"As time goes on we will get horses competing from abroad. British horses can still go for the Breeders Cup if they want to but the races we want are on dirt there, so why fly turf horses all the way over to America? To win at Ascot on Champions Day, value-wise, will be much more."

"There is always a bit of pressure with a horse of his caliber. You are nervous about this, that and the other. I am very happy to have him and he is a challenge. I do the best I can with him. Frankel is a very hot-blooded horse. We have cameras on him and can see what he is up to in our bedroom.... He is always biting himself. He sweats between his back legs in the paddock before a race, and with a lot of horses that is a bad sign, but it is only because he is quite hot-blooded."

"Sheikh Mohammed’s breeding operation breeds 'a lot of horses in Kentucky that run in Europe without medication, and they run very, very successfully,' including Discourse, a top filly in Europe by the sheikh’s stallion Street Cry. 'They’re all top 2-year-olds in Europe, and they all run medication free, so I don’t know why they need it in America when you don’t need it in Europe.'"

"According to Keeneland, 1,631 yearlings have been sold for a total of $198,638,200, surpassing total gross receipts in 2010 of $198,254,900 for 3,059 yearlings sold during a 14-day sale. Cumulative through Sept. 19, the average price was $121,789 compared to $99,973 in 2010 and the median price of $75,000 outpaced the $60,000 figure of last year."

"That is not to say some of the NTRA’s programs are not worth saving when the inevitable curtain falls on the organization. The NTRA operates a lean but effective communications and media office, and it’s vital for that to continue in some form. The NTRA also has done a good job protecting horse racing’s interests in Washington, D.C., working in conjunction with the American Horse Council. Its group purchasing and sponsorship division, NTRA Advantage, was far more successful when NTRA and Breeders’ Cup worked together, but even in its current form should be maintained and given a chance to grow. In recognition of that, a small committee ... has been formed to see what should and can be salvaged from the anticipated NTRA wreckage."

"This year there has been a little pent-up enthusiasm; the buyers are anxious to buy.... People have been sitting on money for a while, plus we have unusual tax incentives that expire at the end of this year. That pushes a guy into that mood as well ... and there’s a lot of thanks for that. It’s encouraging for the breeders. It’s been three years since they’ve had any smiles on their faces."

"The continued down-sizing was expected, as 2011 marks the sixth straight season foal numbers will fall. The 2005 foal crop was up 1% compared to 2004, reaching 38,361, but numbers have dropped each year since, down to a projected 27,000 live foals for this year. The Jockey Club expects the numbers to continue to fall in 2012.... In figures released Thursday, the Jockey Club said 23,558 live foals had been reported through September 7. That figure, believed to be about 85% complete as more reports are expected, is down 13.8% compared with last year at this time when 27,233 reports had been received."

"... the extraordinarily low number of positive tests does seem to me to reinforce the impression that I get hanging out on the backstretch of NYRA tracks; most horsemen are serious about their craft and honest, following the rules as best they can."

"Suspicions about illegal drugs are rampant not only in California, where the California Horse Racing Board seems to lack the spine to conduct serious and probing investigations. Realistically, such suspicions exist at every track in America and little is being done anywhere to deal with them. This, despite many forward moves against steroids and the on-going conversations about Lasix and Bute. That 'other drugs' are in play continues to make a mockery of the game. Fact is, the insidious nature of illegal drug use for racing purposes is what is negatively impacting the sport more than anything we read or write about."

"Think of data as a silo that exists within the cloud. That data can be tapped at anytime, from anywhere, using tablets with applications specifically designed to access the data and give it context. That has precisely what is happening in baseball."

Darley and Shadwell juveniles from McLaughlin's barn are running without Lasix: "With the Breeders' Cup banning the use of Lasix (also known as Salix) in the 2012 2-year-old events at the World Championships, and with the American Graded Stakes Committee announcing that it will deny graded status to any 2-year-old stakes race in which horses can run on the diuretic in 2012, the trainer made the call."

