Lack Of Stabling In California

according to Paulick Report today.  And, here in the midwest with near apocalyptic evisceration of Celestial Acres in OK City a week ago.  The Paulick shrink horse racing crowd would be estatic at disappearance of a few more stalls.  For our RR racing stable, we're sitting around scratching our heads.
WTF now.

Some possibilities include that nice world class training facility in Opeloussas a mere 732 miles away and, I believe, there's a private training facility in Louisville, which is only 500 miles. We might also return to Lextington, KY which for us would turn the clock back to 1998 to the KY Horse Center or at Keenland.

The other possiblity--and the one I am entertaining most seriously, is to attempt to secure a training license at Prairie Meadows which is 175 miles down the road, and shipping back and forth during off days.  Planning a trip north to Des Moines June 5 or thereabouts after schedule clears to investigate things at PM.

Another way--and this has some appeal--the farmer will be cutting his hay surely by mid june which would open that nice nice hay field up for galloping, provided Mr. Farmer would permit this.  Am thinking of greasing his palm sufficiently.  With #17 galloping nicely now we would accomplish all that good work on that field that I'd been planning over the winter before the two foot deep snows struck for 1.5 months.
Here's the Copper Crowne facility in Opelousas:

Presently #17 is working on a little 4 acre slanted grass plot at about 30 degrees.  We're maybe 10 days away from maxing out what can be done on that little plot. Unable to go fast due to the layout.  And so, 10 days to think and figure since we really want to get moving with our stable.

Tues Misc.

Some thoughts on horse racing.  Next post, our stable.

1.  Calder future uncertain.  Here in midwest,  history:  Blue Ribbon Downs, Eureka Downs, Lincoln State Fair, Woodlands.  Columbus, NE meet in serious jeopardy.  Is the Fred Pope/Paulick shrink horse racing crowd achieving it's goal?

2.  Kizuna kicks late for ($5.5 mil) Japan Cup finish.Closed relentlessly. We have a USA filly named Kizuna owned by Edward Selzer.  They are different horses.  So, query, why do Jap horses almost all seem to have English names?

3.  Gai Waterhouse--anybody related to T.J. Smith is dear to the blogger's racing heart.  Hardly first time Gai Waterhouse has been in trouble with the stewards.  Much better looking than her deceased pop. T.J. Smith's attitude in Ross Staaden's book was that some horses make it, others fail, and trainers job to weed 'em out.  T.J. used to have the injured one's shot.  Rubbed off on the daughter possibly?

4.  Link will disappear though for present here is the interesting story of Celestial Acres:


http://www.hrtv.com/videos/tour-of-remains-of-the-orr-family-farm-after-ok-tornado-/?VideoCategoryId=0

Thoughts On Oxbow

A bit long toed possibly though vid may be taken just before final shoeing.  Ridiculous neck contraption.  Lukas explanation?  Expect to see more of these now.  Could be that the horse is near uncontrollable without it.   Awesome Again, again, and out of a Cee's Tizzy (Relaunch) mare.  Physically unimposing. Got one looking just like him in my back yard.

The good news: one can still win the Preakness in :12.37 sec/f.  How could a major three year old race with this years highly talented crop possibly be run that slowly, and without any challenge to the leader.  Fairly obviously a track so deep the big hoofed horses were exhausting themselves paddling through it. I'm all in favor of a deeper track to lighten the concussive load.  There is, however, a point of seriously diminishing returns in terms of safety and where navigation becomes compromised.

This being noted, Lukas and company, unlike Orb and company perceived the pronounced bias of the outer track.  Given Lukas's background he likely also fully understood that Golden Cents would fail to challenge likely for two reasons:  1. they exhausted the horse with :13s ever day, and 2. :13s is the wrong conditioning for trying to go 12s, particularly on a deep track.  Different stride, different effort.  Golden Cents was going to fade.  One could see that in the post parade.

And so, the smaller hoofed Oxbow was skipping over the outer surface while the inner horses were paddling with Rosie skillfully pinning Orb to the rails with Orb's rider asleep at the switch.

The most likely explanation imo was the nice development that Oxbow had through his many races. I'd doubted the horse was sufficiently talented to take this field overlooking the stupidity of the Orb connects, Orbs lack of speed, and the track.

