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‘Horse Of A Lifetime’ Lord Glitters Ready To Shine On Dubai World Cup Night

When Elwick Stud's Lord Glitters came roaring back to form winning the G1 Jebel Hatta on Super Saturday at Meydan, it embodied why trainer David O'Meara has called the ghostly son of Whipper 'the horse of a lifetime' in interviews. Indeed, it seems the globetrotting fan favorite has been around for a lifetime–or at least two or three standard Thoroughbred careers–while competing at the top level and holding his own impressively.

A nine-time winner from 35 starts, the earner of $2,220,544 is in his sixth season of racing and has competed in 13 Group or Grade 1 affairs, winning twice and placing four times. Saturday's triumph added to an eye-catching victory in the 2019 Queen Anne Stakes (G1) and was his second win from four starts over the Dubai turf course.

“I'm over the moon,” O'Meara said. “It was a great ride by Danny (Tudhope) and a fantastic job done by (assistant/rider) Matt Ennis, who's looking after him out there. It's great for the Turnbull family. Geoff obviously passed away last summer and he'll be looking down smiling, I suspect. Nick, who (runs the stable) now is doing a great job. All systems go, now, for the Dubai Turf. Hopefully we can get there fit and well.”

Geoff Turnbull, who along with wife Sandra ran in name and as Elwick Stud, passed at age 74 in mid-July. The pair's dark blue and pink colors have competed at the top level across the world, including winning the Woodbine Mile (G1) and Arlington Million (G1) with Breeders' Cup Mile (G1) runner-up Mondialiste–who competed in UK, France, America, Canada, Hong Kong and Dubai–and in the past few years by his heir apparent Lord Glitters.

Since being purchased at Arqana for $322,659, following four wins from nine runs in France for Christophe Lotoux, the leggy Lord Glitters has gone on to eclipse Mondialiste's earnings mark, while competing against the best milers and middle-distance horses in the world. His brilliant third-place finish to one of history's great fillies, Almond Eye, in the 2019 Dubai Turf (G1) turned out to be a bit of magic foreshadowing, as he has returned to the UAE for the Dubai World Cup Carnival this year and thrice flourished over the same 1800m (nine-furlong) trip. In addition to the Jebel Hatta, he won the Singspiel (G2) and was an unlucky second in the Al Rashidiya (G2).

The focus now is on the next battle for the ageless warrior: a return to the $4 million Dubai Turf–one without Almond Eye and in which he figures as one of the favorites. A secondary focal point will be keeping the high-energy, massive athlete calm and collected as he faces the very best the globe can throw at him. Such appears to be a labor of love for connections who continue to admire his infinite fervor for competition.

“He's nearly been the same since the day he walked in the yard,” O'Meara said. “He hasn't lost any of his enthusiasm and his exuberant ways. He's a joy to have around the place.

“He's come out of the race okay and swam for a few days and had an easy time of it ahead of building him back up for world cup night,” O'Meara concluded. “We don't need to work him too hard. He's always very generous in his work. A lot of times, it's just keeping a lid on him. On race day, he can get a little warm, but we know him well, now, and how to manage his ways.”

Lord Glitters will surely shine as brightly as he can on Dubai World Cup day.

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Ask Your Veterinarian Presented By Kentucky Performance Products: Spring Skin Ailments

Veterinarians at Rood and Riddle Equine Hospital answer your questions about sales and healthcare of Thoroughbred auction yearlings, weanlings, 2-year-olds and breeding stock.

Question: Spring is often the time of year horses struggle with skin ailments due to humidity and wet weather. How do you recognize and treat the most common skin ailments and when do you need to call your veterinarian for help?

Dr. Ashton Broman: With the onset of the rainy and humid season, many owners may dread the thought of going out to the barn to find their horse has skin disease. While there is no single cure-all treatment for “skin disease,” there are distinguishing characteristics of common skin ailments owners can learn to recognize while also knowing when veterinary involvement is necessary.

With the onset of the wet season, one of the most common skin ailments is pastern dermatitis, commonly known as dew poisoning or scratches. Most owners know how to recognize this by the small scabs and sometimes cracked and painful skin along the pastern. Horses in wet, muddy conditions as well as those with non-pigmented skin (often with white hair) or long feathered fetlock hair are more predisposed to this condition. If caught early, clipping and washing the pasterns, gently removing the scabs, and keeping the pasterns as dry as possible can alleviate the problem. For more severe cases, there are medicated ointments containing anti-inflammatories and antimicrobial products that can be prescribed by your veterinarian and applied topically. Occasionally, dew poisoning can predispose a horse to more severe inflammation of the leg and lead to cellulitis. If you notice swelling up the leg with heat and sensitivity to the touch, call your veterinarian.