"It's been an amazing ride for the last year. I've been putting my best foot forward and it has paid off."

"The only sensible way to ban Lasix is to prohibit its use in all American races, but that will not happen, because the rules are made on a state-by-state basis, and pro-medication horsemen have more clout on the state level than do the nation’s elite owners and breeders. Industry leaders concerned about medications have plenty of other work to do: The performance of many so-called supertrainers suggests that illegal drug use is rampant, and it continues to corrode public confidence in the game. But the battle over Lasix was decided long ago, and it’s too late to overturn the results."

"... the Amesbury native knows first-hand that life can become derailed when least expected. Having established herself as a solid journeyman rider in a talented jockey colony that included Carl Gambardella and Rudy Baez in the late ’80s while riding under her maiden name as Tammi Campbell, she seemed destined to become a star. However, a recurring case of viral meningitis interrupted that rise to stardom on several occasions while triggering a decade of more debilitating problems that nearly took her life.

"The first thing Patrick Valenzuela did when he left the winner’s circle Sunday after going wire-to-wire to take the 21st TVG Pacific Classic with Acclamation was pay tribute to the man who started the $1 million race for Del Mar.... The second thing Valenzuela did was thank everyone who gave him one final chance to salvage a career that was sidetracked dozens of times because of drug and alcohol abuse. He lost years off his career, serving more than a dozen suspensions or dealing with license revocations."

“I’ve been blessed this year. This is the best decade of my life.”

"This far-flung operation makes Ward perhaps the first realization of the global American trainer. Like the world itself, 'racing’s getting smaller,' he says. Ward became the first American to win a race at Royal Ascot, when he pulled it off with Strike the Tiger in 2009, and this, more than anything else, propelled him on this international course. At Royal Ascot last June, the Telegraph dubbed Ward 'the mad genius from America' in one of its headlines."

"Industry officials acknowledge next year could be messy. The rhetoric war is under way, though it’s hard to gauge the level of support of the anti-Salix and pro-Salix camps."

"Piermarini, 44, originally from Salisbury, began her racing career at Suffolk in 1985 as an apprentice jockey. Over the course of 26 years, three pregnancies, repeated bouts of debilitating spinal meningitis, and upward of $17 million in purse winnings, she diligently has carved out one of the sport’s more impressive careers for a woman. Not that she really considers 'for a woman' to be a necessary qualifier in the overall discussion of her time in the saddle, because she now has exactly 14,206 races and, oh, the odd dustup in the jocks room with some of her brothers is ample evidence that she considers her sport a level playing field."

"The scoreboard of late has been in Pletcher’s favor. He currently is the top trainer in North America with nearly $12 million in purse earnings. His 26 victories here, at the most competitive and prestigious meet of the summer, top the standings, and he is two victories out of first place at Monmouth. To spend a day with him is to appreciate up close an extraordinary feat of choreography, in which high-tech wizardry is as necessary as plain old horse sense, and where gallows humor, straight talk and a little Spanish all must be deftly employed. Over the course of a single day -- Aug. 13 -- Pletcher touched 100 horses and oversaw the training of another hundred working at tracks up and down the East Coast."

"Racetracks that received subsidies from slot machines in 2010 generated on average only two-fifths of the betting that non-subsidized tracks generated even though they distributed nearly equivalent levels of average daily purses, according to unofficial statistics assembled by DRF."

"Hayward said he didn’t want to reveal details of NYRA’s bid, but he did say the association is committed to making capital improvements at Belmont, something that will be much easier for NYRA when the under-construction video lottery terminal casino at Aqueduct begins operating."

"Never mind that $2 million a year in marketing expenditures, additional consulting work by McKinsey, and technical support by The Jockey Club’s various for-profit companies is a drop in the bucket for an industry that generates roughly $12 billion a year in betting turnover. This is a start. At least someone is doing something."

