Nobody thought there would be much demand for yearlings at the bottom of the market, but I doubt that many people thought it would be this bad.
     In the Northern California yearling sale last week, 45 of the 187 horses that entered the ring left without reaching the upset price of $1,000. They didn't get a single bid to match the minimum price that the sale conditions required. Another 54 couldn't draw a bid above $2,000.
     Things were bad, too, at this week's Washington summer sale, where 34 of the 199 horses that entered the ring left marked "No bid," having failed to reach the upset price of $2,000.
     Not only was the average down 25.8 percent and the median down 45.8 percent from 2007, the buyback number was 42.7 percent (that included the no-bids), the highest in the sale's history.
     The average price of $11,224 was 37.5 percent lower than the $17,966 average recorded just four years ago, in 2005.
     I don't know what the conversations were in Washington, but only a few months ago CTBA president Leigh Ann Howard and general manager Doug Burge both were talking about figuring out what was the proper number of foals that California breeders should produce.
     The implication was that there was something that the CTBA could do to adjust that number. They both said that breeders needed to produce better foals.
     But now, just a few months later, it appears that the situation is self-adjusting, beyond the control of any administrative action, by the CTBA or anybody else. 
     California's foal crop of 2006 will be about 3,300, and that number is expected to slip below 3,000 when all the 2007 foal registrations are recorded, down from a 2005 total of 3,655. Judging from the devastation at the bottom of the market, it's reasonable to infer that most of the breeders dropping out are those producing these unwanted horses. Anything close to 3,000 probably won't be the bottom, when the shakeout is completed.
     Things are at least as bad in Washington. In 1988, the foal crop in that state was 1,226. The 2005 number will be about 720, and the early projection is for a 2007 crop below 600.
     The market exerts its inexorable force. Capitalism at work.
     I am puzzled by the cries of alarm that you hear from a number of sources, people worried that the shrinking foal crops will cause field sizes to shrink as well. If that linkage exists, the way to increase the size of fields is for breeders to produce more foals.
     There's a flaw in that logic somewhere, since it's evident that there are plenty of foals available to fill those fields, if somebody would just step up and pay their training expenses. The problem is that people who want to race horses don't think those bottom-level yearlings are good enough to win purses.
     I don't know how this will play out in other states, but the California incentive program annually pours millions of dollars into purses for races restricted to California-breds. Those races may fill with bad horses, but I can't believe somebody won't enter horses in them. And they can't enter Kentucky-breds.
     We can fret and worry and plot and scheme, and things will take their course, no matter what anybody does. 
     In the end, those most hurt by the shrinkage will be stallion owners, sales companies, farm owners, farm workers, feed growers, farm veterinarians and farriers, vanning companies, and all those others who provide services for horses that won't be there any longer.
     They'll just be collateral damage.

     Another month has passed, and the leaders in the California 2008 freshman sire race are just the same as they were at the beginning of August--Momentum first, Cat Dreams second, and Marino Marini third.
     And that means that the one contestant in our California Freshman Sire Contest who had them right last month, still has them right and is on track to win the prize of $500.
     Four other entries had the top three but not in the right order, though two of them put Momentum on top. Two others picked Momentum but had the wrong horses underneath.
     Right now, Momentum has a $102,080-to-$76,381 lead over Cat Dreams with Marino Marini at $55,785. Cat Dreams has four winners to three for Momentum. The only other California sire with more than one winner is Spinelessjellyfish, with two. He's in sixth place with earnings of only $15,055. Popular ($39,600) and Slew's Prince ($16,364) are fourth and fifth.
     There's still plenty of 2-year-old racing on the schedule, and the present leaders' positions are far from secure. One good stakes win could scramble the standings.
     But for now, that one holder of the winning ticket can hope that things don't change at all. I know she does.

     The 2008 Del Mar meeting is nearing its end, and if you've wondered what happened to racing coverage by the Los Angeles Times, you must have missed a brief item run in the sports section early in the meeting. Here's the explanation:

Because of ongoing reductions to The Times Sports staff and space for news in the Sports section, the handicap charts and results from Del Mar will not be included in the daily sports report. There will be coverage of major events during the seven-week meeting. In addition, other weekly features that have been eliminated are the Gearing Up package on motor racing, Teeing Off on golf and Corner Kicks on soccer.

     That explanation may not be dishonest, but it is certainly disingenuous. They explain that they're cutting coverage of other weekly features, too, so it isn't just racing that's getting the axe. But the "other weekly features" that they list aren't comparable to racing coverage, because racing coverage is--or was--daily, not weekly. That's not honest.
     Aside from the wish to save space and staff time, it's likely that there are two reasons for the cutback: (a) anyone who cares is likely to be getting that information from other sources these days, and (b) in 2008 nobody much cares about horse racing.
     I can fault the Times for the wormy way that it tried to excuse the cutback, but I can't fault what I believe were their reasons, or at least their reason. There may be only one. They may not even know or care enough to consider (a), but they surely know about (b).
     And so do we.

     I couldn't write a definition of a Bad Thoroughbred Sale, but, like pornography, you know it when you see it, and I saw it Tuesday in Santa Rosa.
     If you haven't heard about that sale, click here and find out.
     I've already heard the question asked, "How long will the CTBA keep holding these Northern California sales?" But I think that's not the right question. The right question is, "How long will breeders keep sending their horses to a sale where there's a 50-percent chance that they won't get a bid above $2,000 and a 25-percent chance that they won't get a bid at all?"
     It can't be habit-forming to pay for preparing a horse for sale, pay for shipping to the sale, pay an entry fee and a minimum commission, pay for care at the sale--and get a price that will probably be less than the sale expenses, and maybe no bid at all.
     I guess the CTBA will keep putting on the sale as long as they get enough entries to meet their expenses, and if people want to spend their money that way, the CTBA will give them a place to do it, explaining that they're just responding to the wishes of their members. 
     The responsible answer for the CTBA would be to tell breeders to sell their better horses in Southern California and take the others to the local livestock auctions. 
     More of the horses in these CTBA sales probably would get sold if the $1,000 minimum bid were removed, but the purpose of the $1,000 upset price is to make horses too expensive for the killers to buy, and at low enough prices they could be headed to the Mexican slaughterhouses, going first to Arizona to circumvent the California law against shipping horses for slaughter.
     Eventually, many breeders will be driven to allow the killers to have their horses or to euthanize them themselves. But it's a rare breeder who can bring himself to such infanticide.
     So the only rational course of action is for them to quit breeding that quality of horse. The problem with that is that it isn't always easy to know when you're breeding a horse that's one of those better ones.
     After checking out all their alternatives, many breeders will find that their only rational action is to quit breeding altogether. 
     But any rational person has quit breeding already, so we're dealing with the other kind.

     Here's why I'm worried about today's Northern California yearling sale. Look at these quotes about the Ocala yearling sale that just ended, from a story by Deirdre B. Biles in The Blood-Horse:
     Lynne M. Boutte, consignor: “It's a little challenging; there is no bottom. I have a lot of blue collar horses, and I need the blue collar people, but a not a lot of them are here. I sold a nice little colt this morning for $1,500, I thought sure I was going to get $8,000 to $10,000, but I've got no reserves on 90% of the horses I have. It's tough.”
     Brent Fernung, Journeyman Bloodstock: “It's been a tough sale. It looks to me like there is a general turndown in the medium-priced horse market, and I don't think the weather has helped us any either.
     “You see fuel prices going up, and the economy is in a general malaise.  People who buy these kinds of horses are more affected by that than the guys who buy a $500,000 horse.  Fuel prices won't bother a fellow who will buy a $1-million horse, but they will a guy who buys a $40,000 or $50,000 horse. . . . There are a lot of horses that just can't find a new home right now.”
     Richard Kent, Kaizen Sales: “At least it's better than having a root canal, but not much. It is what it is. They (the buyers) very picky on what they want, and if you lead a horse up that they want, there's a fair price for it. Otherwise, there's no value for it, nothing.”
     All these things apply to the Northern California sale, in spades. I hope it will be different today (and at later West Coast sales), but I fear the worst. The Ocala sale has always been a much stronger sale than any we have out here, and if it's in that kind of shape . . .

     I noted in the news a few days ago that a 2-year-old filly had given birth to a foal in her stall at Louisiana Downs, to the consternation of everyone connected with her, since nobody knew that she'd been bred.
     As often happens if you've had a few experiences, that triggered a memory.
     Years ago, when I was trying to build up my broodmare band by any means necessary, I spotted a filly with both good pedigree and good earnings running for a tempting claiming price at Hialeah Park.
     I got on the telephone, tracked down the owner, and arranged a purchase, pending a veterinary examination for breeding soundness. I found a vet with a decent reputation and gave him the job.
     The next day he called and said that the mare, whose name was Keep Quiet, had a calcified cervix and could never have a foal. I thanked him and told him where to mail the bill, which he sent, along with a certificate stating the reasons that she was turned down.
     I forgot about it until, about nine months later, I read in the Daily Racing Form that a mare named Keep Quiet had foaled in her stall at Oaklawn Park. Nobody knew how that had happened, but there definitely was a foal, standing and nursing. She had to have been pregnant when he examined her.
     I thought that was pretty amusing, so I dug out that vet certificate and mailed a copy of it, along with a copy of the Racing Form story, to that veterinarian.
     He never responded. Some people just have no sense of humor.

     When times get tough, the tough run away.
     The tough ones are the survivors, and when the economy turns bad, they cut back on unnecessary expenses.
     Very high up on a list of unnecessary expenses is surely the purchase of young racing prospects. Like yearlings. 
     Predictably, that's happening right now at the big Ocala Breeders' Sales yearling sale in Florida, where the lower end of the market is nearing collapse.
     This quote from The Blood-Horse pretty much sums it up: 

     Basically, we’re seeing the results of the overproduction of mediocre stock,” said Florida pinhooker Eddie Woods. “Here it is. This is what the whole thing has evolved into. There are too many mares (in production); it's a bad economy; and, boom, it gets ugly.

