen regularly at our training center.

Spicey was going back today, for what I was hoping was going to be her gate approval card.

I arranged yesterday with yet another trainer to meet up there, our two horses both breaking from the gate. Bobby had a big grey colt who was going for his gate card. I wasn't worried about Spicey not doing well this time. If I've learned one thing about this little girl is that all it takes is one time to show her what to do and she gets it.

While I'm getting Spicey ready, she is being her usual impatient self while tacking up. She is always so enthusiastic about going to the track, it really makes me smile.

So by the time Cowboy arrives and tells me we have to wait a few minutes because the tractor is still cutting the track, I'm thinking, oh great- now I get to walk Miss Nutty around the shedrow when all she's interested in is going to the track and going fast fast fast!

Finally give Cowboy a leg up on her and jump in my truck to drive up there to the gate.

When I get there, Bobby wants to know how she is about getting in the gate. I shrugged and told him she's fine. Heck, nothing fazes her- she just walks right in there without being led by anyone, complete nonchalance surrounding her aura and attitude. It's as if she wants to say- Dude, I was born for this. I know what I'm doing.

Bobby's horse isn't quite as amenable to the whole thing and Bobby has to lead and urge him, while Rick, his rider and our "gate master" (the guy who is actually trained as a starter- one of those guys who load the horses into the gate at the track) is on the horse, having to kick him forward. The horse is decked out in blinkers, extra bridle stuff (a Figure Eight) and who knows what else.
Mind you, these two already warmed up a mile or better before we started loading them.

Since Spicey blows the turns at our track, we take the outside. Bobby's horse is supposed to go on and work a half mile. We weren't actually going to work today, because Spicey has been doing spurts of speed all week practicing this. On the off chance that she may not get approved for her card today, I wanted to be able to come back with her tomorrow and then do the official work, breaking from the gate and going 5/8.

So, once Bobby's horse, who is a nervous nellie at this point, is in the gate, Spicey walks in (without any help from me, just Cowboy asking her to go in).
I get behind the horses and close the gate doors.
Bobby wanted me to spring the gate open on the count of three.
He is now perched inside the gate, up on the wall next to his horse's neck.
Cowboy turns to me and says "You know, you should probably smack her on the ass when the gate opens just in case she didn't get it from yesterday."

Well, the pulley string to open the gate is on the left of Bobby's horse. Spicey is loaded in the hole to the horse's right. My arms aren't long enough to reach over and smack any ass, let alone Spicey's, if I'm to be opening the gate!

So, after some hemming and hawing, I tell Cowboy to just do his Cowboy thing and Yeehaw at her real loud once the gate opens.

Rick is now laughing and tells Bobby "Damn, man, you can open the gate, get back there, so she can smack her horse's ass!"

Bobby leans back towards Rick:
" No, I can't! I'm trying to teach my horse something here."
"What the fuck are you talking about? The horse is in the gate, he knows how to break, I'll get him out, get back there and open the gate!"

"No, man, I'm telling you, I gotta teach my horse this thing I do. I gotta talk to him about it first!"

At this point, both Cowboy and Rick are looking at Bobby like he's lost his mind.

"I gotta let him know when I do this thing with my finger on his neck that the gate is about to spring open. This is important, man!"

I'm standing behind this charade laughing along because Bobby has this very intent and serious look about him like he is imparting a great Chinese Wisdom on his horse, who is actually so busy being nervous, he ain't paying a flick of attention to Bobby.

Bobby turns to me and says, "Ok, on the count of three, you open the gate."

Now let me back up a little bit here. When he first told me to open the gate, I had never done it before on this gate. Different gates open with varied strength on the pull string.
I asked him how hard to pull? He told me to pull it nice and firmly but that it isn't too too hard to open.
So at that point I'm thinking, great. It's probably a sunumabitch to open and I'll screw it up and the gates won't open.

So, when Bobby tells me to open the gate on the count of three, I reach up to put my hand on the string (which is actually wire with a loop at the end).

He then turns back to whisper in his horse's ear again. The poor thing at this point isn't just lathered up, but he is probably wondering why some bizarre ethereal mantra is being wormed into his brain via his left ear and why his rider and the other horse's rider are both laughing so hard, they are holding their sides at this point.

As I get my hand situated, Bobby says "Almost ready. I'm about to...."

He never got to finish the sentence. In my worry to make sure I would have my hand in the right position to comfortably be able to pull on the wire without hurting my already cut finger, I put my fingertip into the loop.
That's all it took.

WHAM!

The gates fly open!

Bobby is suspended on his perch still in the position of whispering those sweet nothings into his horse's ear. Spicey breaks like a world champion. The grey breaks about the same time.
They go flying down the track, all I can see is two beautifully muscled horses' rears barreling away from me- and my little girl passing the much bigger grey horse!

