The Racing Biz, LLC, a media company focused on Thoroughbred racing and breeding in the mid-Atlantic region, will host the second in a series of digital panel discussions designed to tackle issues of diversity and inclusion within the Thoroughbred industry on March 17 at 5 p.m. ET.
The series, titled “Truth to Power,” was created by The Racing Biz founder Frank Vespe in partnership with freelance journalist Teresa Genaro and NTRA Director of Communications Alicia Hughes for the purpose of bringing together participants from the racing realm and other sports to share their perspectives on racial, gender, and social inequality within their respective industries and the importance of and efforts to promote greater inclusion.
The upcoming panel is set to feature Renee Hess, founder and executive director of Black Girl Hockey Club (BGHC), a non-profit and advocacy group focused on making hockey more inclusive for the Black community; Ron Mack, founder of Legacy Equine Academy, which promotes the equine and agriculture industry to racially diverse middle and high school students; and Leon Nichols, CEO and founder of the Louisville-based Project to Preserve African American Turf History.
“We are so pleased our first panel attracted an active viewership who contributed questions and comments, and we are very much appreciative of the media coverage that followed,” Vespe, Genaro, and Hughes said jointly. “We look forward to more impactful conversations as the series moves forward.”
The first “Truth to Power” panel took place on February 24 and featured noted bloodstock agent Greg Harbut, his business partner, Lexington-based entrepreneur Ray Daniels, and Rose Grissell, head of Diversity and Inclusion for the British Horseracing Authority. An archive of that panel can be found here.
The March 17 panel will be streamed on both The Racing Biz website and social media platforms @TheRacingBiz as well as on the NTRA's Twitter account @NTRA.
Tentative dates for future panels include April 7 at 5 p.m. ET.
Chantal Sutherland has announced she will return to riding regularly April 1 at Gulfstream Park.
A multiple graded stakes-winning jockey who has ridden more than 1,000 winners, Sutherland will set up business at Gulfstream after spending the winter here galloping horses for trainer Ken McPeek. Sutherland last rode at Turfway Park Dec. 9 after riding at Churchill Downs in November.
Sutherland will be represented by agent John Salamone, who will also book Sutherland mounts for Florida Cup Day March 28 at Tampa Bay Downs.
“I felt like when I got here [this winter] it was like home,” she said. “When I got here, I loved it, and I've had good feedback and vibes from everyone.”
A Sovereign Award winner in her native Canada and a Grade 1 winner on Game On Dude, Sutherland said she's been training for her return and wants to ride as much as possible.
“The combination of boxing, yoga, and meditation has created a great balance of grit and calm that I will leverage to win,” she said in a statement. “The choice to return has been manifesting and growing in my heart over the last year. I want to ride as much as I can before releasing the hold to a sport that is part of me. Someday I will face the expiration date that all jockeys and professional athletes must face, but not yet.”
Sutherland rode at Gulfstream in 2005. In 2016 she returned to Gulfstream to ride Kiss to Remember in the Added Elegance Stakes.
Veteran horseman Johnny Burke claims he's a “small cog” in the grand scheme of the Godolphin operation, but every good engineer knows that every cog in the machine, no matter how small, has to work together in perfect synchronicity to produce the desired outcome.
“I'm part of a big, global team, just trying to get the boss in the winner's circle,” Burke said. “It's me that's having the good fortune to work with these guys, the whole team. Any time we get to be associated with a horse that's winning, we enjoy knowing that we played a part in it.”
One of the top older horses in training to have come through the Godolphin rehab and pre-training barn Burke runs at Keeneland is Mystic Guide, a 4-year-old son of Ghostzapper being aimed at the Dubai World Cup. Mystic Guide won the G2 Jim Dandy Stakes and placed second in the G1 Jockey Club Gold Cup last year, and began his 2021 campaign with a striking win in the G3 Razorback Stakes at Oaklawn Park on Feb. 27.
If he can find success in the UAE, Mystic Guide will be just the second winner Godolphin has sent from North America to the $12 million race, following the success of Street Cry in 2002.
That isn't the only reason the colt's success will have extra meaning for Burke, however. The Irish-born trainer counts himself lucky to have had Mystic Guide's dam in his barn when he first started working for Godolphin, and it would be pretty special to watch her have similar success in the broodmare shed to what she was able to achieve on the racetrack.