In this field, if not Orb, then who? And so, with opposition out to lunch we get a strong gate to wire performance from a horse that finally was prepped to go that way.  Watch Oxbow's races and his development in those races.  They push the horse a little more each race--the perfect e.g. of the snow ball rolling down the hill.  It's impressive what Lukas did with this horse

Training:
#17 is galloping. #148 seven days away. We're calling tracks! A barn at Celestial Acres just below.

Best Laid Plans

Put aside the already drafted Oxbow post for the moment, and a few words about Celestial Acres.

The Moore, OK tornado was a tragedy without a doubt, and it also had some important personal implications since we'd wanted to go to Celestial Acres in early May and were just unable for various reasons.  Had we been able to travel May 1 I'd likely have two dead horses about now.

After the Moore, Oklahoma tornado Monday that blew away Celestial Acres Training Center the Epic Fail vid about says it all for our RR stable--nowhere to run.  Celestial Acres is/was the only private training facility I know about within hailing distance of KC, and, I needed a private facility since the Kansas Racing Commission is out of business and I am without a trainer's license.  The plan was to get to running somewhere near a race track and apply for a license so we can get back on track.

My stable spent some time in the early 1990s at Celestial Acres with it's 5 barns, 5f track, turnout facilities, owned by Dr. Tom Orr, run by his son Glenn Orr.  Nice people!  On premises were a vet hospital, stallion barn, and the upscale Orr residence a few hundred yards away from the barns.  The plain white barns were old even in the 1990s, likely once upon time built by QH people in QH country.  Fairly small dark stalls.  There are better.  Yet, Celestial Acres was one of those horse racing islands keeping this sport going in the hinterlands and a beacon of hope and connection for those of us trying to start up. In 1992 the fee was $125/mo. for a stall.  When I called last month that was still the price.

Then came Mon. and similarly to most sudden unexpected occurrences, the evolution of my thoughts are interesting as they progressed from initial awareness to finally pinpointing that the tornado in fact had made a direct hit on Celestial Acres.  I detailed this as it happened and as I was coming to realize what happened last post.  They were reporting first that "a farm" was hit, then the Orr family farm which is still a few hundred yards from the main barns, and this was still the report when Blood Horse finally came out with an article Tues.  I'd scanned every news media Monday and was unable to find any confirmation that Celestial Acres was hit for even the exercise rider video was failing to mention the name Celestial acres.

The extent and exact location of events was still unknown until finally DRF came out with an informative and detailed post.  Mon. I called Celestial Acres to check up.  Their line was busy.

DRF confirmed that 4 of the barns were destroyed, though one stands without a roof, and one barn survived apparently.  RIP to the unfortunate horses and the dead people.  As to the rest of them their good fortune will be that the insurance will buy them all brand new houses.  Property damage disasters these days come down a little different than in days of old.

As to my stable, the Epic Fail vid above literally says it all.  There's nowhere else to run.  Eureka Downs is history. Blue Ribbon Downs is history, Lincoln State Fair meet in Lincoln, NE where we were always welcome is history.  Celestial Acres was the last in the outer limits of where we can travel. The the blogger has a business to run, distance and gas prices are a factor.

Unknown at the moment were we're headed.  I have a couple of decent two year olds, maybe some of the best I've had.   Will see.

http://www.drf.com/news/horsemen-suffer-heavy-losses-oklahoma-tornado

Training:  #17 has been galloping daily.  Missed a couple of days from rain. 1 week to #148 training restart.

omg

RR stable  headed (early June) to Celestial Acres in Moore Oklahoma.  Celestial Acres, maybe, just got blown off the map.  Unknown.

 Moore, OK was hit today by a giant tornado.  OK newspaper tweets report the hardest his area bordered 134th to 149th between Santa Fe and Pennsylvania in Moore. I am thinking Celestial Acres right in middle of that area.  indeed. Double click on map shows streets.

http://www.yellowpages.com/oklahoma-city-ok/mip/celestial-acres-training-court-17921677

Update:  100 horses killed somewhere. Huffington Post.

Damage track of storm.  Good grief that has to be right on top of Celestial Acres:

https://twitter.com/NWSNorman/status/336587839728918528/photo/1

Orb

This looks like a pretty nice horse to me.  What happened? Hindsight easy, as always.

One could see the Lukas karma working all week, and really, all year.  Good horses, confidence, the let's see what happens attitude, training decently by any measure.  And yet, there we have two horses from the same barn using exactly the same methods (documented that Lukas uses same approach without flinching)--Oxbow wins and Will Take Charge never runs a jump.  Inexplicable.