     Small business owners probably make up the core of buyers of yearlings of lesser pedigree, and small business owners are the first to suffer in a recession. When they feel that financial squeeze, they quit buying yearlings.
     I'm not writing this just as an observation on the yearling market in general; I'm writing it because the CTBA's Northern California yearling sale next Tuesday in Santa Rosa is squarely in the path of that economic tsunami.
     Every year since it was inaugurated in 2004, the sale has seen many horses leave the ring without a bid and many more either sold or bought back at cruelly low prices. I can't see how that situation can get anything but worse next week.
     Wise consignors will make whatever plans they can to reduce their suffering. (Unfortunately, I can't think what that would be, other than to cut the reserve to the bone or expect to still own the horse after the sale.)
     I'm really writing this in the hope that someone wanting to own a nice saddle horse for very little money will read this and get out there to the Sonoma County Fairgrounds Tuesday and make a delightful acquisition.
     Some horses always sell well at this sale, and the ones with quality will still be attractive to buyers with money. I'm not talking about them; I'm talking about all those others.
     The upset price at the sale is $1,000, which means that the auctioneer won't accept a bid lower than that. Sometimes, when a sale is really terrible, I've seen auctioneers waive that rule and just take any bid they can get.
     That probably won't happen Tuesday, but if you want that nice horse cheap, take note of which horses leave the ring without a bid and get back to the stable area and buy a horse at a shamefully low price from a seller who'll be pleased to help you do it.
     Some consignors, if they're thinking clearly, will even be willing to give horses away rather than go home with horses they don't want to own.

     The dismantling of historic Bay Meadows is about to begin, and it's a sad thought.
     But I guess there's a consolation prize for someone who cares enough--and I suspect that lots of people do.
     The Great American Group has announced a public auction of bits and pieces--some large, some small--of Bay Meadows to be held this weekend, Saturday and Sunday, August 23 and 24.
     The GAG is an auction/liquidation business, a kind of commercial vulture that performs the same service that those ugly birds perform--stripping the last meat from the bones of a dead creature. The company's initials seem somehow appropriate.
     According to the GAG announcement, the offerings will include "signage and graphics, concessions and food service, facility equipment, stadium memorabilia, souvenirs, audio/video equipment, photographs, tack and riding equipment, and more."
     The auction will continue next Monday with "facility equipment only" to be sold.
     That's all I know for sure. I've heard that everything will be on the block, from horse stalls to cocktail napkins. A bonanza for souvenir seekers and farm owners alike.
     If you want to buy, GAG instructs you to register in advance on their website.
     Have a good time, if you can hold back your tears.

     The harrowing episode of the endangered Thoroughbred mares and stallions in Arizona is drawing to a close. Stallions and mares have been rescued, and now a number of mares are safe at Tranquility Farm but in need of new homes.
     Tranquility president Priscilla Clark, who did a major part of the rescue work, has finally been able to put together a list of the mares, and she deeply hopes that each of them will find a home. Click here for the list.
     She's done her part--more than her part--and now it's up to you.

     There's great news about the efforts of Tranquility Farm's Priscilla Clark to save those horses in Arizona that were threatened with slaughter. See The Newsdesk page for full details. In addition, there's a good story on The Blood-Horse website.

     The discussion--maybe even controversy--over the performance of American Thoroughbred breeders appears to have died away, but I was reminded of it when I read a Daily Racing Form story a few days ago.
     European horses, the story reported, swept the top three places in this year's Arlington Million and did the same in the companion feature at Arlington Park, the Secretariat Stakes. Both are Grade 1 races.
     How can those European horses be so much better than American ones?
     A few hours later, I received an e-mail that triggered an association--could the problems of American breeding be related to the influence of the popular computerized nicking analyses that have become so prominent over the past several decades? As far as I can determine, nicking is nowhere nearly as significant on other continents, and probably not significant at all. 
     (If I'm wrong about that, please advise me and I'll try to decide whether I'm pleased that they, too, have been corrupted.)
     That e-mail came from a gentleman who identified himself as a pedigree and bloodstock consultant for a major Kentucky breeding farm. He had just read my article on the false promise of nicking, and it inspired him to send the following:

     I am contacting you, because I am absolutely astonished how the computerized "nick" has overtaken the industry, to the point of no other analysis takes place other than getting the sire's yearling average. We had to put it on our website in order to sell seasons!
     It is now even printed next to stakes winners in the Thoroughbred Daily News! As you noted in an old article, "if it is computerized it must be accurate." I am amazed at how I explain to a breeder for 30 minutes about how genetically all genes are NOT coming from 4-generations on the sire line, and yet they still want the A, B, C letter grade--some are almost obsessed with getting an A++++.
     What can be done to create a revolution against this poor statistic. I was hoping that we could find a geneticist and a statistician that can help in co-writing an article that can debunk this stuff before it does any more harm. What did it take, and how long did it take, before people figured out that using leaches to suck your blood did not cure and/or bring down a fever?
     Do you have any ideas?

     I had to disappoint him with this response: 

     You probably noted that I had some help from geneticists with my nicking article.
     Regarding the eradication of the nicking kudzu, I've done all I can do and have no energy to expend on pursuing it further. I willingly leave the fight for truth and integrity to others, of which I fear there are few.
     If I can do anything that requires little or no effort and no imagination at all, I'm ready for that.
     I have had dispiriting results from my efforts to wage that fight. I've even had the experience of urging someone to read my nicking-debunking article before paying hundreds of dollars to buy a nicking analysis and having them respond that they'd read my article but thought they'd go ahead and buy the analysis anyway so they would have all available information before making an important mating decision.
     But "information" that misleads is destructive, not informative. I believe the proper term would not be "information" but "pseudo-information."
          Good luck, and let me know if you find any reason for hope.

     I don't expect him to provide me with that reason for hope. It's too late. The breeding industry has been, I think, irrevocably corrupted. 
     I've long been convinced that Jack Werk, who started the whole thing, was the greatest marketer in Thoroughbred history. Now, I fear, he may turn out to be the most influential as well.

     It's a hard slog untangling that mess in Arizona. Here's Priscilla Clark's most recent report:
     "The support and generosity of the Thoroughbred community for the recovery of the Warren mares has been absolutely tremendous, and Tranquility Farm has been in negotiations all week to purchase all of the mares and stallions at the Arizona feedlot. 
     "It would appear that the owner of the feedlot, David Quinn, is convinced that the value of this lot of mares and stallions is roughly double what they would bring at auction, even though he still has not provided to Tranquility Farm so much as a listing of the mares' names. We regret that we cannot provide this to our adopters at this time. 
     "Negotiations will begin again next week, but it appears that the feedlot owner needs some time to arrive at a  more realistic price for horses. The feedlot is under close observation in order to guarantee the security of the mares and stallions." 
     And she appended this note: "Priscilla Clark of Tranquility Farm will be interviewed on HRTV on Sunday at 9:45 a.m. (Pacific Time) regarding the rescue of the Warren mares and the slaughter situation in California."

     Tranquility Farm's Priscilla Clark is still trying to straighten out the mess in Arizona. She's making some progress, she reports, but the knot is hard to untie.
     She also sent this note: "I will be interviewed regarding the situation in AZ and CA Penal Code Section 598c, Horse Slaughter Prohibition, and how it pertains to conduct in racing. It will be on HRTV Sunday morning at 9:45."

     There's an update on the Arizona horse situation on the Tranquility Farm website. It appears that the problem is almost under control, but it won't be completely okay without more help. 

     The campaign to rescue those unfortunate horses in Arizona is continuing, with considerable success, but your help is still needed. See the August 4 entry below to learn how to give it.
     Tranquility Farm president Priscilla Clark, who's quarterbacking the effort, says she'll post a list of the horses on the Tranquility website as soon as she can. You can check there periodically to look for it.

     For the latest on the horses-in-peril story described in yesterday's Notebook, click here.

     The war to save retired horses from slaughter or lives of degradation never ends.
     The latest battle in that war has broken out in defense of a group of 46 horses shipped from California into a threatening situation in Arizona. Before I go on, click here and read The Blood-Horse story that explains the situation. It's an ugly tale, and its finish is still to be determined.
     Priscilla Clark, California's most prominent defender of imperiled Thoroughbreds, is leading the fight to save these horses, and she's already making progress, but she needs your help. 
     More accurately, the horses need your help.
     Clark, president of Tranquility Farms, a horse rescue/rehabilitation/retraining facility located near the mountain community of Tehachapi, is spearheading an all-out effort to wrest them from their present precarious position and find homes for them.
     Let her speak for herself:
     "A rescue is under way for 40 pregnant broodmares and the stallions Seattle Bound, Dante's Inferno, Mr. Bolg, Kris Kross, Major Moment and Dynamite Vision. The horses, originating from Warren's Thoroughbreds in Hemet, are currently at a lot of a livestock dealer in Phoenix, AZ, and may be at immediate risk of shipment to slaughter if buyers are not quickly found. 
     "The horses are at the feed lot of a horse dealer/killer buyer in Phoenix. He will sell to private parties, but also ships directly to Mexico, according to local sources. 
     "We have been told that the papers are with the mares, and we should know on Tuesday, when we have someone meeting with the dealer, the names and ages of the mares. I won't know until then if the foal certificates accompany the papers. That will make a big difference. Anyway, we can perhaps make sort of a catalog of mares available and put that up as well. 
     "This is such a nightmare. I raised over $4,000 yesterday so people are stepping up to help. 
     "A listing of the mares and who they are in foal to should be available from Tranquility Farm on Tuesday, August 5. People interested in purchasing mares may contact Tranquility Farm by e-mail at info@tranquilityfarmtbs.org or by telephoning 661-823-0307. Anyone wishing to donate toward the rescue of  these horses may donate on the home page of www.tranquilityfarmtbs.org. 
     "We will purchase mares with the donated funds and funds received from people who wish to purchase at least one of the horses. The horses will ship on to their new homes directly from three safe locations where we will be keeping them in the Phoenix area. 
     "The only ones coming here to Tranquility will be horses on their way north, and maybe a few stragglers that need adopting. Tranquility Farm is not funded to take on a bunch of broodmares, so we are finding homes as fast as possible. People are e-mailing and calling in from all over to see about adopting one of the mares, and I have potential homes for three of the stallions. 
     "I'm expediting the rescue and then sending them all over the place to homes. In a small way, this is sort of like General Patton saving the Lippizanner stallions after World War II. "
     You--yes, you--can help, either by sending money or, better yet, by taking one of the horses for your own.
     But soon.