Janney said there are “significant challenges” but “many people in this sport have grown weary of the pace of change.” He said horse racing “doesn’t need federal intervention to set the right course.”

"If it was at Belmont, purses would have to be cut from $26 million to $15 million to break even."

"Repole’s Breeders’ Cup (I bet he loves the sound of that) could keep some New York horsemen home. It might keep Pletcher home. 'I’m all for it if he wants to put up the money,' Pletcher said and he was serious. 'If there was an equivalent race, why would I ship to California if I had an equivalent option in New York. I am all for having (Breeders’ Cup) in California, just not every year ...'"

"If Frankel can slam one of the 'big guns' over ten furlongs next year, then there's every chance he'll achieve a rating in excess of 145, thereby earning the title of Timeform's greatest ever racehorse."

"The way we campaign horses has changed. We don’t run as frequently as we used to. The ‘bounce factor’ is a real deal. If you ignore it you get your butt kicked. I actually think that’s been one of the biggest reasons in the downward spiral in starts per year for a horse. We simply give them more time between races. Every time we lead them over there these days we expect an ‘A’ effort. And then when they give you an ‘A’ effort they need more time to recover. It’s as simple as that. I mean, with a lot of trainers, if their horse is not 4-to-1 or less, they’re out. They don’t run."

"This is the thing that makes the most sense. It gives the players what they have been looking for."

"The step by the committee was criticized by Rick Violette, the executive director of the horsemen’s group in New York, where 17 graded stakes for 2-year-olds are scheduled for 2011. Violette said that the horsemen would oppose any effort to roll back the rules, citing scientific studies that have demonstrated that furosemide is effective in mitigating the severity and frequency of bleeding. Violette also said that horsemen would go so far as to ask for a restraining order if the policy were to be enforced next year."

"The policy will be evaluated at the end of next year, when a decision will be made whether to continue it or expand it to other graded stakes.... The move dovetails with action taken by Breeders’ Cup to ban race-day drugs for 2-year-old races in the 2012 World Championships."

"If I have top horses like Mo, Thirsty, and Overdriven running next year, I am going to have to rethink my decision to go over there. It's just not fair. They don't hold the Super Bowl at the same venue three out of five years. It's a joke. I wouldn't be surprised if some of the top East Coast trainers and owners didn't go out there next year. Actually, if NYRA decided to run some big races on the same weekend as the Breeders' Cup, I would encourage other horsmen to stay close to home." Also: "As an owner who regularly spends up to $4 million on horses per year, what am I supposed to do if one of these horses bleeds after his first start ... ?"

"... things have changed in racing, just as they have changed in other sports. The sabermetrics movement, defined by objective analysis, especially statistics, shunned the insider perspective in baseball and has altered the way the sport is run. In professional basketball, 'stat geeks' use mathematical formulas in an attempt to assess a player’s contribution in more meaningful ways than a scoring average or a scout’s eye-test. Many teams have bought in, and most have advanced stats experts on payroll. Over the years, a similar shift has occurred in racing. Class still counts, and horsemen still train horses, but speed figures have wormed their way into every nook of the racing world."

Aggregating recipes from the top food sites.

A grid system fluid down to mobile.

"Despite the infrequency of incidents that would trigger the rule, the change has ruffled the feathers of horsemen in California and put horsemen in other states on notice of changes to come. By and large, horsemen said that they do not object to the spirit of the rule. What rankles them, the horsemen said, is that the California rule contains a significant loophole and could lead to the adoption of other exceptions that would hold horsemen responsible for any injury a horse suffers in a race, chilling horsemen’s willingness to enter horses in claiming races, which comprise approximately 60 percent of all races run ... Arthur said the rule was not written as an indictment of trainers at large, but he said there were some horsemen in California who had reputations for entering unsound horses in races. The rule was approved to make those horsemen think twice."