As to Orb, anybody that's had one come out of the gate quickly gains understanding -- it's other than they just give you this stuff.  Some RR thoughts:

1.  McGaughey as a nice though unsophisticated fellow reduced in his explanations to "I never would have thought...."?

2.  Was Orb injured, bled, temporary breathing obstruction?  Where was the horse that looked so up in the post parade and with the nice training?

3.  When Orb made his run up in there near the leaders on the back stretch--I'd swear on a stack of bibles that Rosario, the jock, took back on the reins for 3 or 4 strides And, in further support of this notion--when Orb backs out of it Rosario instead of urging his horse, sits chilly.  Was Rosario thinking there--we're up too close too soon" or did Rosario just fall asleep? I think the latter.

4.  Continuing with #3--my experience in competitive internet chess--you see it over tens of thousands of games, every competitor at all levels has moments of micro-sleep. Attention suddenly wanders followed by that "how could I have done that" moment..  Happened to Rosario possibly when Orb back up, got passed by half the field, and Rosario did nothing.  All in all Orb got a horrific ride in the Preakness. Pinheads.  Every trainer's nightmare.

6. Were Titletown and My Lute the designated tag team both to keep Orb bottled inside and to provide an obstruction up ahead? 

7. In defense of Rosario's actions--when a horse quickly backs up, the thought occurs--injury, self protection.

8.  Seems they lacked any plan to get the horse on the outside where he likes to run. ????

RR views of Preakness week and what got Orb beat--saw a vid of the track about Wednesday from the outside with hoof divets seeming to go half a foot down.  My thought then was "good grief that is a deep track".  As always the deepest is on the inside.  Let's say the connections of Orb handled that reality very questionably from what I saw.  All of the horses on the inside faded out of it though Titletown put up a little more of a fight.  If you've ridden on such a deep track it's like running on skates.  A big and big hoofed horse will have a tough time gaining ground on a speedy smaller hoofed one running on the outside.  The connections should have figured a strategy to cope.

I'd noted before the Derby that Orb lacks speed.  Doubtful Orb is as slow as what showed.  I think the problem was the deep inner track combined with questionable unresponsive race riding and possible injury. I'd have liked to seen the warm up. Orb looked dead as a door nail coming out of the gate.
Some thoughts on Oxbow and the field next post.

Preakness Day

Get motivated for horse racing:

RR Pick:  Orb in a romp.

Preakness Friday

Is there something in the air? On Blood Horse they're dropping like flies.  So many deaths of late of the human kind. 

Preakness--maybe toughest in awhile?  Orb seems man among boys with best training job to boot.  Funny how that works out year after year. When did the 2nd or 3rd best trained horse win the Derby?

Will Golden Cents run away with the race?  What O'Neal has done with him, maybe it's in the barn notes I have yet to read.  The other quality horse here--Will Take Charge, possibly, and can he find a straight and unimpeded line to the wire for his massive efficient stride?  How cool would it be to see WTC and ORB in a neck to neck run to the wire--two big and beautifully striding horses. Seems to me those are the threats.  If the track turns up hard fairly easy to visualize a game conditioned front runner running away from deep closers.

Itsmyluckyday lacks sufficient tightness in his photos.  Plesa on his vids seems a nice fellow. There's plenty of those unable to train a dog to bark. ; Oxbow and Governor Charlie--doubting they're enough horse for this race.  Departing and Title Town have yet to look at. Last out winners always a threat?  My Lute looks to me like he'd have to have something scare him to death in the stretch to make it to the wire in front.  Will see.

As to bandaging and holding--txs. for comment last post.  We all have our methods.  By my experience we tend to learn as we go, and foolishness on the back stretch becomes wisdom when one day we see it working for one of our own horses.  I never used lasix till I had a horse bleed.  I never used a tongue tie until one day while on board I got a small roar--thought I'd try a tie, and voila recognized immediately how much better the horse was able to get his air.  I never see tongue ties on Lukas horses--go figure.

Bandaging, I'm other than a fan.  There are detailed arguments pro and con.  All I'm able to say is that through several race meets I never had an injured horse excepting one stupid act by a rider I should have avoided, and those injury free meets were without bandaging with the toughest on track works, although I have my own post work therapeutics.  Bandages create heat and pressure.  There are imo very uncomfortable for the horse in several respects.  One can create the same heat with saran wrap and furazone without the bandage.