     When I made that list of grim predictions in the July 2 Notebook entry, I thought I was making predictions. You know, about the future. But look at these news reports from the Daily Racing Form, coupled below with the Notebook forecasts:

     Notebook: Fans will drive less frequently and less far to racetracks, and those who do will have less disposable income to wager. . . . Gamblers reluctant to travel will present racetracks with an important new group of potential horseplayers--the stay-at-home bettor.
     Daily Racing Form: Some of the wagering has migrated from ontrack to account wagering services, as bettors stay closer to home to avoid high travel costs, [TOC president Drew] Couto said. To make up that deficit in ontrack business, account wagering handle must increase drastically.

     Notebook: With customers reluctant to drive to remote locations, Indian casinos far from urban centers will lose business, as will Las Vegas, opening an opportunity for racetracks.
     Daily Racing Form: A softening market for leisure is not limited to a popular horse racing venue in San Diego. The Pechanga Resort and Casino in nearby Temecula, a Native American casino, announced in late July that it was laying off 400 employees, or 8 percent of its workforce.

     I thought my predictions were likely to be accurate, but I wasn't ready for them to be accurate so soon. Too soon.

     The California freshman sire race is continuing formfully, with Momentum keeping up his momentum (forgive me, but I just had to do that) with Cat Dreams and Marino Marini holding the second and third places.
     Those rankings haven't changed since July 1, which means that there's still only one of our Freshman Sire Contest entrants with the correct 1-2-3 selections. Two others have Momentum first, Marino Marini second, and Cat Dreams third, which is close, and one other has Cat Dreams, Momentum, and Marino Marini in that order. Nobody else has the top three, in any order.
     (If you don't know who these horses are, you can find the basic facts by clicking here.)
     For the record, here are the earnings of the leaders' runners: Momentum, three winners, $92,340; Cat Dreams, four winners, $68,819; Marino Marini, one winner, $47,160. After them come Popular, one winner, $36,200, and Redattore (Brz), no winners, $12,324.
    Momentum's lead over Cat Dreams is only $23,521, which can be wiped out by the winner's purse in a single race. It's still early. The stretch duel lies ahead.

     I'd like to take a brief recess from more serious matters to bring up something that has both annoyed and puzzled me for a long time.
     Why is it that things that are obviously bets are passed off as investments? Why does horse racing have to jump through all sorts of hoops when people who gamble on things in the stock-market arena can just call up a broker and place a bet from anywhere? Why does the government have to pass laws to allow interstate betting on horse races when there are no such rules on the gambling that I'm about to tell you about?
     This was brought back to my mind when I chanced upon an investor-advice column in our local newspaper called "The Motley Fool."
     Under the subheading, "Ask the Fool," a reader writes:
     "My dumbest investment, so far, was to buy call options on Chesapeake Energy Back in July 2006. Due to warm weather and record amounts of natural gas inventories, I lost my entire position, worth more than $2,000, waiting for the cold weather that never came. I made the investment because I remembered the year before, when natural gas prices started to go up starting in July. Needless to say, history didn't repeat itself this time. Oh, well."
     Note that he twice refers to his "investment." Did this fool think he was making an investment rather than placing a bet?
     My understanding is that you have to own something for it to be an investment. If you aren't actually buying something, you're betting, not investing. Same as betting on a horse race, where you aren't buying the horse. Nobody calls those bets "investments," except in jest.
     Seems to me that the world would be better off if those "investments" were clearly identified as bets and the participants in the game forced to play by the same rules as racetracks and racehorse investors.
     Or, sadly, is this a case of class discrimination, where the suits who play at that level don't have to follow the same rules as the lowly slobs who bet on the ponies.

     I've been advised that the CARMA deduction from purses (see July 25 entry below) is 0.003 percent, not 0.004 percent. So the deduction from a $5,000 purse would be $15, not $20.
     But that's not really relevant, because with those owners who don't want to contribute, it isn't the money, it's the principle.

     Racehorses are considered to be pretty much pampered, but they aren't even in the same pamper class with the ones featured in this article from the New York Times. Take a look.

     It should have happened years ago--decades ago, really--but California racehorse owners are finally contributing to a fund to pay for the retirement of the horses that have brought them excitement, pleasure, and, in some cases, profit.
     (See yesterday's Special Report for a full explanation.)
     But not all owners are contributing. The retirement plan is funded by a tiny deduction from purses at current meetings, but not all owners are agreeing to those deductions. The plan is optional, and it appears that a sizable number of owners are choosing not to allow those deductions from their purses. (The deductions are four tenths of one percent, which amounts to $20 from a $5,000 purse, for example.)
     There are only two reasons for an owner to refuse to allow those deductions, and both are based on principles.
     The principle most prominently offered is that each owner should take care of the retirement of the horses that he races and should not have to help pay for the retirement of anybody else's.
     I've heard that position stated by more than one prominent owner, and though I respect their experience and knowledge, the principle on which their refusal is based is badly flawed.
     Of course, each owner should take care of his own horses. Unfortunately, most owners don't.
     As far as that goes, there are surely some owners who just can't take on that heavy a burden. If a horse lives only 10 years after retirement and costs only $200 a month--and that's surely a low figure--that would amount to $24,000. Multiply that by whatever number of horses an owner might retire over the years, and you've got a big enough obligation to drive a lot of owners out of the business.
     It certainly would wipe out cheap claiming races. Can you imagine an owner claiming a horse for, say, $5,000, knowing that if the horse breaks down before he can unload him onto another owner, he's going to have to support the horse as long as he lives?
     A few owners have their own farms and would be willing to keep those retirees, but most owners don't have farms.
     Those owners who won't contribute because they believe that every owner should care for his own horses certainly know that every owner is not going to care for his own horses.
     Knowing that, how can they maintain that they're refusing to contribute as a matter of principle? I guess that they'd want to eliminate the police on the same principle: Everyone should be responsible for his own protection. (Hello, NRA!)
     If those people really believe that every owner should care for his own horses, how about this: Pass a law making it a felony for an owner to fail to provide a proper retirement for every racehorse that ran its final race under his ownership.
     If owners should be responsible for the retirement of their own horses, that would make sure that they did. It would, of course, destroy racing.
     It's obvious that the care of those horses is a collective responsibility, and that's just the way it is. Why pretend that it isn't?
     The second reason that owners refuse to contribute is also based on principle. That principle is this: Never pay for anything unless you have to.
     Those are the two principles involved here. I'd be hard pressed to tell you which is less honorable.

     After all these many, many years, California owners are finally taking responsibility for the care of their retired racehorses. At least some owners are.
     The organization known as CARMA is in operation, and before too long there'll be money to help support the equine warriors who make the entire sport of horse racing possible.
     CARMA is an acronym for California Retirement Management Account, a non-profit entity set up by Thoroughbred Owners of California.
     It's the subject of a Showcase Special Report, "Caring for the Warriors.". Click here to learn all about it.

     Unsurprisingly, the Windfall Farms public lien sale that was to be held next Monday, July 21, has been postponed. It has been rescheduled for Wednesday, August 20, when it may or may not be held.
     The sale has been scheduled and rescheduled several times--I've lost count of just how many times--because Michael Power, owner of most of the horses involved, keeps getting court orders delaying the sale.
     That's what happened this time, too. I don't know whether this can go on indefinitely or whether there's some kind of limit to the number of times this drill can be repeated, but there's no clear end in sight at this point. 
     If you don't know what this is all about, read the two preceding entries below.

     I have been mildly scolded by a reader who thinks I should have pointed out in yesterday's Notebook that the public lien sale scheduled by Windfall Farms has been scheduled and canceled/postponed a time or two before. I should have pointed that out, he suggests.
     He's probably right, though my primary subject was the offering of the farm for sale and I didn't want to go into detail on the sale. But, to fill out the record, most of the horses to be offered--including Siberian Summer--are the property of the controversial owner-breeder-critic Michael Power, who has prevented the sale of his horses before and has pledged to do it again.
     So before you go up to Windfall for the sale on July 21, it would be a good idea to check and see whether it's still going to be held.

     The final chapter appears to be near in the ultimately tragic story of the beautiful Thoroughbred establishment known first as Cardiff Stud Farms, then as Creston Farms, and now, in what evidently is to be its final incarnation, as Windfall Farms.
     The 724-acre showplace located near Paso Robles is being advertised for sale by a realtor at an asking price of $35,000,000. Offered as a "spectacular 724-acre horse farm with one of the finest equestrian facilities in the Western US," its true fate is revealed a few lines later in the flyer advertising the facility: "Windfall Farms sits atop 76 underlying parcels each with Certificates of Compliance and vast development potential."
     Asked for a clarification, a representative of the listing realtor put it unequivocally, saying, "The property is being offered for development. It comes out of the Williamson Act in December, 2012, and at that time the underlying parcels with certificates of compliance will be able to be split out. . . . At the current time, while under the Williamson Act, the property can be split into two 160-acre parcels, nine 40-acre parcels, and one 10-acre parcel with the remaining acreage grouped with any of these individual parcels."
     Doomed.
     (The Williamson Act is the popular name for the California Land Conservation Act of 1965, which offers greatly reduced property taxes in exchange for entering into long-term contracts restricting the use of the property to "farming and open space.")
     If the final selling price comes anywhere near the $35,000,000 being asked, it will surely provide a handsome profit for the third owner of the property, a group headed by the Davis family of Paso Robles.
     Opened in 1986 as the magnificent realization of the vision of Santa Clara County horseman/developer Fred Sahadi at a cost of an estimated $18,000,000, the facility flourished for a time as Cardiff Stud Farms. (Sahadi also built the Barretts sale complex at Fairplex Park.)
     But in 1993 the bank that had financed the venture foreclosed and put the property up for sale. Three years later, eager to get the white elephant off its books, the bank sold it to Alex Trebek, host of television's "Jeopardy," for only $4,100,000.
     That must have looked like a great investment to Trebek, who renamed it Creston Farms, but he soon lost interest and the property fell into disrepair.
     In 2005, the Davis group took it off his hands at an undisclosed price. Whatever that price was, it surely was much, much less than $35,000,000.
     The property then was renamed Windfall Farms, but its new owners could never bring their operation into focus and in January they just about shut down, dispersing the farm's stallion tenants and announcing that the farm operations would be limited to breaking and training.
     Whether or not that will continue, the finish line is in sight.
     As a final flourish, Windfall Farms has scheduled a public lien sale on Monday, July 21, of 27 horses owned by five of the farm's clients. The process, colloquially know as a "sheriff's sale," is typically employed to sell horses to settle unpaid board bills.
     The most prominent of the horses listed for sale is the 19-year-old stallion Siberian Summer, sire of 10 stakes winners, including Dream of Summer ($1,191,150) and Summer Wind Dancer ($898,762). He bred 62 mares in 2007 but was not bred at all in 2008, though he was at Windfall Farms this spring.
      All in all, a sad business, and a sad time for the California breeding industry.
      If you want to buy those horses, call (805) 239-0711. If you want to buy the farm, call (805) 543-7727.