"... reading and thinking about the generations of women who had to suffer this kind of knee-jerk condescension from men, you begin to wonder how it was that any woman managed not to put her head in an oven before approximately 1968. Plath’s classmate in Robert Lowell’s poetry seminar, Anne Sexton, did eventually kill herself, too, but Plath’s sometime rival Adrienne Rich did not. Many millions did not. Why not? The situation was intolerable. How could anyone tolerate it?"

Role of social media in newsgathering: "That said, one of the things I like about Twitter is that it behaves in many ways a lot more like a newsroom than a newspaper. Rumors happen there, and then they get shot down -- no harm no foul. I think that big flagship Twitter accounts like @Reuters or @WSJ should be held to a higher standard. But for the rest of us, we’re conversing on Twitter just like we converse in real life."

"Blanket, across-the-board elimination of Lasix, however, would bring about irreversible pari-mutuel Armageddon -- a problem more insidious and ultimately debilitating than any posed by the use of Lasix."

"While Jockey Club officials will begin to assess totals submitted by stallion owners this month, the estimated foal crop this year is 27,000 -- a 10 percent drop over the prior year and the lowest number since 1973, says Club spokesman John Cooney. The registered foal crop has steadily decreased since 2007, now approximately one-fifth its size then."

"Canford Cliffs, the big, dappled colt who ostensibly represented the biggest challenge yet to Frankel's immaculate record, looked relaxed and imposing. But Frankel just took the breath away, brawny but fluid. His physique is increasingly pugilistic ... his overall demeanour was so insouciant that it was easy to accept Cecil's theory that Frankel is outgrowing the reckless exuberance of his younger days."

"The search for a US superstar drew another blank this weekend, making it increasingly likely that the American horse of the year award could be set to leave the continent for the first time in 2011.... There may be four months left to run, but with no suitable alternative forthcoming, Goldikova is beginning to look more and more like a horse of destiny."

"Among the 60-plus member countries of the IFHA, however, only a few South American countries such as Argentina, Chile, Peru, and Uruguay race predominantly on dirt. In North America in 2010, 76% of the races were on dirt, accounting for 63% of available purse money. Great Britain, Ireland, Italy, Australia, Japan, South Africa, Hong Kong, and Singapore, all with horses rated higher than any American horse on the current ratings, all race exclusively or predominantly on turf. American exceptionalism, the idea that America is qualitatively different -- in so many words, better -- than other countries, may or may not still be a viable concept in political circles. In the context of Thoroughbred racing, however, the rest of the world has clearly decided that it is an outdated belief."

"In a filing, Veitch argues that the commission has an 'unconstitutional vendetta' against him because of disagreements with the commission's executive director, Lisa Underwood, over penalties given by the stewards."

"Another industry insider, who preferred to remain anonymous, had stronger words when asked why Santa Anita had so many fatalities earlier this year. 'Same ol' (bleepin) thing,' he said. 'Too much cortisone, too much painkiller and trainers that are too greedy and too desperate. I mean, how many of the same guys are breaking down the same horses?'"

"There it is, the 19-hand Clydesdale in the room. The issues of takeout, field size, and horsemen’s representation are all subordinate to a single, monumental reality: The sport is running short of horses."

"At this year’s Santa Anita Park winter/spring meet, purses paid totaled $29,335,718 over 65 days, up from $28,005,440 for 73 days in 2010. Average daily purses increased 17.6%, from $383,636 in 2010 to $451,319 in 2011. Field size at Santa Anita, however, went from 7.77 horses per race last year to 7.61 this year even though its synthetic surface was replaced with dirt at the urging of horsemen. Through 37 days of this year’s Hollywood Park spring/summer meet, purses paid totaled $15,080,052, up from $13,299,606 last year. Average per day increased 13.3%, from $359,449 in 2010 to $407,569 in 2011. Field size at Hollywood Park has dropped as well, from 7.81 last year to 7.64 this year."