Additionally--there's also the Q down to the atomic level--heat will certainly speed up action of the osteoblasts and clasts in restoring damaged bone cells etc..  However, if the microscopic bone damage is a little greater and there is more fluid build up between bone cells threatening to develop into a microscopic fracture line, do we really want to heat that area and create more leaking fluid or do we want to freeze that area to prevent fluid build up? I avoid bandages when I'm able because I believe they make horses uncomfortable.  I like happy horses.  As to the holding of the horses, there's zero excuse for the abysmal handling of these horses heads that is showing of late. 

Training:  #17 galloped up a short incline on his fourth trot heat this morn.  Illusion that we could use the new ground in lieu of race track quickly disappears.  This stretch of ground will allow beginner stuff only.   Good w/o this morning.  If rain holds off expecting full gallop tomorrow.  Full scale planning to get to OK now actively underway.

Thurs. Pre-Preakness Misc.

The RR got up out of the wrong side of bed take on the Preakness Stakes:

Does anybody on the backstretch know how to hold a horse?  Or, anybody besides me tire of seeing these great horses led around unable to move their heads, flick at a fly, or even normally look around.  G-r-r-r-r-r. Earth to grooms, it is possible to control a horse and give the horse it's head.  Worst e.g. was Zenyatta who'se idiot groom perpetually kept her head cranked to the left.  Two handlers to lead Orb.  Really?

Orb obviously has also won the bandaging Derby.  It's other than that I know everything.  But--standing bandages.  Why?  And, above the knees. This accomplishes what?  Horses are unable to talk, unfortunately. As to how Steve Haskins' copyright infringement lawsuit against the RR blog goes for co-opting Haskin's (great) photos--will advise.

Training:  Things going well.  Weather cooperating.  Found a nice straight away though it's up and down like a roller coaster. 15 min. off and on trot this morn.  #17 has taken a few gallop steps now.  2 weeks to #148 recommence training.  Weather--dry. 

Preakness Misc.

Interesting development of Oxbow here:

http://www.preakness.com/race-info/contenders/2/Oxbow

Possibly the horse is insufficiently talented to keep up with the longer striders.  Or, Oxbow's between race training is inappropriate.

Orb--still looks a little weak galloping to me in the 5/13 breeze, although those long Belmont turns likely contribute to that, and a deep surface possibly.

Rest of them this morning:  Interesting how the trainers of the inferior horses back off instead of step up their training.  What is the mind set?  Mine always is--assuming a healthy well prepped animal--to do what is necessary to try to win the race-- "controlling the variables" --e.g. Baffert and Gov. Charlie with his almost 7f in :12s.  Lukas finally decides a  faster fractions with Will Take Charge, and less with Oxbow.  Unknown what the horses are doing on their off days, and so difficult to make definitive conclusions.  Yet, were I the trainer of My Lute, do I breeze :13s or :12s, given what the horse is facing?

Sat. Misc.

All well with the world since in KC we get a stretch of warm dry weather. Coggins tests 5/18 and then off to OK 400 miles down the road..  The money there, barely.  A little more to moving to race track, and will fill in details as they develop.. 

Rudy Rodriguez banamine positive--anybody besides me sick and tired of the same paranoid gamblers chiming in about the destruction of horse racing and their limited and brainless little agendas every time the subject of drugs comes up? Highly likely Rodriguez overage an accident. System catches violator and appropriate punishment. Needed:  a driver's license system of enforcement to differentiate jay walking from axe murder.

Thurs. Misc.

16th day of rain today since April 1.  That's 4 days of rain in every 10.  Next rain day I am headed to Oklahoma to scout things out there.  Nob was back on #17 yest. after a week off due to weather.  We were wearing winter clothing in KC on May 5.  #17 can be a bit of a stinker.  Walked for 15 min. as Nob gets sea legs and tries to assume control.

Preakness--should be interesting.  Txs. for comment re Orb.   Since I began riding in 1999 I've concluded breathing is the biggest separating factor between horses.   Larger nostrils have occurred to me before as a possible advantage.  Certainly would avoid a horse with small ones.  I'd think Orb's torn nostril gives an illusion of making his flared nostril larger than it is.

My fear that they'd put wraps on Orb and avoid training him--ala Dutrow with Big Brown--may be mistaken.  Will see what Orb does to Preakness.  The horse imo has big advantage merely due to winning last race--conditioning, confidence, etc.

Wed. Misc.

Classic looking Derby horse?  As classy a looking Derby horse as there's been?  Although--ardly scaring them off of Pimlico. Combo of reasons possibly including that Derby field had a lot of very good horses all of whom, somehow, came out of running 1.25 miles on a sealed surface without injury.  This might be a testament to the more intelligent training that's coming.