     Time out now from existential problems to take a look at the half-year shape of our Freshman Sire Contest.
     Counting racing through July 2, the leader is Momentum, with Cat Dreams second, and Marino Marini third. Just one of our contestants has the top three in that order; seven others have the top three in some other order.
     Momentum had six starters, three winners, and $92,340 in earnings. Cat Dream had seven starters, three winners, and $64,214 in earnings. Marino Marini had two starters, no winners, and $15,360 in earnings.
     Redattore (Brz), with two starters, no winners, and $7,440 in earnings, was fourth. He's off to a great start in Brazil, where his first crop is six months older, but by agreement of our contestants they won't be counted.
     There's still a long way to go, but up to now the most popular choices are up near the top. The winner of this year's contest will get a prize of $500, unless it has to be split with others who had identical choices. We've got enough tie-breakers in place to make a tie pretty unlikely.
     (I hope I used "existential" correctly. I've waited decades to decide what it means, and I'm trying it out for the first time.)

     I've had several responses to yesterday's apocalyptic predictions, and for some reason none of the writers want me to post their letters. Unfortunately, all but one agreed with me. I'd hoped that someone would explain to me how I was wrong.
     The one dissenter didn't disagree with my predictions but said that I shouldn't have focused solely on the effects of oil prices and should also have listed the other things that are threatening our industry as well.
     He's right. I should have have concluded with something like this: "All this in addition to all the others problems that the industry has already been facing."
     Somehow it doesn't make me feel a bit better to be reminded that we were in trouble even before oil prices went crazy.

     No one appears to have noticed, but the sport of Thoroughbred racing is heading inexorably into the most perilous time it has faced since World War II, when the federal government shut down all the tracks.
     The potentially lethal force creating the threat is the high price of oil, and the consensus of experts is that it will go higher--perhaps much higher--before it levels off.
     Already high fuel prices are stripping money from everyone who drives a gasoline or diesel-powered vehicle as well as burdening businesses with crippling increases in costs. The only thing that can change that situation is the development of some lower-cost replacement fuel, and that is nowhere in sight.
     Profound changes are coming to the Thoroughbred industry, and it may not survive.
     I'm not capable of organizing all the elements of the situation into a coherent presentation. I can only offer observations, predictions, and an occasional suggestion, as follows:
..... The price of feed will continue to rise, forcing increases in trainers' day charges and farm boarding rates.
..... The cost of shipping horses will continue to rise, reducing the movement of racehorses from track to track and of broodmares from farm to farm.
..... Fans will drive less frequently and less far to racetracks, and those who do will have less disposable income to wager.
..... Reduced income will drive small-business owners, a major segment of breeders and racehorse owners, from the game.
..... Higher costs and the reduction in the broodmare population will force many public breeding/boarding farms to close.
..... With few exceptions, only upper-income people will breed and/or own racehorses. 
..... Weighing operating costs against potential revenue, the remaining breeders and racehorse owners will seek higher-quality stock. Lower-quality stallions and broodmares will be forced out of production.
..... With fewer owners racing fewer horses, racetracks will have difficulty filling enough races to present programs.
..... With the cost of transporting broodmares at oppressive levels, The Jockey Club will come under great pressure to legalize artificial insemination, with semen rather than mares shipped.
..... Shipping horses by rail, a practice that was common even into the 1960's, will again become attractive, even for top-quality horses. 
..... With customers reluctant to drive to remote locations, Indian casinos far from urban centers will lose business, as will Las Vegas, opening an opportunity for racetracks.
..... Gamblers reluctant to travel will present racetracks with an important new group of potential horseplayers--the stay-at-home bettor. Simplified forms of Advance Deposit Wagering could attract those gamblers, helping make up for the loss of on-track business.
..... Many racetracks will close, especially those located significant distances from urban centers. 
..... Racetracks located near public transportation will have a better chance of survival. Tracks may choose to offer shuttle service to and from stations.
     Summarizing: If racing survives at all, it may well again be as the Sport of Kings, with only the wealthy able to participate as owners and breeders.
     This isn't fantasy.

     I am not alone.
     Roger Attfield, a Canadian Hall of Fame trainer, was asked this question by Thoroughbred Daily News: If you could change one thing in our sport, what would it be?
     His answer: "Zero tolerance of all drugs, let's have a level playing field."

     I've gotten a few responses to my appeal for help (see June 21 entry below), and I doubt that there will be any more. So here's what I've learned:
     Nobody has provided any answers that I find completely satisfying, though Linda Vetter comes close, but as valid as her statements are, the question still remains: Where is the evidence that breeders who race are, as a group, wiser than buyers, and that they make choices that are different from those of buyers? I seriously doubt that anything approaching a majority of breeders are as rational as Linda is.
     Let me summarize what we're discussing. 
     Some experts have suggested that breakdowns have become more prevalent because more breeders are selling their horses than are keeping them to race themselves.
     In other words, breeders breed for sale horses that are less sound than those they would breed for their own racing stables and buyers buy horses that they think are the best racing prospects and are willing to accept a higher risk of unsoundness in exchange for a higher probability of racing class.
     This appears to bring us to this: For their own racing stables, breeders prefer to produce horses that can't run as well but last longer.
     If you believe that, the question is answered.
     But I don't believe that.
     Some breeders may make such a choice, but it is inconceivable to me that there are enough of them to create a significant difference between the soundness of horses sold at sales and those that are not. Until someone comes up with proof of such a difference, we just don't know and are left with opinions.
     So, in summary, my opinion is that those experts who believe that the cause of widespread racehorse breakdowns has anything to do with breeders breeding to sell rather than to race don't really understand what they're saying.
     Anyway, that's the way it looks to me, so I'll move on, tossing that theory out into that cyberspace where e-mails cluster when they never get where they're supposed to go. 
     Now, moving on . . .
     Even though trainer Jack Van Berg, whose career spans several eras, recommended it at the recent Congressional hearing, I'm a little apprehensive about saying what I'd like to see done.
     And that is this: Disqualify any horse that tests positive for anything after a race. In other words, no medications in the horse when it races.
     That would certainly reduce the number of breakdowns by keeping sore horses from running. Medications that relieve pain and temporarily reduce inflammation keep horses racing when they have physical problems that should be treated, usually by rest. When medications keep horses racing, the problems are likely to get worse and in many cases lead to breakdowns.
     These efforts to get one more race out of the horse are a major contributor to breakdowns. If the horse's welfare were the primary consideration, the best thing would be to take him out of training and give him a chance to get well, either by additional treatment or just by rest. Almost all horses that suffer catastrophic injuries have had some earlier injury that contributed to the disaster.
     Putting it another way, a horse that has to be medicated in order to race has no business racing.
     It isn't likely that many people would dispute any of that, but there is one powerful argument against doing it.
     Owners carry a heavy financial burden, and forcing them to take a horse out of training not only removes his opportunity to earn purses but incurs expenses while he's recovering--if he ever does.
     You can argue that when the horse does come back to the track he'll be healthier and probably will run better and last longer, but the added financial burden of that down-time certainly might force some owners out of the game.
     You can also argue that taking such horses out of training will reduce field size, which nobody wants. In the long run, that may not be true, but there would be a lag time while the system waited for those recovered horses to return to the track, if they did.
     There are two sides to this, and both sides have valid arguments in their favor, so it comes down to a choice: Do you protect the horse or do you protect the owner and the track?
     That may be an oversimplification, but if it is, it isn't much of one.

     I'm starting to get some help with the problem that I explained in yesterday's posting, and I'm putting them on a separate page rather that try to jam them in here. Click here to read them.
     When it appears that everybody who's going to check in has done so, I'll study them and see whether I have an answer. I have noted, though, some tendency to veer off into the difference between the management of sale horses and those not sent to sales. My question is whether there is a difference in breeders' choice of matings for the two different purposes. 
     If you have ideas, let me hear them.

     Before we all get too deep into the multiple aspects of the causes of breakdowns by racehorses, I have a question that I need help with.
     Amid the numerous causes of unsoundness that I have heard assigned blame is this one: Breeders are breeding to sell, not to race.
     That has been offered by some prominent, knowledgeable experts, so I have to take it seriously, even though it seems to me to be nonsense.
     Here's why I'm having trouble with that: I can't understand how there there can be a difference between breeding to sell and breeding to race, because those horses are sold to people who plan to race them. So what would the breeder do different if he were going to race the horse instead of selling it?
     The only way for that to be possible would be for the breeder to believe that he knows more about what makes a racehorse than buyers at sales do. Since many of the most knowledgeable horsemen in the world advise the buyers of those horses, can breeders possibly be so arrogant as to believe that their judgment is better than the judgment of those buyers?
     Those buyers want horses that can win races and earn money. If breeders are producing horses in order to please those buyers, isn't that a pretty good way to produce horses that can win races and earn money?
     If those buyers want unsound horses that run fast, is that then the definition of the ideal Thoroughbred? If it isn't, who gets to write that definition?
     Anyway, I'm not asking rhetorical questions here. I  really want you to explain this for me. I must be missing something important.
     Send me an e-mail. I'll post every response that I get. If you don't want your response posted, don't send it. If you don't want your name posted, tell me and I won't.