Re: Salty Strike: "Those two victories also coincided with McPeek taking the filly off of Lasix, making her one of two of the 90 horses entered on Saturday’s card to run without the anti-bleeding medication. 'She seems to run well without it,' McPeek said. 'We feel like we can come back a little quicker because we’re not running on Lasix. She’s doing good right now.'"

"TL;DR version: Last year, I was threatened with a lawsuit over the pixel art album cover for Kind of Bloop. Despite my firm belief that I was legally in the right, I settled out of court to cut my losses. This ordeal was very nerve-wracking for me and my family, and I've had trouble writing about it publicly until now. "

"Handle through two of the three leading national account-wagering platforms in the United States declined in the first quarter of 2011 compared with the first quarter of 2010, according to the platform operators and regulators in Oregon, where the platforms have betting hubs. The decline signals a contraction in the account-wagering market for perhaps the first time. Combined with a slight increase for the third large account-wagering operator the overall 7.9 percent decline is the first significant quarter-to-quarter drop for the leading operators in the account-wagering sector, which has been the only growing component of the national wagering market over the past several years. The decline far exceeded a 1.8 percent contraction in race days during the quarter and was a significant component in an 8.5 percent decline in total wagering on U.S. races for the first three months of the year."

Mentions useful plugins.

"Even if we agree that American conditions are different from foreign conditions -- and they are -- in the long run it does not matter. Globalization is here in Thoroughbred racing, and it has been here for about 15 years. Our choice is either to retreat from the global village and die a long, painful death, or to embrace it and compete on even terms."

"Here's how: the racing commissioners from the three Triple Crown states (New York, Maryland and Kentucky) plus the people from the California Horse Racing Board need to sit down and decide what they want to do. If they decide they want to get rid of legalized race-day medications, just do it. With the four most important racing states on board, others will likely follow. If they don't, so be it. These are the four states that matter most."

"Science notwithstanding, it's true that, for whatever reason, the US and Canada stand alone among major racing jurisdictions in permitting race-day use of Lasix. Here's what other major racing countries do ..."

How the NYT used Twitter to update election results from the field in real-time on their site.

“My worries for American racing is that you’ve become isolated,” he said. “We want to see more international racing.”

"It is six and a half weeks since Frankel broke his opponents before halfway in the 2,000 Guineas at Newmarket with an explosion of speed that was as brutal as it was astonishing. It was the sixth race of his career, and the sixth victory. If he can produce something similar on Tuesday ... it will establish him as being as close to perfection in racing horseflesh as an imperfect world is ever likely to get."

"In addition, the racing board’s study expressed concern about the depth of the track, recommending that the cushion, or top layer, be 3.75 inches in depth. Tests conducted during the meeting pegged the depth at levels ranging from 2 to 4.25 inches. The report states that alternations were made during the winter-spring meeting to ensure the cushion was closer to the recommended 3.75 inches, which prevented horses from reaching the harder 'pad' section of the track below the cushion. The study concluded that Santa Anita’s sand-and-clay track never had the intended mix of sand, clay, and silt during the recently concluded race meeting."

"Horsemen contend that furosemide does not enhance performance but instead allows horses to run to the best of their ability."

"Fighting to continue performance-enhancing drugs on race day and to keep horse racing leaderless with an outmoded business model is a futile self-preservation strategy by the worst elements of the sport."

"You'd be amazed by the number of people who stop me, bring me papers to autograph. I give a speech and ask for questions afterwards, this is 20 years on, and somebody always asks about The National. People do remember it fondly."

"And whatever the outcome, she thinks the contest will encourage more women to take on this challenging role. Which unfortunately leaves the frightening prospect of a woman being the next John McCririck."

"... ordinary times are evidence that horses are not running on steroids anymore ..."

"Many of the best vacation memories of my life I owe to these strategies, which prove again a useful principle for all couples: don’t try to change each other. Study and subvert each other."