Plecher?  The typical.  This trainer dislikes quickly running back.  The blog might have had one thing right about the Derby--Plecher's breezing his one time in 3 weeks prior to Derby failed to work.  Verrazano was exception to that though V was going to tank on that surface irregardless.  Best Preakness in a while coming up.  I am sort of rooting for DWL.  Oxbow is a real threat here given his nice Derby performance.  Will see how Oxbow trains.

Training:  7 days of terrible weather in KC.  Two days drying. Raining again today.  We're using this untrainable weather as a spur to get out of town.  Will report soon.

2013 Derby Post Mortem

Another post derby crowfest here at RR as we once again suffer the slings and arrows of seeing my two picks--Verrazano and Golden Cents--  up the track, and also the humiliation of overlooking Orb, who was correctly identified by most of the known universe as the winner.

1.  Two things occurred to me from the TV broadcast:

a.  Palace Malice is a great looking horse.

b.  When Golden Cents was flashed in the post parade with the deer in the head lights totally intimidated look from Kevin Krigger it occurred to for the first time that, given the track conditions, number of talented horses, that this Derby may well turn into a jock's race instead of all this finesse concerning appropriate conditioning.

I'd figured Krigger could carry out simple instructions.  If something untoward happened I was having serious doubts during the post parade concerning Golden Cents and Krigger's abilities.

2.  The unexpected/expected happened right out of the gate with Palace Malice charging to the lead in Bodemeister type time and Golden Cents rocketing along seemingly out of control in the early stages.  4f in Krigger to his credit finally recognized the suicidal nature of the pace and reigned in his horse. What happened to GC after that who knows.  I'd highly expect injury, bleeding in the humidity.  Respectfully differ with O'Neal that GC failed to fire.  He fired right out of the gate.  What happened after that, doubtful we'll find out.

3. The second most certain thing to happen on Derby day after the sun coming up was the Golden Cents was going to get tag teamed by one of the Plecher horses.  Surprise that it was Cot Campbell's horse (what did they do? Draw straws to see which Plecher horse would do the dirty deed?)  Surprise that it happened right out of the gate.  Surprise it happened that strongly. Surprise that O'neal and Co. seemed so totally unprepared for the maneuver, or, maybe unsurprising, as I consider.

4.  Have a group of Derby horses ever shown less total energy?  That was my impression.  Wondering if it rained all night Friday night on the barn roofs and kept those horses from proper rest?

5.  As to Orb, he managed to get 1.5 minutes of pre derby video coverage here:

http://www.kentuckyderby.com/workouts

I refuse to believe that a horse can win the KY Derby in this day and time against this group of talented horses with 4f works..  How did this good performance happen?

First, I personally missed--if u watch Orb's 4/29 4f breeze (above) that Orb, like the Plecher horses also breezed past the wire.  The vid stops at the 7f pole but Orb is still essentially breezing at that point.  Thus, possible that Orb may well have been doing 6f works instead of 4f.  Wtf is happening here with these trainers being allowed to report 4f works and actually doing 6.  Against the rules, and certainly misleading in the PPs.  .

Finally--and obviously Orb is a very good horse, although I'll stick with my pre-Derby observation that he's comparatively slow and therefore eminently beatable by a smart trainer.  I'm fearing already what the soft Woody Stephens style East Coast training is going to do with Orb between races.  Congrats however to the connections for a great Derby!  Good once in awhile to see racing's leaders in the winners circle!

RR 2013 Derby Choices

 On Planet Moro Plecher wakes up May 4 after dreaming he finished 1-2-3-4-5 in the Derby.  Almost did it in the Oaks.

I wound up looking closely at the race.  Learned a lot more from rewatching the preps than watching the few gallops that show.  Could write a book, but will avoid lengthy analysis.  Some horses were eliminated last post. 

I had a fairly clear handicapping idea that Golden Cents would lead most of way, get ragged in late stretch and get run down by Verrazono. or Revolutionary.  Verrazano would be my choice on a fast track.  Looks like another great horse in the making.

On mud--which seems likely looking at Louisville forecast:  small hoofed front runners have great advantage.  I'd have to think Golden Cents will win and win easily on mud, though maybe challenged at the end by Java's War or Revolutionary.

There are so many good horses in this race.