     Thursday's appearance of racing and breeding moguls before the House Energy and Commerce Committee subcommittee produced testimony that was interesting, candid, and astonishing.
     For one of the few times in human history, rulers of fiefdoms within a kingdom sought to cede their power to a higher authority.
     One after another, industry leaders testified that they were powerless to solve their problems and called for creation of some entity to rule them and and bring order to the land.
     Members of Congress, who have a quest for power embedded in their genes, listened receptively while giving no indication of what they might do to set things right.
     The basic problem with attempts to control the drugging of racehorses is that regulations all are established by states. Nobody has the power to enforce nationwide conformity or uniformity.
     The widespread--some say rampant--administration of legal drugs quickly became the focal point of the hearing, climaxed by the declaration of Hall of Fame trainer Jack Van Berg that all horses should have to race with no medications of any sort--just "hay, oats, and water."
     The implication was that if a horse required medication--including lasix and bute--he shouldn't be allowed to race. I don't recall whether anyone put it that bluntly, but someone probably did.
     I guess it wasn't surprising that the only speakers who opposed the idea of a national racing office were the heads of the two leading national organizations, The Jockey Club and the National Thoroughbred Racing Association.
     They didn't want to surrender power, even though they have not done anything to solve the problems raised at the hearing and, in fact, have no ability to do so.
     Somewhat to my surprise, the members of the subcommittee appeared to know enough to ask the right questions, though one of them edged near to the unreal by suggesting that perhaps The Jockey Club should refuse to register horses inbred closer than a 4 x 4 cross.
     Probably wisely, The Jockey Club's president and CEO, Alan Marzelli, leaped sideways away from that patch of quicksand by pointing out that his organization's rules for registration had to conform with international standards, which would never be changed to comply with such a rule.
     It might have been interesting to hear experts testify about the best way to legislate the breeding of a good horse, but there surely would not have been unanimity that could possibly have led anywhere.
     The hearing covered just about the full range of industry problems, all the way down to testimony by the operator of a horse retirement/retraining facility who got in a good shot about the failure of the industry to provide for its discarded athletes.
     The hearing was called in response to the furor about the fatal breakdown of Eight Belles--and of Barbaro two years earlier--and the subsequent publication of statistics on racehorse mortality.
     The day's events showed that somebody needs to do something and that control--even prohibition--of drugs probably is a good place to start.
     I had feared that any legislation passed by Congress would be ill-considered and ill-conceived, but maybe it won't be. Maybe federal intervention is just what's needed here.

     Next Thursday a House of Representatives subcommittee is going to hear testimony, under oath, by 12 representatives of the Thoroughbred industry. They're going to testify about the sport's policies regarding the use of anabolic steroids, and maybe other drugs, too.
      I can't imagine what those legislators are going to make of what they hear.
     They'll be told that . . . steroids aren't performance-enchancing, in the sense that a horse gets a shot and then runs faster . . . but, yeah, they probably help a horse to run better . . .  and we know that they're illegal just about everywhere else in the world, and we're really working to make them illegal here, too . . . and we've pretty much figured out how to test for steroids (don't know how they've been taking care of that in those other countries all these years) . . .but, you know, each state makes its own rules, so it's really hard to get all this worked out . . .
     They say that making laws is something like making sausage--something you don't really want to watch because it's so messy. But watching racing laws get made is even harder, because you can go crazy waiting for everybody to agree on the recipe. 
     But it will be even worse if Congress decides to write the cookbook.

     The 2008 freshman sire race in California has gotten off to such a slow start that I forgot to provide the promised first-of-the-month report for June.
     So here's the way it stand for racing through June 11: 

     1. Cat Dreams, $53,919. 6 starters, 2 winners.
     2. Momentum, $49,280. 5 starters, 2 winners.
     3. Ancient Art, $5,840. 1 starter, 0 winners.
     4. Marino Marini, $5,760. 1 starter, 0 winners.
     5. Redattore (Brz), $5,040. 1 starter, 0 winners.

     Four of the 20 contest entries listed Cat Dreams as No. 1, and just one of those put Momentum at No. 2. None of the entries named Ancient Art anywhere.
     The most popular selection was Momentum, on top of six entries, with Cat Dreams and Marino Marini picked on four, Redattore (Brz) on three, Popular on two, and Vronsky on one.
     With plenty of 2-year-old stakes races coming up in the next couple of months, someone's due for a breakout.
     But not yet.

     It appears that all sorts of people are concerned about the present preference by breeders of speed over soundness. There's an article in the Daily Racing Form and another in the Wall Street Journal. 
     The article in the Form reports on the explanation of the breeders of Eight Belles of how they did, in fact, breed the ill-fated filly for soundness. At somewhere around the same time, an article by the respected turf writer William Nack explains on the espn.com website how she was, in fact, bred to be unsound (though not intentionally, of course).
     I couldn't find a link to that article, but Barbara Lopes of Lakeport sent along a copy and I've transferred it to a Showcase page. The article quotes pedigree guru Ellen Parker, who blames much of the present situation on Native Dancer and his influential sons Raise a Native and Mr. Prospector.
     The best thing about all this is that people are talking and even appear to have decided that there's a problem. That's where you have to start, by identifying a problem. That's being done, so there's hope.
     However, since change will have to be brought about by individual breeders making their individual mating decisions, it will be years before we know whether any progress has been made.

     This doesn't quite rise to the zen-like level of the question, "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" but a statement quoted in yesterday's notebook does bear examination.
     Our correspondent wrote, "Slow horses = no fans."
     So . . . if all the horses in the race are slow, do fans know that they're slow?

     A breeder whom I have found to be an astute, insightful observer of our industry sends along comments relating to my proposal for redirecting breeders' choices from speed toward stamina.
     He writes, "Admittedly I have no direct experience with the breakdown of any horse I bred. That's because I have excelled at breeding slow horses. It really is all about speed. Among the reasons why claimers generally and other slow horses can make so many starts is that they are slow. In a nutshell, they don't run fast enough to hurt themselves.
      "In this sport the fastest horses win the prize. As usual, Don, you hit the nail on the head: unless through the almighty prescience of Congress the industry somehow successfully reorients toward rewarding slow runners, breeders and owners will continue to covet stock with speed.
     "Slow horses = no fans. Ain't gonna' happen." 
     His comments made me realize that in my earlier (May 30) Notebook entry on the subject I had neglected to make clear that I wasn't proposing that breeders seek stamina without speed. There's a word for horses with stamina and no speed: plodders.
     I'm certainly not recommending that everybody should aspire to produce plodders, though I guess if a plodder was faster than all the other plodders, he'd be a valuable horse . . . well, I don't think I want to get into that. What I would like to see is breeders sending their mares to stallions who had shown both speed and stamina.
     As I said in my earlier piece, I am assuming that there's a correlation between soundness and the ability to race at longer distances. If you don't agree with that assumption, you can tell me about that, too.
     In his comments, my friend appears to be making his own assumption, that horses that can get a distance of ground are necessarily slow. But the goal, after all, is to produce a horse that has speed and can carry it over a distance of ground.
     Those stallions certainly exist. I don't think it was too far back in the dark ages when breeders looked for a stallion that had stamina and was sound but had performed well at 2. Right now, many breeders are happy to settle for precocity and speed without stamina and soundness.
     Certainly there are stallions with speed, soundness, and stamina. They should be treasured.
     My correspondent followed not long after with a second e-mail, making a salient point:
     "I don't think it is genetic at all. It is how we train race horses to compete.
Establishing a series of distance races wouldn't alter the gene pool in any way, but it would force trainers to alter their approaches to training.
     "The fact that Kenyans dominate international marathon racing is not genetic. It is the way they train, where they train (up and down Kenyan mountains) and discipline."
     I can't quarrel with that observation, which shifts the responsibility from breeders to trainers (and owners, of course). But we wind up in the same place. If trainers train horses to go a distance, they still want a horse that can get that distance faster than his competition.
     In that case, they want horses that run fast and don't break down early. That's not their preference when so much money is available for horses that run fast and break down early and so little for horses that don't run quite as fast but can run farther and last longer.

     Mary Forte of Solana Beach suggests that this article in the New York Times may help explain why there's a movement toward banning the use of steroids in racehorses, and I agree.

     The tension between horse retirement and horse slaughter will be with us for a long time, I fear. It even relates to the problem of racehorse unsoundness, since a horse too badly injured to be useful but not badly injured enough to be euthanized is a prime candidate for slaughter.
     For an insightful analysis of all this, click here.

     If anybody has any ideas about how to get breeders to shift from seeking speed rather than soundness, I haven't heard them.
     Now, to my surprise, I've found someone with an idea.
     Me.
     My plan assumes that there's a correlation between soundness and the ability to race at longer distances. Can there be any doubt that there is?
     The idea was triggered by this item from the Australian Breeding and Racing Magazine's website:

     I don't know how they would go about making that happen in Australia, but in California, at least, that could be accomplished by fiat. The CHRB could pass a rule requiring a certain percentage of stakes races be run at a mile and a quarter and farther. There would certainly be a hail of criticism if they tried to do that, and it may even be illegal. But it's an idea.
     If that isn't possible, the CTBA could do something. After all, if the problem lies with breeders, a breeders' association logically should be taking the lead in looking for a solution.
     The CTBA could require that a specified number of stakes races restricted to California-breds be run at distances longer than those being written at present.
     It would have to be done over a period of several years, with the distances for all Cal-bred stakes gradually increased. There would be a time lag, of course, between booking a mare to a stallion and having a racehorse ready to run a distance of ground, but we could wait.
     Is anybody serious about trying to solve the problem?  Or is the answer, "Gee, yes, but not if we have to do something that radical."
     Or will we hear the standard knee-jerk response to any new idea in this industry: An explanation of why it can't be done.

