Brennan Not Welcome at Meadowlands

In a rather curious twist to the Pena saga, Meadowlands owner Jeff Gural has told driver George Brennan to not come to the Meadowlands - or after this week Tioga and Vernon - to drive horses. This on the heels of Brennan's pro-Pena comments in the New York Times.

Gural:

• “I was very offended by [Brennan's] remarks about the Pena suspension in the Times. It seemed he was saying it is alright to cheat because the object is to win and this is not my philosophy or the impression I want my customers to have. While I agree the rules are confusing and should be uniform, there is no room for Mr. Brennan’s views on this subject.”

I have no staunch feeling either way on this. Gural, as a private operator, can do whatever he wants. I respect that. However, comments in a paper? This feels weird.

One thing I do agree on though, is that participants in our sport should always be professional with public comments to a newspaper like the Times, or on television.  Golfers don't publicly question rules, NASCAR drivers can't do it with infractions, pitchers with suspensions, lineman with penalties, and on and on.  It's the way major sport is structured. If a fan swears at a driver or jock for a bad ride, the driver can yell back, while a player in the NHL or his coach can't. If a driver has a buddy that gets suspended, he can stick up for him all he wants. If an outfielder starts excusing a guy who got caught with steroids it's a different story.

We're not that type of sport though. We don't have set rules, or a commission. Our participants do not have media training. They, like Gural, can do what they want.

Like I said, I have no real feeling on this either way, because it simply feels very odd.  However, I have a sneaky feeling that within a few weeks we'll see George driving in an NYSS at Tioga, or the Meadowlands Pace. That's what my gut tells me.

Monday Happenings

What do Rachel Alexandra and See You At Peelers have in common? Many things, but the bulk of it is they are both animals, and animals can't speak.

For a lot of people, the beginning of the end for Rachel was in her first start as a 4YO, where she was, well, not Rachel. Despite some flashes of speed from there on out, the connections didn't want to cheapen her any longer, and she was retired.

See You At Peelers' beginning of the end happened at the Meadows last year. There were excuses, people blamed the driver, the track, the trip, whatever they could. But no matter what, most cappers knew that horses like her don't come home in 30 seconds, unless something is wrong.

Takter never found out what was wrong, and despite a few good miles this year, she was retired after two terrible efforts.

Those two fillies could not tell their trainers what was wrong,  and rather than keeping on looking, the connections did right by the horses.

They were two awesomely brilliant animals. 

This is one of the reasons why I, as a player and fan, hold horses like Somebeachsomewhere, Cam Fella, and Zenyatta to such high esteem. Week in week out, slugging it out and fighting, sometimes over several seasons, and they were still standing. Horses like that amaze me in so many ways, and I consider myself lucky to have seen them.

Peelers is bred to Somebeachsomewhere. If genetics truly worked in the real world like on paper, that colt or filly will likely be able to go as fast as a thoroughbred for a piece. If there are a handful of horses in harness racing history with as high a cruising speed as those two, I think you have a small hand.

More notes:

The New York Times took another shot at racing in an editorial yesterday. Insiders disliked it, mainly because they brought up Doug's TCO2 violation, and used the crux of the CHRB guy saying he didn't milkshake the horse as some sort of exculpatory evidence. That's weird, if you ask me. If some Tour de France guy got caught with a banned performance enhancer, but they found he didn't inject it, but he probably ate it, it wouldn't matter. It's a fallacious argument.

What I have trouble with, with the PETA folks and the Times folks, is counting all his class IV's as "drugging". That is misinformation, in my opinion. Most of those things were overages of things that are barely penalized. I am not excusing him - overages are a sign of bad stable management and are not nothing - but they sure ain't as bad as the Times alludes either.

Scott Ferguson (from the UK) looks at the decision made by horsemen regarding Betfair in California.

• This was always coming in the States - the structure of stakeholders in American racing is considerably different to those they have faced previously in Britain and Australia. Everyone gets a say and there's no controlling body (government or administrator) who can push things through without approval at all levels. The horsemen's groups, in case the TOC, are as stubborn as they come. Racing in the US is dying big time, and yet anything which has a chance of moving the game forward has to jump through an incredible number of hurdles.

He's quite right. Can you imagine running a business where you make furniture, and to make a deal to sell it on furniture.com you have to ask for approval from the guys cutting the trees down?

Have a great Monday everyone.

Music, Books, ADW's & Some Solid Racing

The WSJ had a nice piece from the dude who created Listen.com, about what books have done right, and what music did wrong; post 1998. I know everyone remembered that music - used to selling overpriced CD's for $20 - really had a tough time with new technology, and went to great lengths to stop it. It's so fascinating to look back now and see that if those lawsuits succeeded, the iPod likely would've never been invented. Subsequently, it's not a stretch to surmise that without an iPod, an iPhone would not have followed either. Trying to protect slices, tends to ensure that new slices are not created.

We've talked about it a ton of times over the last five years on the blog, so no need to re-hash it, but our ADW rules and the way we've put our product on the web (high prices, and low accessibility) has simply been a game of catch up. What's worse about the whole episode, is that we had a monopoly in the darn thing. How could we screw up a monopoly? Lord knows.

Anyway, I found the article good, so I pass along the link.

Last evening we had a taste of what's in store in harness racing for 2012. Our preps - long after the three year old preps for the Derby - always tend to separate horses, and sometimes add more questions than answers. They also prove that April qualifiers should never be a harbinger that we need to worry about in June.

A Rock n Roll Dance got beat last night, and looked to be off somewhere - whether it be sickness or just not having a good day. The field was super-close to him, and although a really nice horse won, he looks to be better than that. I am not striking him off the list off one sub-par effort. Simply Business, in the same race, continues to look one-paced, after a nice run at two.

At Mohawk, the very fast Thinking Out Loud was beaten, and again it did not look like he fired a bullet. On the far turn, where he should've had tons, he looked to be slipping a little on the soupy track. Bob McIntosh confirmed as much on twitter. Count him out at your own risk.

Easy Again, after being beaten in his last, broke. He's not going into the elims with as much confidence as a few weeks ago.

Blot the Duer lost off fairly easy fractions at Yonkers in the Rooney. Pet Rock looks fine, and Hurrikane King Cole looked like he wanted to run several times.

Of course, Warrawee Needy is off sick, since his 149.2 Q a few weeks ago.

This is a fascinating time of the year. Who you do you like besides Sweet Lou, who hasn't seemed to do much wrong? It might be a different horse tomorrow. It's the way it is in harness racing with a potential deep crop.

Enjoy your Sunday everyone.