“Music Note was one of the charter members here at the Rice Road barn,” said Burke. “She was among the first group of horses I was rehabbing, and she turned out to be one of the better horses in America by the time she retired.”
Music Note, a daughter of A.P. Indy, broke her maiden at Aqueduct in November of her 2-year-old year. She would go on to three Grade 1 races as a 3-year-old, and a further two Grade 1 stakes as a 4-year-old. Music Note also ran third in both the 2008 and 2009 editions of the Breeders' Cup Ladies Classic before retiring to Gainsborough Farm with earnings over $1.6 million.
“I'm so glad for her to show up with this caliber of horse,” Burke said. “We've kind of been waiting on her to produce this kind of horse, so it's great to see her do that. You always want them to take that same performance between the rails and bring it to the paddocks.”
Music Note had found mild success in the breeding shed with her second foal, Ventura Highway (Street Cry), a gelding with no black type but a solid record (12-17-12) over 66 starts to earn $217,925 on the track.
The rest of the millionaire mare's offspring had yet to show the same kind of potential she'd had on the track, but that trend changed when Mystic Guide walked into Burke's barn at Keeneland in 2019.
“Usually the 2-year-olds get dispersed out of Ocala to their assigned trainers after the (Kentucky) Derby,” Burke explained. “Instead, he came from Niall Brennan up to me for a little bit, because he wasn't quite as forward. He was a nice, big, good-looking horse, though, and we just worked him a couple of times over the summer but mostly gave him time to grow.”
Mystic Guide went to trainer Michael Stidham's barn at the Fair Grounds before his first start in February of 2020, and the colt's recent effort in the Razorback has shown once again that Burke still knows a good horse when he sees one.
“For him to run a 108 Beyer off the layoff, that kind of thing always makes you feel good,” Burke said. “We'll be cheering him home in Dubai, for sure.”
Ghostzapper colt Mystic Guide wins the Razorback Handicap by six lengths under Luis Saez
Burke knows good horses, thanks to a lifetime of experience from the ground up.
The son of a steeplechase trainer who served his apprenticeship with the legendary Vincent O'Brien during his pre-Ballydoyle days, Burke has wanted to work with horses for as long as he can remember.
His father insisted Burke finish school, and as soon as he hit graduation Burke began riding out in the mornings. Burke attended the Irish National Stud Course in 1979, and spent a couple years in Australia before traveling to Lexington.
He spent seven years galloping horses and traveling for future Hall of Fame trainer Carl Nafzger, and eventually took out his own trainer's license.
“I didn't have anything else I knew how to do,” Burke said, laughing. “I ended up with one horse (in the beginning), and said, 'I'll keep going as long as I can.' I made a living at it, galloping a lot of my own horses, and rented half a barn at Paris Pike for a while.
“It's a tough business but a satisfying business, running a public stable. I have no qualms about the fact that I tried it; I wasn't going out with sky high ambitions. You know, they gave me a lemon and I tried to make lemonade.”
He trained a couple maiden winners for Godolphin over the course of his career, and in 2006, Burke got a call from Jimmy Bell about the organization's desire to open a year-round operation in a barn on Rice Road at Keeneland.
“It was a great phone call to get,” Burke said. “My days of getting on horses galloping were about over, and I said to myself, 'I'll probably never get a call like this again.'
“I do think mid-range horses teach you more about training than the real good horses, which basically train themselves. Good horses don't grow on trees, though.”
Neither do good employees.
“This business, you gotta have a bit of luck, but you gotta put a bit into it, too,” Burke summarized. “Hard work and reputation will carry you a lot further than anything else in life.”
Trainer Rob Atras didn't blast Ice Cube's “It Was a Good Day” from his office speakers, but it would have been warranted after he saddled four winners at Aqueduct in Ozone Park, N.Y., on Saturday, highlighted by Sadie Lady outlasting Call On Mischief by a head to win the $100,000 Correction in her seasonal debut.
Atras had to wait an additional month for Sadie Lady to make her 5-year-old bow after a stakes race did not fill in February at the Big A. But the New York-bred Freud mare ensured the wait was worth it for her connections, winning for the fifth time in eight starts since turning 4 in 2020.