Some owners, when grooming their horses, will notice scabs or areas of hair loss along their horse's body and assume it is a fungal skin disease. While fungal disease of the skin is common especially during the rainy season, there are other allergic and bacterial causes. It is important to be able to differentiate between each to ensure proper treatment is started and it is recommended you work closely with your veterinarian to diagnose the problem and come up with an appropriate treatment plan.

Dr. Ashton Broman

Allergic dermatitis can often be seen as small, raised swellings along the skin with actively seeping or dried crusts which are often extremely itchy. It is usually seasonal, coinciding with the onset of spring and summer, with horses presenting with the same problem year after year. It is often caused by an allergy to insect bites but can also be due to reaction to certain chemicals or plants. As the foundation of treatment is prevention, it is important to identify the cause and attempt to prevent exposure. Because this condition is recurrent, some owners will become familiar with treatments to use for their particular horse and be able to implement treatment as soon as clinical signs begin to appear. Occasionally, some horses can develop a secondary bacterial infection so if you notice the lesions are hot or painful to the touch, contact your veterinarian for further treatment.

Rain rot, also known as rain scald, is medically termed dermatophilosis. While most assume it is a fungal disease, it is actually caused by a bacterium called Dermatophilus congolensis. It is characterized by areas of hair loss and scabs that easily flake off containing entire hair follicles. Lesions are usually concentrated to certain areas of the body such as along the croup, back, and face but can extend to any part of the body. Treatment consists of bathing the horse using medicated antimicrobial shampoos, regular grooming, and keeping the affected areas clean and dry. The scabs should be removed with the bathing, but carefully, so that the affected areas are not irritated. It may take more than one bath to effectively “de-scab.”

Ringworm is a skin disease caused by a fungus, not an actual worm. It is recognized by characteristic circular, flaky lesions with hair loss and tends to be concentrated in smaller areas with single or multiple lesions. This is important to identify because it is highly contagious between horses and may be zoonotic so it can be passed to humans as well. Treatment consists of the use of anti-fungal shampoos and topical anti-fungal medications. In severe cases not responsive to topical treatment, there are systemic treatments that can be used by your veterinarian.

For all skin diseases, early recognition is key so frequent grooming and attempting to keep horses in as dry an environment as possible are critical. Remember that brushes, etc. may get contaminated with the causative microorganisms, so be aware of the need to change grooming equipment between affected areas and between horses. While most common skin diseases are easily treated on the farm by owners, it is important to work closely with your veterinarian to ensure the correct treatment is being used and to recognize when veterinary intervention is necessary.

Dr. Ashton Broman was born and raised in Glendale, Calif., where she first developed her love of horses at the age of three. After high school, she earned her bachelor's degree at the University of California, Davis where she later worked as a technician at the veterinary school. She was accepted to Colorado State University for vet school and graduated in 2018. Dr. Broman started an ambulatory internship at Rood and Riddle with Dr. Brad Tanner in 2018, where she discovered a passion for equine dentistry and foal medicine, this passion was greatly increased during my second internship at Rood & Riddle. Dr. Broman plans on following her passion for dentistry and foal care in her new position as a Rood & Riddle associate.

She got married in 2020 and with her husband, Kris, and stepson, Bentley, has three faithful dogs and two beautiful horses.

The post Ask Your Veterinarian Presented By Kentucky Performance Products: Spring Skin Ailments appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

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Taking Stock: West-Bred Life Is Good and Concert Tour Top Baffert Barn

Gary and Mary West bred last weekend's hugely impressive Gll San Felipe S. winner Life Is Good (Into Mischief) and Saturday's leading Gll Rebel S. contender Concert Tour (Street Sense), both 'TDN Rising Stars', both trained by Bob Baffert and probably the two leading Classics aspirants in his barn, with five wins, three graded triumphs and no losses between them. That's quite a feat for the Wests and their racing manager Ben Glass–clients of Werk Thoroughbred Consultants–because the Baffert barn is loaded with expensive and well-bred auction purchases for a number of big-time outfits, including the “Avengers” group that raced Gl Kentucky Derby and Breeders' Cup Classic winner Authentic (Into Mischief) last year, and their former partners in Triple Crown winner Justify (Scat Daddy), WinStar and CHC, which races Life Is Good.