"Oooops!"

"Damn, girl! I hadn't counted yet!"

I feel bad because obviously this was not how we planned to do it and I honestly didn't expect the damned gates to fly open so easily- I had barely hooked my finger into the loop!

I apologize to Bobby severely, all the while trying to swallow the belly-whopping laugh that is threatening to spring up out of my throat.
I leave Bobby standing there, muttering something about wanting to teach the horse that a fingertip applying pressure to his neck means the gates are about to open up.

Ooops.

Teehee. I jump into my truck and run back down to my barn.

Spicey comes back like none of this was any work for her. She's breathing well but her muscles along her topline aren't even bunched up. Physically, she is so fit, that what she just did was sissy stuff for her.

Anne and Don are standing on the other side grinning at me.
"You know that little filly can fly, don't you?"

"Yup, she sure can."

Cowboy tells me that she would easily have outworked the other horse.

We got our gate approval card! Tomorrow we take it easy. Saturday Spicey works her last work before her first race, which I am hoping will go. Entries are tomorrow for next week.

She'll be a pissed off energizer tomorrow not being allowed to run like all hell broke loose.

All part of becoming a racehorse. This filly is so ready for a race, she's going to burst if she doesn't get to run soon.

As I walk Spicey around the barn after her bath, I overhear Cowboy telling Anne and Don:
"Hey, did you guys know that Tres can't count?"

The laughter is stilling filling my ears.

Spicey and Cowboy posing for the camera while warming up this winter

We've Created A Monster!!!

I know I haven't posted in a while and you are probably all wondering what happened with Cindirelli's race. I don't want to get into that too much at this point (there is a post coming up soon and no, it's not bad news!) but wanted to let you guys know that Cindirelli is fine, and awaiting her next race entry.

In the meantime, I've wanted to post about a little star athlete in my barn for a while.
Her name is Spice So Nice. She goes by Spicey. Or the Spice Meister. Or any amount of other rhyme-y nicknames.
Spicey was right at 14 hands when she arrived here as a 2 year old.
After some problems with unfortunately pre-existing baby injuries, Spicey is working hard on getting to her first race as a 3 year old this year.

She's grown a good hand since I got her in my barn. She's a little bombshell who can do no wrong when it comes to training. She's a complete professional who has already made up her mind that she is a racehorse, end of story, period.

Spicey is working hard everyday on getting her gate card. She's totally used to the gate but she hasn't worked from it until today.
Since I wanted to have her break from the gate for a "work" a couple of times before we get our card, I hooked up with another trainer from up the hill today to break from the gate in company. The other horse would do an actual work, Spicey would only go about 100 yards at work speed and then continue on her regular routine after stopping and turning.

I wish to God I had a real video camera. I laughed all day about this.

So we meet up at the gate - since Spicey is great about going in etc, I said I would head down the shute to the stretch and see Cowboy when he gets down there with her- gave me a much better vantage point- sort of like the head on view in a race replay.

They load. She's a super-pro about this. Nothing fazes her.

Gates open.

Other horse jumps out galloping.

Spicey kind of stands for a second.

Sees the other horse running full tilt.

Gets REALLY pissed off and goes after it.

Her little legs were going 90 mph according to Cowboy.

She wasn't having this! How dare that horse think it can outrun her!

She went after this horse with a vengeance. Cowboy had such a hard time pulling her up, she was pissed big time!

The most amazing part of it was that she actually closed that distance between herself and that horse - my jaw dropped.

She's gone in company plenty of times, I knew she'd probably really like going together. And she's always made sure that she keeps up with all those bigger horses. I just had no idea how competitive she REALLY is.

After she came back from the track, while I'm walking her, everytime we turn the corner and walk on the side of the barn facing the track, she was jigging, looking- would see a horse out there and the look on her face was:
"Oh, lemme go, lemme go, there is that SOB from earlier, I can catch him, lemme go!!!!"

After she had her bath, cooled down, I thought I'd take her to the grass. Oops, mistake. The track is right there. She was nuts wanting to go back to the track everytime she saw a horse out on it!

When I finally put her up and was getting ready to catch my next horse, everytime a horse walked past her stall, she was shoving her muscular little chest against the screen and jumping around as if she was saying- come on, let's race, you and me, buster!

We've created a monster!

I'm still smiling. I wish every one of my horses was this enthusiastic!

In the meantime, I took Doodle to the gate and literally had to get behind him and PUSH with both hands for him to want to break from it!
But he barely fit into that gate, too, he's so wide....

Spicey enjoying one of her naps this winter