"To me, it’s the most satisfying win I had," Pletcher said at Wednesday’s draw for Saturday’s 143rd Belmont in which he will run 20-1 shot Stay Thirsty. "To me, it was the most exciting race I won, just the stretch-long duel. When you look back it as far as fillies go and then you look at what she did in that race and what Curlin accomplished after that, to me it was as good as a filly has ever run."

“We’re going to shoot for the stars and who knows, maybe even give her a chance at Horse of the Year. If that means tackling the boys at some point this summer, that is a possibility too. There are not that many high-dollar filly races out there. She already has her grade I, so if someone offers us money to show up, we have that option. I don’t want to put the cart before the horse, but we have big hopes for her.”

"... industry leaders will meet next week under the threat of federal legislation introduced in early May to ban race-day medication and provide stiffer penalties for abuse. Perhaps more importantly, the bills would reopen debate on the law allowing interstate wagering on horse racing -- an advantage the sport has over other forms of gambling that few in the industry want to risk. The fight over anti-bleeding medications is the 'mother of all battles,' said Dan Metzger, president of the Lexington-based Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Association, which supports a race-day medication ban."

"There was a tremendous amount of inconsistency, and if there’s one thing that drives trainers crazy, it’s inconsistency," Arthur said. "Unfortunately, a lot of people gave up on synthetics just as we were learning how to maintain the surfaces."

"Just as fast fashion seeks to pressure shoppers with the urgency of now or never, social media hope to convince us that we always have something new and important to say -- as long as we say it right away. And they are designed to make us feel anxious and left out if we don’t say it, as their interfaces favor the users who update frequently and tend to make less engaged users disappear."

"When Kentucky Republican Rep. Ed Whitfield and New Mexico Democratic Sen. Tom Udall recently filed the Interstate Horseracing Improvement Act -- designed to eliminate drugs from horse racing -- Arthur and Staci Hancock of Stone Farm, George Strawbridge of Augustin Stables, and Roy and Gretchen Jackson of Lael Stables signed a letter of support for the legislation."

"I fundamentally believe that we are entering the next great era of the web -- The Validation Era. In this age of too much content and not enough time, the public will increasingly need to hear things validated across four interconnected media clovers that are converging across four different screens -- phones, tablets, PCs and TVs. To be successful, businesses and individuals will need to continually ensure their engagement spans the media cloverleaf."

"If you’re a designer, entrepreneur, or creative -- you probably haven’t been asked for your resume in a long time. Instead, people Google you -- and quickly assess your talents based on your website, portfolio, and social media profiles. Do they resonate with what you’re sharing? Do they identify with your story? Are you even giving them a story to wrap their head around?"

Brian Stelter's lessons learned from covering a disaster.

"Frankel produced one of the greatest performances seen on a British racecourse when running away with the 2,000 Guineas here, propelling his much-loved trainer, Henry Cecil, back to the top of his profession long after his career had seemed in its twilight. Incredibly, the manner of this all-the-way victory matched the wildest hopes held for the colt, whose reputation has grown ..."

"Somehow, the sport has to find a way to improve its betting product, because a time bomb is ticking. The United States is struggling this year with a horse shortage because only about 32,000 foals were born in 2008 -- the current crop of 3-year-olds. In 2011, the Jockey Club estimates the size of the foal crop at 24,900, so there will be no escape from the horse-population crisis in the next several years. It seems almost inevitable that fields will get smaller and horseplayers will wager even less."

"Ontrack handle had the lowest decline of 3.3%. The average this year was $976,919 this year versus $1,010,939 last year. The largest drop came from out-of-state handle, which fell 14.3% from an average of $4,533,707 last year to $3,887,198 this year. In other categories, in-state handle at other wagering outlets dropped 7.7%, and California advance deposit wagering handle was down 11.9% to $518,107 per day. ADW has been hailed by many in the industry as the primary growth channel for handle. Overall, total average daily handle for 2010-11 was $6,675,569, down 11.6% from $7,553,653."

"Teach your clients about the mysteries of the web."