     A long-time California breeder whom I've known for many years but doesn't want to be identified here has responded to my comments on plans for a Congressional committee to step in to deal with the problem of racehorse breakdowns. I want to pass those comments on to you, probably because I agree with almost all of what follows:
     "Just read your editorial on breakdowns and that Congress is going to get involved. The real problem is not so much that Congress is getting involved, which is bad enough, but that our industry cannot do anything for itself to keep itself from drowning.
     "As you know, any time you get the government involved, it is a dangerous thing. First, they do not know anything about the industry, especially the breeding end of it, and they will just about believe anything that they are told and go from there.
     "What they do not realize is that the industry does not want to change a thing. As long as the sales run the show, everything is just fine. Band-aids like synthetic tracks will not save the breed. All it does is allow for more breeding of unsoundness; it's just being used as a safety net,
     "As you well know, just about all of the sound bloodlines are gone. So-called popular (but unsound) ones continue to proliferate. The industry is doing it to themselves and cannot or will not see the light. They have now brought on the government, which is the worse thing that can happen. After being in the industry for 53 years, I can say that we are seeing the industry destroying itself."
     I don't have quite that apocalyptic a vision, but I certainly agree that we are in bad shape and things are not getting any better. 
     I'm going to write more about this whole problem in the next week or two. You're invited to write, too. 
     (Some of you are already writing.)

     Just about every expert in the Thoroughbred industry has weighed in on the question of racehorse fatalities since the breakdown and death of Eight Belles in the Preakness Stakes earlier this month.
     And now the federal government is going to do its part.
     The United States House of Representatives Subcommittee on Commerce, Trade, and Consumer Protection has served notice that it's going to move in and straighten things out.
     Good luck. 
     The Subcommittee wants the Association of Racing Commissioners International to provide information, and soon--by June 2, less than two weeks from the time of the request. The legislators want to know about breakdowns, drug use, and breeding.
     Most of the industry people who have offered opinions as to the cause of breakdowns have included drug use and breeding on their lists of possible causes, along with 2-year-old racing, excessive numbers of starts, running females against males, excessive whipping by jockeys, and dangerous racing surfaces.
     For the moment, let's put aside all those except breeding, which may well be the most likely cause of breakdowns.
     Just about everybody agrees that breeders have abandoned soundness as a requirement and gone overwhelmingly for speed. A fast horse can win a lot of money before breaking down. That pretty much sums it up. Everybody mourns when they break down so badly that they lose their lives, but, hey, that's just part of the sport.
     So let's agree that breeders ought to try to breed sounder horses. How are you going to get them to do that? As long as both buyers of racing prospects and breeders who race their own value speed more than soundness, horses are going to be bred for speed, regardless of soundness.
     Certainly there are ways to reduce the incidence of breakdowns and the committee should explore those.
     But there is just no way that breeders can be coerced into doing what they think isn't in their best financial interest, not as long as free enterprise exists. Maybe education could convince them, but what would that additional knowledge tell them? That there's more money to be made by valuing speed over soundness.
     So I'm eager to see just what Congress does with that problem. Maybe after a lot of expert testimony they'll find that sound horses break down less frequently (that's why they're called "sound") and that breeders value speed more than they value soundness.
     If they can devise a law that fixes that, they can devise laws to fix global warming, worldwide hunger, AIDS, malaria, high oil prices, education, racial and gender bias, and all those other troublesome problems. Maybe even tornadoes, floods, and earthquakes, too.

     Jockeys all over the world suffer serious injuries. From the Australian Breeding and Racing Magazine's website there's another report of a jockey badly hurt in a fall.
     This rider was hurt in a way that American jockeys usually aren't. Here's the report: 
     "New Zealand's top jockey, Michael Walker, remained in a critical condition, in a coma with head injuries, in Auckland Hospital last night following his fall down a cliff while pig hunting in Taranaki bush on Monday."
     There's a lesson here for all of us, not just for jockeys: Be careful walking on the edge of cliffs when you go pig hunting. Especially in the Taranaki bush.
     As unusual as it was, Walker's fall is no less serious and potentially tragic as a bad fall in a horse race. It's just different.

     Many of the stories about our sport/industry that appear in the mainstream press aren't worth reading, but yesterday, on one morning, two major newspapers offered articles that I think you'll find of interest.
    One was in the Washington Post, the other in the New York Times. Take a look.

     The Thoroughbred Timesstory on Tuesday's Barretts May sale of 2-year-olds in training contained these two paragraphs:

From the 328 juveniles originally cataloged for the 2008 auction, Barretts reported 147 horses as sold for total receipts of $7,816,400, a 31% decrease compared with last year’s record total of $11,331,300 from 181 horses sold. Average price dropped 15.1%, from the 2007 record of $62,604 to $53,173. Median dipped 4%, from $25,000 last year to $24,000. The buy-back rate increased from 31.7% in 2007 to 33.5%.

“There was a lot of money for the good horses, but weakness in the middle and lower ends,” said Jerry McMahon, president and general manager of Barretts.

The first paragraph provides the statistical background for the second. The second, as you can see, is a quote from Barretts president Jerry McMahon.

I'll bet you could go back one, two, three, or maybe even more years and find an identical quote from McMahon, maybe even verbatim. That is no criticism of McMahon, who is always upfront and honest. What it does tell you is that the market is continuing, year after year, to punish the great majority of sale horses that are just good, solid racing prospects.
     It rewards the favored few who have that extra whatever-it-is that buyers at top of the market are looking for.
     Over and over it has been shown that hardly any of those desperately desired prospects run as well as a great many of those who were rejected by the big-money buyers.
     Something is seriously wrong when a horse has to have that Certain Something in order to bring that big money. Pedigree helps, though it's not necessary. But something is wrong, because there's no way to breed for that Certain Something. It just happens. The horse moves "athletically," he has a "great attitude," etc. Or even, heaven forbid, he "looks like a runner." 
     What's a breeder to do?

     I don't know whether to bid my tearful goodbye to Bay Meadows now or to wait until the last race is run on August 18.
     Sunday's racing program was the last that will be run as part of a Bay Meadows meeting. The San Mateo County Fair meeting--usually known as the Bay Meadows Fair--will provide a two-week curtain call in August as the concluding event of the Northern California fair racing season.
     That, I guess, will be the funeral for the 74-year-old track, which will be demolished to make way for commercial development. It was pronounced dead as night drew near Sunday.
     That development has been in the works for several years, but the track had continued to operate, one year at a time. The CHRB's decision to require that California's major tracks would have to install artificial surfaces disconnected the track's life-support systems.
     The track's management got a one-year waiver on the requirement that enabled them to race this year, but clearly the end was near. There was no way that the track's owners were going to spend millions and millions to install an artificial surface that would be used for only a year or two.
     Now that Bay Meadows has been pronounced dead, everybody can get on with the too-long delayed business of deciding where to race those dates that no longer have a home. That project requires immediate attention.
     The death of Bay Meadows marks the first time in 44 years that a major California racetrack has been lost. The last time that one closed, forever, was on July 31, 1964, when 65-year-old Tanforan, located in nearby San Bruno, was destroyed by fire.
     Bay Meadows won't be granted such a spectacular death. It will just be euthanized, cold-bloodedly.

     Sorry to interrupt the buildup to the Kentucky Derby, but there's nothing new to report and it's time for the monthly report on the 2008 California Freshman Sire competition.
     Right now just one of the entrants in our contest has a winning ticket, having picked Momentum, Cat Dreams, and Redattore (Brz) to finish 1-2-3, which is exactly the way they stood at the end of April.
     Momentum, with earnings of $28,480, and Cat Dreams, with $8,767, didn't add a dollar in April. Redattore, with $5,040, displaced Slew's Prince in the No. 3 spot.
     Only Momentum  has sent a runner to the winner's circle so far, but the action will heat up when the Hollywood Park juvenile program gets rolling, especially when the money from 2-year-old stakes races is distributed.
     Now my attention returns to Louisville, where I'm hoping that Bob Black Jack shows the world what real California speed looks like. And if he doesn't, maybe Gayego will provide a consolation prize. He's not a Cal-bred, but all his connections are Californians, and that sure beats an empty stall in the starting gate..

     Well, unless something bad happens to Bob Black Jack in the next few days, there will be a California-bred in Saturday's Kentucky Derby.
     At No. 20, the speedy son of Stormy Jack was at the tail end of the list of eligibles for the big race based on earnings in graded stakes races. But first Proud Spell (No. 2) and then Behindatthebar (No. 19) opted out, so Bob Black Jack has moved up to No. 18 and is eligible to enter the starting gate Saturday.
     If you want to see that he really is entered, you can watch the draw for post positions at 2 p.m. today on ESPN2.

     In telling the story of Black Jack Attack (see the April 26 entry below) and ending with the report that he'd been slaughtered, I carelessly created the impression that he is dead and that the search has ended.
     I concluded with that notation for dramatic effect but didn't point out that  whoever added that death notice couldn't possibly have known what happened to the horse.
     I thought it was puzzling that someone had added that to his pedigree entry, and I suppose that my publishing it without expressing skepticism revealed my belief that the horse will never be found. 
     The fact is that the search is continuing without slowing, so if you have any clue as to the whereabouts of Black Jack Attack (or to, sadly, his fate), please let me know and I'll advise the Glenneys.