The Wests don't race in partnerships, going it exclusively alone–a rarity these days. They mostly buy yearling colts at Keeneland with a focus on Classic types with the aim of developing stallions, and their nascent breeding operation is mostly based around supporting their young horses at stud, including champions Game Winner (Candy Ride {Arg}), West Coast (Flatter) and Maximum Security (New Year's Day), plus American Freedom (Pulpit). That they've raced three Eclipse Award-winning colts in the last four years tells you all you need to know about their program, but Life is Good and Concert Tour, plus the promising 3-year-old homebred filly and 'TDN Rising Star' Slumber Party (Malibu Moon), are now showcasing the power of their broodmare band, too. Eventually, the plan for the Wests is to sell yearlings commercially, and selling a top colt like Life Is Good, which WinStar and CHC purchased for $525,000 at Keeneland, is good business to that end.

But did the Wests sell or keep a potential Derby winner? Much can happen between now and then, but if Concert Tour and Life Is Good were to meet in the Derby, it would test that question and add some drama to the race for the Wests–not that they need any more drama in Louisville after getting disqualified from first in the Derby with Maximum Security in 2019.

At the moment, Life Is Good, who is out of the Distorted Humor mare Beach Walk, is widely considered the most exciting and talented colt of his class, and that he won the San Felipe by open lengths with a massive 107 Beyer Speed Figure in early March makes him look like a man among boys.

“Based on what I saw today, Life Is Good is by far the best 3-year-old right now,” Gary West told me after the race. “But he will not make an uncontested lead in the Derby. Pace makes the race.”

He's right, of course, because there are questions about the colt's ability to see out 10 furlongs at Churchill Downs, certainly based on the speed he shows early in races. One of the reasons Life Is Good was sold and Concert Tour, who's from the Tapit mare Purse Strings, was retained is that the former is by Into Mischief, a horse who a few years ago was mostly known as the sire of outstanding sprinter/milers, while the latter is by a Kentucky Derby winner.

Perceptions about Into Mischief have changed since Ben Glass sent us an email in late 2016 that said, “Mr. West has put Into Mischief on his list this year [for stallions to use].” The stallion's fee had been rising steadily since it hit a low of $7,500 in 2012, and it was bumped to $75,000 for 2017 from $45,000 the year before. Nevertheless, Into Mischief was represented by only two Grade l winners at that time, Goldencents and Practical Joke. The former had established himself as a premier miler and the latter, from a Distorted Humor mare like Life Is Good, was a 2-year-old of 2016 that had accounted for two Grade l races at 7 furlongs and a mile, the Hopeful and the Champagne, respectively. By the time Life Is Good was foaled in 2018, Practical Joke had reverted to sprinting after a fifth-place finish in the Derby and won the Gl H. Allen Jerkens over seven furlongs, but Audible had won the Gl Florida Derby in early 2018 and would go on to finish third in the Derby, hinting at what Into Mischief could accomplish under the right conditions.

In the August 23, 2019, column “Into Mischief's Changing Profile,” I foreshadowed the arrival of horses like Authentic when I wrote: “With the better mares he's being bred to, it's easy to project that his Grade l output at 1 1/8 miles and up will increase in the coming years. When that happens, his progeny earnings should rise that much more, which means that his rivals on the General Sire list are in for a greater tussle in the ensuing years. The latest chapter of this impressive stallion's book is just being written. Stay tuned.”

To date, Into Mischief is the sire of eight Grade l winners, and he led the General Sire list for the second consecutive year in 2020 with $22,507,940 in progeny earnings, almost $10 million more than runner-up Medaglia d'Oro. The year before, he'd led the list with earnings of $19,179,389, a little more than $3.5 million ahead of Curlin.

The Wests, however, decided to sell Life Is Good in 2019 because he was bred on the same cross as sprinter/miler Practical Joke, but they were only prepared to let him go at their price. They got it–$525,000–from WinStar and CHC, who'd raced Into Mischief's son Audible, and it was a no-brainer for the partners to send him to Baffert after their success with Justify and Baffert's handling of Authentic and the outstanding speed filly Gamine (Into Mischief) last year.

The Figure-8 and Baffert

In Gamine, the $1.8 million Fasig-Tipton Midlantic 2-year-old sales topper in 2019; and Authentic, a $350,000 Keeneland September yearling, Baffert had a bird's-eye view of the best of Into Mischief–and the stallion's limitations and potential as well. Both Gamine and Authentic were fast, but the filly, a champion sprinter, had distance limitations at nine furlongs like many past top Into Mischiefs while the colt proved he could carry his speed 10 furlongs against the best, surprising many in the process.