KY Derby Handicapping

With sterling record of handicapping KY Derby (see blog)(see sarcasm font)--let's try it one more time with caveat that spending one hour on a 20 horse field leaves a little to be desired, and that's assuming this field can even be handicapped.  And, away we go:

1.  Up the track:

Kelly Breen--Black Onyx
Dallas Stewart--Golden Soul
Tom Amos--My Lute--of horses watched this is the one I might like to train.

Some trainers, like bad football coaches, never figure it out.
Query why K. McPeek is omitted from this group, see below.

2.  Will Take Charge--my perception--he's got an injury problem of some sort.  Body language to me indicating WTC wants to be anywhere except a racetrack.  Additionally, I'd doubt a horse can be competitive at this level off :13s works for a 1.5 months. Let's do observe WTC has had a nice set of works.
Finish:  Up the track.

3.  Horses obviously without a chance:

Giant Finish-three 4f works since 3/23. Nope.

4.  Horses probably without a chance:

Palace Malice--had 2 races and one 4f work 7 days out.  Or, one 4f work in 21 days pre-race + Plecher's moderate gallops.  I'd avoid putting a lot of change on PM, who, although this schedule sometimes works--against the more rigorously trained here, doubtful.

Charming Kitten--same deal. Insufficient work.

Lines of Battle--how smart (dumb) is it to have ur horse quarantined or traveling on Tues.,Wed,Thurs before the race?  + the killers of George Washington have race this horse one time since first of Nov.

8 gone/13 to go.

5.  Improbables (though, be wary):

Overanalyze--really like this horse and his sire Dixie Union--the good one's eventually if often belatedly show (others in this race--Boston Harbor, Cape Town, War Pass, Rainbow Quest.).  Unfortunately has same work tab as Palace Malice.  Insufficient to be competitive in this race off one 4f in 21 days pre-race unless racing against similar?

Falling Sky:  other than a pig and much better work though again one in 21 days.

6.  Contenders--eliminated only 10 horses.  Eleven contenders, good grief. Unable to separate these by the PPs. Training is primarily the same except Golden Cents.  I will look again at the vids and hopefully report Sat. Morning.

Training:  32 degrees and snow in KC this morning. Blowing Louisville way am fearing. WEATHER.  Thurs. Off.

More Derby

In terms of handicapping the derby, or for training our horses, can we get anything out of watching the Derby horses gallop--see last post?  After watching every last one of them, and wish there were more and that they showed gallops start to finish--I am unable to say anything other than that all the horses look very decent.  Probably I'd have to watch two or three times to note subtle differences, and, am tempted to do that if I have time.

First one I watched was Black Onyx.  Impressive, till u watch the rest.  Comparitively Black Onyx a lesser talent, probably.  Just on the fly, after seeing them all in motion, a few things I recall:

Plecher horses breezing--indeed they're reporting 5f breezes but breezing a mile.  The new Plecher.  Watch old Plecher Derby vids and those breezes stop sharply at the finish line.  And also, the times are faster than the Plecher of old even if I am other than a fan of bringing those horses down the stretch nose to nose without pressing them at all.

Fairly safe bet imo one of Plecher's will win the Derby and, other than than by sheer numbers.  Combine these works comparatively with what the others do + the new Plecher without pony warm up noted by Bill Pressey--Plecher's will have such an advantage one of them is bound to win.

Most impressive horse to me:  Verrazano, even though it's close.  I could see him running away from the field.  Big, strong, powerful galloper with some speed and conditioning.  And, he'll be warmed up going into the gate. 

Orb:  as everyone I am impressed with his stride.  Old Phipps breeding with champions up and down the pedigree--but then I have $2000 horses in my back yard with the same.  And we know that McGaughey can engage in the sort of training that wins big races.  Yet, I think McGaughey likely out dated, and Orb will have the disadvantage of being limited to 4f breezes.  I think that will get to Orb down the stretch and he'll be unable conditioning wise to withstand charge of the Plechers.

Continue next post.

Training:  Monday thought for first time this month we'd have a dry warm week.  Happened to Wednesday.  Today blizzard blowing in from N.W. and enough precip to drown us for two days.  So it goes in KC.  Encouraged by #17s sudden growth spurt.  He pop finished second in the Ark. Derby and #17 is a spitting image.  Looks the part now.  1 month to #148 training to start.  #17 has been tacked every day + nice riderless gallop Wed.  Have found a place to gallop at speed which is encouraging.

Galloping Vids

Voila:

http://www.kentuckyderby.com/workouts