     A touching, and depressing, report that landed in my e-mailbox a few days ago illustrates the complexity and difficulty of saving from slaughter or lives of misery the many, many racehorses whose competitive careers end each year.
     Unlike the usual stories of uncaring owners who turn their backs on the horses that have brought them pleasure--and sometimes profit--this tale related in painful detail the efforts of a Mr. and Mrs. John Glenney, the breeders of one of those runners, to do the right thing.
     They wanted to make sure that the horse, a 7-year-old gelding by Carson City that they bred in Kentucky, had a comfortable retirement, and they were ready to provide it.
     He'd gotten away from them in a claiming race, but they weren't concerned, because they believed that when his racing career ended they could just repurchase him and give him a proper home.
     When it became apparent that the horse, whose name was Black Jack Attack, was approaching the end of a hardscrabble career in which he'd won twice in 29 starts over five seasons for earnings of $136,990, they contacted his trainer at Bay Meadows.
     Too late.
     According to the report that I received, the trainer treated their inquiry "in a dismissive manner." They finally were told that the trainer had given the horse to a groom, who'd sent him on to a sister in Mexico.
     The Glenneys called back, this time offering a substantial reward for information leading to the return of the horse, and the trainer, memory refreshed, told them that he'd given the horse to a pony boy, not a groom, after all, though he really couldn't remember, because he always "just gave them to whoever would take them and give them a home."
     I won't go into the considerable detail that the e-mail related about the Glenneys' efforts to find Black Jack Attack, but you could safely say that they've tried everything,including seeking information from a New Mexico operation known for sending horses to Mexico for slaughter.
     No success, but they're still trying.
     Though the search continues, the fate of Black Jack Attack may have been summed up by this entry on his page in the online Thoroughbred Pedigree Database: "As of April 2008: Presumed SLAUGHTERED IN MEXICO R.I.P."

     The 2008 Kentucky Derby may or may not turn out to be a close race, but the battle for the last place in the anticipated 20-horse field is going right down to the wire, with the lone California-bred contender fighting to the end.
    That Cal-bred is, of course, Bob Black Jack, the Cinderella son of Stormy Jack.
     The field for the big race is limited to 20 horses, and priority for entry is given to the horses with the greatest earnings in graded stakes races. Bob Black Jack has earned $180,000 in those races, thanks in considerable part to his $50,000 purse for running second in the Grade 1 Santa Anita Derby.
     Bob Black Jack had been hanging onto 20th place in graded stakes earnings among horses that are planning to run on May 3, but now he isn't. The latest list that I've seen appeared in Wednesday's edition of the online Thoroughbred Daily News, and it had Bob Black Jack a notch lower, at No. 21.
     That demotion was the result of the addition of Behindatthebar to the roster of likely entrants. He has graded earnings of $201,500, which lands him 19th on the list, shoving Big Truck ($194,500) back to 20th and Bob Black Jack to 21st.
     So unless one of the 20 now in front of the Cal-bred opts out--or is taken out by injury or, better yet, an untimely cough--our state will be represented only by Gayego (No. 5, with graded earnings of $640,000). He's a Kentucky-bred, but he's been racing in Southern California, is owned by Southern Californians, is trained by a Southern Californian, and was selected for purchase in a Keeneland yearling sale by Southern California bloodstock consultant Suzanne Cardiff.
     That's not as good as his being a Cal-bred, but it may have to do. A surrogate, sort of, as they say in political circles these days.
     Speaking of yearling sales, TDN printed a list of auction sale prices of those Derby contenders, and Gayego and Bob Black Jack were two of the bottom three. Gayego was bought for $24,000 at the Keeneland September yearling sale and Bob Black Jack for $4,500 in last year's Barretts January mixed sale. Gayego has earned $723,420 and Bob Black Jack $442,925.
     Both of them were prime bargains, especially considering that 12 of the other contenders cost $100,000 or more, all the way up to $375,000. (And where are all those $1,000,000-plus sale-toppers?)

     One of the features of our now-discontinued newsletter was a list of pinhook prices for California sales, showing what horses cost in earlier sales, who bought them, and where they were bought.
     We continued that with this year's Barretts March sale, posting the results of our research as a Special Report on this website. But it was a lot of work and I decided not to do it any more.
     I've had calls from former newsletter subscribers asking about such a list for the Barretts May sale, and I've had to disappoint them.
     That prompted me to see if I could find some way for them to get that information, and I succeeded. Thoroughbred Times publishes Buyer's Guides for any number of sales, including this one, and it includes pinhook prices in addition to lots of other information.
     If you want one and are willing to pay $75 for it, you can call Wendy Young at the Times and place your order. Her telephone number is (859) 260-9800, extension 199. You can pay by credit card, of course; the price includes two-day delivery.

     You don't often open a magazine and have your first reaction be: Oh, no! That is wrong!
     In this case, I didn't even have to open the magazine. When I unwrapped my April California Thoroughbred, it was back side up and on the back cover was an ad for In Excess (Ire), beyond question one of California's premier sires.
     In a prominent position was this line: "More than $66,000 Average Earnings Per Start."
     Did you get the instant "Oh, no!" reaction, too?
     On the inside of the same issue, on the "Leading Lifetime Sires in California" page, In Excess's record shows 499 starters with earnings of $32,997,067. Divide that earnings total by 499 and you get--of course--a bit more than $66,000. But that's earnings per starter. Not quite the same as earnings per start.
     According to The Blood-Horse's online Stallion Directory, In Excess's runners have had 5,627 starts. With earnings of $66,000 per start, 5,627 starts would have produced earnings of more than $371,380,000.
     In Excess is an excellent sire, but not that excellent..

     So Bob Black Jack is going to the Kentucky Derby. Or at least he's going to try to.
     His connections have announced that they're going to try for the Big One, figuring that the son of Stormy Jack can get the mile and a quarter distance of the Derby, since he finished a good second in the mile and an eighth Santa Anita Derby and wasn't reeling at the end.
     In order to start in the Derby, he'll have to have enough earnings in graded stakes races to put him in the top 20 of horses seeking entry. That's the largest field they can handle for the big race.
     Bob Black Jack, who has graded earnings of $180,000, was tied for 19th on the last published list. It's likely that somebody will earn enough to move ahead of him between now and May 3, but it's unlikely that all those horses who are ahead of him will want to run, so he'll probably qualify.
     Being a firm believer that most news in the horse business is bad, I'm apprehensive. I hate to see a promising young horse get chewed up in the Triple Crown grinding machine, but lots of horses who looked like they shouldn't try have wound up winning.
     We'll see, and if he does run, I'll be pulling for him--unless Gayego is in the field, too.
     I've been following the accomplishments of Bob Black Jack because he's the only California-bred in the Derby chase, but I do have another interest, Gayego, who won the Arkansas Derby yesterday and is almost certain to go in the Derby. (In case you don't know, that's pronounced "Guy-eggo.") 
     He was bought out of a Keeneland yearling sale on the recommendation of my friend and client,Suzanne Cardiff. If both he and Bob Black Jack run, I'll have a sort of rooting entry, with two chances to feel good instead of one.
     Or two chances to feel bad, if you want to look at it that way.

     You may recall that in a March 21 Notebook entry I observed that a survey comparing injury rates on synthetic tracks with those on dirt tracks had been released before its time. It was reported by the Daily Racing Form. The survey, conducted and announced by Florida veterinarian Mary Scollay, was flawed in a number of ways and should not have been made public until it was corrected and made valid.
     Since it was clear to me that the study was just not sound and was certainly misleading, I wondered how it would be handled by the major Thoroughbred weekly publications. They would have had more time to think about it than the daily Form had. If they were truly responsible, I thought, they would either not publish it at all or publish it with a lot of caveats. I'm pleased to say that I chose not to put a link to the original Daily Racing Form story on our Western Newsbeat page.
     Well, the weeklies published it. 
     Thoroughbred Times printed it straight, making it the lead cover story with the headline, "Fatality Rates for Synthetic, Dirt Tracks Nearly Equal." That's what her report said, that the fatality rates were about the same.
     The Blood-Horse was somewhat more cautious, printing the story in a box at the bottom of its first news page with the headline, "Vet Urges Caution Over Fatality Numbers," but I couldn't find anything in the story that supported that heading. It printed the results of the study with quotes from Dr. Scollay that didn't suggest that her report was invalid.
     Maybe each publication expected the other to use the story and didn't want to be scooped. Or maybe they knew they were publishing a shaky story but figured they could publish a later story correcting the misinformation and thus have two stories instead of none--the original and then the correction instead of not using the flawed story. A time-honored newspaper tradition. Dishonest, but traditional.
     If the results of that survey could be believed, it was big news--tracks are spending millions to install surfaces that are no safer than the old ones.
     And now we have the correction, in a news release from The Jockey Club distributed yesterday. It opens with this paragraph

      The on-track injury reports and total starts utilized in providing the catastrophic injury rates presented by Dr. Mary Scollay at the March 17th Welfare and Safety of the Racehorse Summit have been revised after being thoroughly reviewed.

     And two paragraphs later, quoting Dr. Scollay: 

     “However, I would like to report that after a thorough review, the fatality rates I reported at the summit last month should have been 1.47 fatalities per 1,000 starts for synthetic surfaces and 2.03 fatalities per 1,000 starts for dirt tracks."

     Uh huh.

     Everybody knows that riding racehorses can get you killed, and sometimes does. But how about this, in the New York Times?

     Just to keep us updated on the possible participation in the Kentucky Derby of the last California-bred still standing, here's the situation with Bob Black Jack.
     His second-place finish and $150,000 purse in the Grade 1 Santa Anita Derby at a mile and an eighth increased his graded-stakes earnings to $180,000 just enough to qualify him for a place in the starting gate on May 3 at Churchill Downs.
     His connections haven't decided yet whether they want to send the son of Stormy Jack to the big dance, but they may not have a choice. If more than 20 horses want to run, eligibility will be determined by earnings in graded stakes races.
     At this moment, Stormy Jack's $180,000 are good for a two-way tie for 19th in those earnings, so if nobody moves ahead of him in the three and a half weeks remaining, he can get in if he wants to. But behind him are 13 horses with graded earnings of $100,000 or more and four with earnings of $150,000 or more, so he's a long way from being sure of qualifying. Any of those others could move ahead of Bob Black Jack with just one good performance.
     My guess is that they'll decide not to chew up a good young horse by sending him east to be a longshot in the Derby, so the earnings count question is likely to be moot.