Both Gamine and Authentic are lighter and more elegant physicals, whereas Life Is Good is a more robust and masculine model. Like the other two, speed is his game, but how far he can carry it remains the question. In his second start, you'll recall, Life Is Good was cruising easily on the lead and building a sizeable margin in the stretch of the Glll Sham S. before Baffert's Medina Spirit (Protonico), a $35,000 OBS July 2-year-old, took a substantial bite out of that lead at the finish.

As Baffert was preparing Life Is Good for the San Felipe, I noticed he'd called an audible for the colt's last work before the San Felipe and fitted him with a Figure-8 noseband, which is used for control and for encouraging proper breathing through the nostrils by keeping the colt's mouth shut. I texted Baffert last Friday, before the San Felipe, inquiring in text-speak: “Noticed you put fig8 on Life Is Good for 2/28 work and have galloped him in it since. Rare for you. Should help his air, right?”

Baffert replied: “Put it on more for control. Slow him down. His air is great.”

The move proved both inspired and effective, because Life Is Good had eight lengths on Medina Spirit at the end of 1 1/16 miles whereas he'd held the same colt to a 3/4-length margin in the Sham at a mile. As Gary West pointed out, however, Life Is Good had it easy on the lead in the San Felipe with Medina Spirit hard held early to give his stablemate breathing room and the others not wanting to tangle early, but that triple-digit Beyer and the manner in which he won, even with the drifting to the middle of the track, was undeniably impressive and a move in the right direction if 10 furlongs is the goal.

Triple-Digit Beyers

The Twitter persona known as @o_crunk–if you're not following him, you should, because he's the master of stats– tweeted after the race that since Jan. 1, 2010, there have been 132 3-year-olds that have earned Beyers of 100 or more from January through April, with Baffert training 32 of them and Todd Pletcher 27 in second place. In a follow-up tweet, @o_crunk put this in context, noting that Baffert and Pletcher also get the most expensive auction purchases to work with, and he included an old blog post titled “The Toddster in context” that backs up this hypothesis with auction numbers.

Note, too, that over the same time span Baffert has trained six of the past 11 champion 3-year-old colts, the cheapest of which was Authentic at $350,000 if you don't count homebred American Pharoah's $300,000 “sale” as a yearling. Justify was a $500,000 yearling, West Coast was a $425,000 yearling, Arrogate cost $560,000 as a yearling, and Lookin At Lucky was a $475,000 2-year-old.

There's a reason why folks pay good money for yearlings and 2-year-olds at auction, and why they send them to Baffert, too.

Sid Fernando is president and CEO of Werk Thoroughbred Consultants, Inc., originator of the Werk Nick Rating and eNicks.

The post Taking Stock: West-Bred Life Is Good and Concert Tour Top Baffert Barn appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

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Preakness Anchors $3.25M Stakes Schedule at Pimlico

The $1-million GI Preakness S. returns to its normal position as the second leg of racing's Triple Crown and is the marquee event of a $3.25-million stakes schedule at Pimlico Race Course this spring.

The Preakness, repositioned as the last of the three Triple Crown events due to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, was won by Swiss Skydiver (Daredevil), who became just the sixth filly in history to win the race. She defeated GI Kentucky Derby winner Authentic (Into Mischief), who would return to win the GI Breeders' Cup Classic en route to champion 3-year-old and Horse of the Year honors.

Each of the 16 black-type races–10 of which carry graded status–takes place over Preakness weekend May 14 and 15. Preakness Day features 10 stakes races, a half-dozen of which are graded, including the $250,000 GII Dinner Party S. (formerly Dixie S.) for older turf males; the $200,000 GIII Chick Lang S. for sophomore sprinters on the main track; the $150,000 GIII Gallorette S. for turf fillies and mares; and the return of the $150,000 GIII Maryland Sprint S. for older male sprinters.

Three-year-olds not quite up to the Preakness have an alternative in the form of the $100,000 Sir Barton S., while turf sophomores are featured in the $100,000 James W. Murphy S. at a grassy mile. The Preakness Day stakes schedule is rounded out by the $100,000 Jim McKay Turf Sprint at five-eighths of a mile; and the $100,000 Skipat S. for sprinting fillies and mares on the main track.

After occupying a spot on the Preakness undercard last fall, the $250,000 GII Black-Eyed Susan S. returns as the highlight of the May 14 program. It is joined by the $250,000 GIII Pimlico Special S. for older handicap males; the $150,000 GIII Miss Preakness S. for 3-year-old filly sprinters; and the $150,000 GIII Allaire du Pont S. The $100,000 Hilltop S. for 3-year-old fillies on the turf; and the $100,000 The Very One S. for distaff turf sprinters round out the Friday card.

Pimlico opens its doors Friday, May 7 and concludes with a special Memorial Day program Monday, May 31.

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