Sadie Lady earned a career-best 84 Beyer for her first career stakes score, going gate-to-wire at 5-1 under jockey Manny Franco, who earned his third win of the day and kept his charge pressed forward as Call On Mischief linked up with her in the final furlong through a head-bob finish.
“She came out of the race really good,” Atras said. “We were sitting on her for a little while after she won her last race in December. Unfortunately, the New York-bred stakes [Broadway] didn't fill, so we pointed her towards this race and everything worked out. She trained good in the morning and is an aggressive horse and she's battled like that before in races. I was so happy to see her compete like that in the lane.”
A future spot for Sadie Lady, owned by Dennis Narlinger and bred by JMJ Racing Stables, will be determined in the next week, Atras said.
“We're not quite sure just yet. We never looked past this race,” he said. “We wanted to see how she performed and go from there. In the next few days, we'll map out a plan.”
Atras also teamed with jockey Dylan Davis to win with both Saint Selby [$8.90] in the opening race and Heavy Roller [$3.60] in Race 4. Storm Advisory, guided by meet-leading rider Kendrick Carmouche, gave Atras his third win of the day in Race 5 before Sadie Lady's victory in the feature.
“I'm just really grateful,” Atras said. “To do something like that, especially in New York, is special. We've had multi-winner days but nothing ever like that. It's hard to win one race in a day, so to win four, it's a great feeling. To cap it off with a stakes win was extra special.”
Atras, who saddled his first winner in 2009, set a personal-best in 2020 when he won 43 races, posting a 43-39-38 record with 210 starters and earnings of more than $2 million. He's already built on that success, earning his first two career graded stakes wins in 2021 with Chateau and American Power.
“I've always wanted to focus on quality, not just quantity,” Atras said. “Our stable has grown quite a bit, but I think we've upgraded our quality, too, and that's been one of my goals. That's not to say I don't like the $10,000 or $20,000 claimers, but every time I lead a horse over, I like to be a contender. That's the focal point of the operation.”
Atras had updates on those stakes winners, as American Power, the last out-winner of the seven-furlong Grade 3 Toboggan on January 30 at the Big A, breezed four furlongs in 50.44 seconds on Sunday over the Belmont training track.
American Power, owned by Sanford and Irwin Goldfarb and the Estate of Ira Davis, could target either the Grade 1, $300,000 Carter Handicap that will be featured on the Grade 2 Wood Memorial presented by Resorts World Casino card on April 3. Atras also said the starter stakes on Saturday, March 27, at Aqueduct could be a possibility for a less ambitious spot.
After defeating claiming company over a sloppy track at Belmont going one mile in October, American Power registered a 3 ¼-length win in an optional claimer in December at Aqueduct to cap his 5-year-old year. Atras moved him up to graded stakes company for his 6-year-old debut, and he responded by outkicking Pete's Play Call by a half length to win the Toboggan last out over the same one-turn distance as the Carter.
“He worked really good and his last couple of works have been pretty sharp,” Atras said. “It seems like his last few races have been better than the next. I always liked him as soon as I got him. He's always trained well. His confidence is high and he's breaking sharp and rating the race right away. All his races, he's fought all-out. He's just stepped up to the task every time.”
Chateau is another stakes-winning sprinter who found success at Aqueduct, wiring the field in a 3 1/2-length victory in the Grade 3 Tom Fool Handicap on March 6 that netted the 6-year-old his first triple-digit speed figure, garnering a clean 100 one start after earning a 96 for his front-running win against optional claimers on January 18 over the same track.
Overall, Chateau has won five of his seven career starts at Aqueduct, logging a 5-2-2 mark in nine career starts in Ozone Park. His last 18 starts have been at six furlongs or less, though Atras said his success at Aqueduct could tempt him to stretch him out in the Carter. It would be Chateau's longest race since running fifth in a one-mile maiden claimer in September 2018.
“He came out of the race really good, and I was very pleased, especially after a top effort like that,” Atras said. “We're kicking around the idea of starting in the Carter. His record is really good at Aqueduct, so he likes that track and we're considering it, even though the distance might not be to his liking. But we're considering it.”