     I'm sorry to note that The Blood-Horse has joined the other major American racing/breeding publication, Thoroughbred Times, is lending its services--and presitige--to further the nicks myth.
     It's offering readers the chance to get a free mating rating to any of a long list of stallions--none in the West, I'm happy to note--whose owners have paid a fee to have their stallions included.
     TrueNicks, its website explains, bases its calculations on a more sophisticated process than other nick-sellers do. I won't try to explain it, but no matter how complex a theory is used, it can't overcome all the problems explained in mind-numbing but necessary detail in my Nicking: An Analysis study.
     I found interesting these comments of TrueNicks co-founder Alan Porter the other day on The Blood-Horse website:

     Yesterday brought the news that champion 3-year-old filly Rags to Riches was to be retired and bred to Giant’s Causeway.
     The match of the history-making Belmont Stakes (gr. I) heroine with Storm Cat’s leading son is one that should create a tough runner, and a horse that will have no problems with classic distances.
     Of course, we couldn't resist running it through the TrueNicks program. This came up with the mating as a C based on the Storm Cat / A. P. Indy cross. That cross has produced only three stakes winners, albeit a couple of notable names, headed by the Haskell (gr. I) winner and Kentucky Derby (gr. I) runner-up Bluegrass Cat, and graded stakes winner Untouched Talent. Storm Cat himself sired Bluegrass Cat and Untouched Talent from seven starters out of A.P. Indy mares, but so far there are 42 starters by sons of Storm Cat out of A.P. Indy mares, and only one stakes winner.
     There are, however, some other factors – beyond the outstanding class of the sire and dam, a very important point – that might help this mating. From a pedigree pattern standpoint, we can note that both Giant’s Causeway and Better Than Honour, the dam of Rags to Riches, are Northern Dancer / Blushing Groom crosses. We can also note that Giant’s Causeway is sire of the exciting sophomore stakes winner Giant Moon, who is out of a mare by Capote who, like A.P. Indy, is a son of Seattle Slew.

     There may be something useful in there, if you have the time to work on it. Maybe it's in this sentence: "There are, however, some other factors – beyond the outstanding class of the sire and dam, a very important point – that might help this mating."
     But, of course, you can't get beyond the outstanding class of the sire and dam, unless you go beyond it to figure that if you own Rags to Riches and can get to Giant's Causeway, you don't need to ask anybody what to do. You just breed the best to the best, and you don't need a computer for that.
      Or, looking at it from the perspective of scientific methodology, to know whether a Giant's Causeway/A. P. Indy cross is better than some other, you have to have some "other" to compare it with. You'd want to see what happened when Giant's Causeway and an A. P. Indy mare of quality equal to that of Rags to Riches were mated. (Not just once but enough times to produce a sample of adequate size.)
     Then, if you could do that, you'd have to figure out what to compare those results with.
     Oh, well, I guess I just don't understand.

     They're off and running, and our 2008 California Freshman Sire Contest is under way.
     The 20 contestants seeking the $600 winner's purse in our contest have heard the first call in the race, and we have a leader.
     I'm not going to identify the players--the $25 entry fee might get them unwillingly known as high-stakes gamblers--but at the end of each month I will report on how the field is sorting itself out.
     After the first month's racing for 2-year-olds of 2008, Momentum is in the lead with $28,480 in earnings, followed by Cat Dreams at $7,200 and Slew's Prince at $400. All those earnings came from the one "baby race" run so far at Santa Anita.
     Six contest entrants picked Momentum (the winner of that first race) to wind up with the title, but only one chose Momentum and Cat Dreams to finish 1-2.. Nobody put Slew's Prince anywhere on any ballot. The leader's ticket picked Momentum, Cat Dreams, and Redattore (Brz) to finish 1-2-3. 
     There's a long, long way to go in this race, and at the end of each month we'll post a progress report on the fight for the handsome winner's purse.

     Speaking of California-breds, which I was yesterday, two of them ran in the Dubai World Cup Saturday, and one of them did well.
     Idiot Proof, a son of Benchmark, took the lead in midstretch in the $2,000,000 Dubai Golden Shaheen at about 1 1/8 miles but was overtaken by winner Benny the Bull, a Florida-bred, and finished second, a length and three quarters back.
     It was the second time in three years that a Cal-bred had taken second in that Grade 1 race. Thor's Echo, by Swiss Yodeler, did the same thing in 2006 on his way to winning an Eclipse Award as champion sprinter.
     Finishing second wasn't nearly as good as a win for Idiot Proof, but he's lugging home a purse of $400,000, enough to make him the latest Cal-bred millionaire with career earnings of $1,263,204.
     But what of the other Cal-bred, Notional, a multiple graded stakes-winning son of In Excess (Ire)?
     All bad news.
     He finished last in a field of 16 in the $5,000,000 Dubai Duty Free and, according to the Thoroughbred Times story, came up "lame in his left foreleg."
     In its report, the CTBA website, which, like the organization that produces it, is interested only in good news about Cal-breds, had nothing to say about Notional's race and his misfortune, choosing to tell only about Idiot Proof's becoming a millionaire. Not a word about poor Notional.

     Only two horses bred in the West are still in the running for the Kentucky Derby, and only one of those has much chance of making it into the starting gate on May 3 at Churchill Downs.
     Both of those are California-breds, and only Georgie Boy is likely to run in the classic--unless something bad happens to him before then.
     The maximum number of horses that can run in the race is 20, and if more than 20 want to enter, eligibility will be based on earnings in graded stakes races. Right now, Georgie Boy, a son of Tribal Rule, has won $390,000 in those races, good for sixth place in that earnings competition going into this weekend's action.
     That's $266,583 more than the 21st horse on the list. It's possible, I guess, for one of the low-ranked horses to run the board and pile up enough earnings to move ahead of Georgie Boy, but 14 horses would have to do that to push the Cal-bred out of the top 20, and that isn't going to happen, even if Georgie Boy doesn't earn another penny.
     The other Cal-bred still eyeing the Derby is Stormy Jack's son Bob Black Jack. He has only $30,000 in graded earnings, good enough for 37th place, but he's only $99,000 back of the 20th horse, so a couple of wins in graded races might get him into the field. 
     It will be a challenge for him, but he could do it, though not by winning Cal-bred or other ungraded stakes in which he's earned the bulk of his bankroll of $292,925. 
     It will be something to watch, though. He's surprised us before.
     But for now, Georgie Boy is most likely to carry the banner of the West in the Derby.

     A couple of other points about choosing a stallion: the physical compatibility of stallion and mare and that curious theory called dosage.
     For some observations on those subjects (not necessarily mine), click here and here.

     Here's some news: The CTBA has decided to use blacktype rather than stakes rules for the catalog of its 2008 Northern California yearling sale, which will be held this year at Santa Rosa.
     (If you aren't familiar with the difference between blacktype and stakes rules, click here and scroll down to the August 6 entry. It's explained there.)
     The change returns the CTBA to the mainstream of California sale cataloging, where it belongs. No longer will buyers have to fear that the black type shown on a catalog page won't be there if they enter their purchase in a later Barretts sale. More important, they won't be misled by black type that designates a race with a purse of $3,000 at some place like Wyoming Downs as a stakes race--by definition an event of quality.
     According to CTBA general manager Doug Burge, the change was made when a survey of "the bulk of" consignors to the sale showed that they wanted blacktype rules. He pointed out that stakes rules were chosen when the sale was resumed in 2004 because a survey at that time showed it was what consignors wanted.
     I've always suspected that consignors who picked stakes rules back then didn't fully understand the consequences of their choice. There's been enough discussion of the subject since then for consignors to make a more informed decision, and they made it.

     In his most recent letter to Voices From Cyberspace, Larry Stevens makes this observation: "I could cite a few bloodlines that "nicked" with real success in the QH breed. In the TB, of late it has been Storm Cat on Mr. Prospector mares."
     I certainly can't quarrel with the idea that breeding a Mr. Prospector mare to Storm Cat gives a breeder an excellent chance of achieving "real success." The question, though, is whether this is a "nick."
     That brings us right squarely to a bigger question: What the heck is a nick, anyway?
     It has to be more than just the result of breeding a superior sire to a daughter of a superior sire. I guess to be a nick, there has to be a better result than that achieved by breeding a daughter of a different superior sire to a different superior sire.
     Immediately, you can see the swamp we're wading into. To test a possible nick, we have to determine whether it produces better runners than a combination sire and dam of identical quality but of different bloodlines. That's what nicks are, crosses that do that.
     Already you can see that we aren't going to be able to identify that sire and dam of identical quality. How can we do that? If we're going to make a valid comparison, the horses have to have not only the same bloodlines but the same race records, produce records, conformation, and goodness knows what else and the foals that make the race records we are going to compare have to have identical raising, identical training, and everything else.
     Just impossible.
     Decades ago, the prized cross was *Nasrullah bred to *Princequillo mares. I don't recall that that was called a nick, but it probably was. But what it really was was a case of a high-quality sire bred to high-quality mares.
     Both of those sires stood at Claiborne Farm, which had mares probably as good as any in the world. And the master of Claiborne Farm, Bull Hancock, was the guy who said that the key was to breed the best to the best and hope for the best. He did that, and I doubt that he cared whether anybody said his success came from a magic nick.
     Since there's just no way to test the Storm Cat/Mr. Prospector "nick," I think we just have a case of the best being bred to the best. An excellent idea--if you can afford it.
     The great allure of the whole nicking idea is that it offers the promise of getting  a superior runner without breeding the best to the best or the good to the good, but the mediocre to the mediocre. Forget about the quality of the sire and the dam and her sire; just get the nick and wonderful things will follow.
     Success on the cheap.You can see why people want to believe.

     I don't do a lot of sighing, but I sighed deeply, with sadness, when I saw the announcement recently that Thoroughbred Times is offering a free service providing nick ratings for mares bred to the advertised stallions.
     The professional providers of mating advice based on nicking analysis continue to thrive. After all, they have a right to sell their services if people want to pay for them. It's the American Way.
     Nicks offer a shortcut to breeding success. A way to breed a good horse on the cheap, or just a way to get an advantage. Nicks certainly may exist, but there is just no way to know what they are. That doesn't stop people from believing and embracing those nicking analyses, all gussied-up to look scientific.
     But before you make a mating decision based on such a nicking recommendation, I urge you to read my own nicking analysis. You'll find it by clicking here.
     Entitled "Nicking: An Analysis," it originally was published in three installments in c