The Wire
Aggregating horse racing commentary since 2008
Looking for picks, previews, tips & touts? Try Tout Wire!
Looking for picks, previews, tips & touts? Try Tout Wire!
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charmaine’s mia confounds the cognoscenti at the sales to become a graded stakes winner
Not many daughters of the faintly remembered stallion Chati (by Terrible Tiger, by Amerigo, by Nearco) ever found themselves in …Continue reading →...
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The Friday Show Presented By PHBA Stallion Seasons Auction: The Optimists Club
For the last three years as the calendar pages turned from December to January, the Paulick Report took the pulse of its readers, asking how they felt about the future health of the Thoroughbred industry: Were they optimistic or pessimistic? In January 2019, 43% expressed optimism. In January 2020, that...
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Campbell: New Mexico Racing Is At A Critical Crossroads In The Face Of Another COVID-19 Shutdown
The author submitted the following open letter to the New Mexico Racing Commission to be read at its regularly-scheduled meeting on Jan. 14. The letter originally appeared on HorseRacing.net and is reprinted here with permission. Since early last year, New Mexico has by order of Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham, closed...
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Taking Stock: The Widener Influence in Capo Kane
Two years ago at Keeneland January, a short yearling colt by Street Sense from Twirl Me, by Hard Spun, exchanged hands for $35,000. He’d been sold in-utero by Godolphin for $30,000 at Keeneland November in 2017 and was foaled the following year in Bakersfield, California, at Jason Tackitt’s Rising Star...
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Driving Jonathan Sheppard
It was 2008. Jonathan Sheppard was in yet another chapter of his storied career and The Blood-Horse magazine wanted a feature story. Steeplechase Times still existed, and I still wrote freelance articles for other racing publications....
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Making Claims: Joe Nevills’ Five Fearless Predictions For The Bloodstock Market In 2021
In “Making Claims,” Paulick Report bloodstock editor Joe Nevills shares his opinions on the Thoroughbred industry from the breeding and sales arenas to the racing world and beyond. Making predictions at the beginning of 2020 meant starting with certainty and taking a wild detour after COVID-19 changed the world. Assuming...
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WORLD-CLASS HORSE RACES TO LOOK FORWARD TO IN WINTER 2021
Throughout 2020, horse racing around the globe was, for the most part, able to operate without fans in attendance. The same is true so far in 2021. For example, although British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has locked down the nation until at least mid-February due to a spike in coronavirus...
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KEEP: A Legislative Fix For HHR Is About Keeping The Status Quo, Not Expanding Gaming
The Kentucky Equine Education Project (KEEP), Kentucky's equine economic advocate, released the following statement on the importance of legislation to maintain historical horse racing in Kentucky on Tuesday: Kentucky's signature equine industry has a simple request for state legislators in 2021: maintain the status quo and protect local jobs and...
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life is good echoes the promise of the new year
The name of the winner of the 2021 Sham Stakes might as well be the year’s motto: Life is Good. …Continue reading →...
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January News: On This Race Day in 1852; and Remembering Louisiana Champion Lecomte
On this day in New Orleans in January 1852, racing was cancelled on account of—snow? Mild winters in New Orleans mean that few days, if any, fall below freezing in a given winter, thus snowfall is a rarity. While nineteenth-century race days were often rescheduled due to rainfall and the...
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charlatan and the chestnut tide are rising
Chestnut coats are not the most common color in the Thoroughbred. Bay, and then dark bay or brown, far outnumber the red-headed wunderkind of the breed, and yet for some reason, there are a considerable number of very high-class racers who are chestnuts. Man o’ War, as well as Triple...
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Leading North American Breeders For 2020: A Different Take
Last week, The Jockey Club released its list of leading North American Thoroughbred breeders for 2020, proclaiming Calumet Farm as the top breeder for the second year in a row. Sure enough, the historic Lexington, Ky., farm owned since 2012 by reclusive billionaire Brad Kelley was atop the list of...
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Strides by IV Hendrix: Harrods Creek takes to the hills
Eighteen and a half couple, voices in full cry. Foxhunter math for 37 hounds galloping in pursuit of their fox....
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OVERLOOKED ATHLETES TURN INTO STARS
When quarterbacks Josh Allen of the Buffalo Bills and Baker Mayfield of the Cleveland Browns led their teams to places in the 2020/2021 National Football League playoffs, it reminded me again about how exceptional athletes, human or equine, are often overlooked early-on by talent evaluators with a reputation for expertise....
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1,000-mile Challenge
Every year the goal stays the same. Get in better shape, put in 100 miles a month and make it 1,200 (or more) for the year....
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Cool Songs 2020
The website title says horse racing so you should expect some horse racing in this spot. This is not it. OK, here’s a little . . . the Eclipse Awards voting choices for 2020 were difficult, maddening and kind of weak at the same time. Here’s to better stuff in...
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Looking ahead to the New Year
Happy New Year to anyone reading this. I’m not a big new years resolution person in general. Mostly cause I probably never really hit them when I set them. But I do believe in manifesting things in my life so I may as well put some things down on internet...
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New Year's Resolutions
Happy New Year’s. By the Numbers. A personal By the Numbers....
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Fletcher Jones’s Unusual Racing Legacy
Warmed by the fireplace, or perhaps by sipping yet another glass of a Santa Ynez vineyard’s rich and full-bodied red, I was contemplating the new year and how it needs to be better than the fiasco that was 2020. The wine, by the way, was issued by a label called...
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TIHR Top Stories of 2020
What more needs to be said or written about 2020? A year that we can’t wait to move past certainly produced its share of things we’ll never forget....
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Why Do Rebates Work?
I remember back in my mid-twenties, an associate and I had a good idea (well, more accurately we thought it was a good idea) during the dot com phase. We brought this amazing idea to a finance person at a brokerage where we learned pretty quickly we lacked a big,...
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A YEAR OF DISRUPTION
Like most enterprises in 2020, horse racing was severely disrupted as the result of Covid-19, which begin to drastically affect the United States in March. But not all of the disruptions were caused by the pandemic. Covid-Related Disruptions The racing calendar was radically altered when the Kentucky Derby was moved...
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racing offers some rays of joy and optimism after a year of trials
The holiday season is a time of hope, and this year is especially so, as governments and people around the …Continue reading →...
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December 25, 2020
From as many of the horses on the main farm as I could get into it, here’s video greeting card withing you a happy holiday season. Here are a few of those who participated. Nicanor Amazombie new resident Tom’s Ready … Continue reading →...
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RACING TRADITION AT THE REAL DOWNTON ABBEY
This week I received an email from Highclere Thoroughbred Racing suggesting that participating in one of its partnerships would be a “perfect Christmas present.” Highclere Castle, the namesake of Highclere Thoroughbred Racing and Highclere Stud, is the site of the fictitious Downton Abbey, the immensely popular British historical drama series...