Afleet Alex | Superfectablog v3.0

The Good, The Weird and the Very Ugly

Quality Road breaks his own record

With Santa Anita’s card rained out over the weekend, the 3-year-olds in New York received a bit more of the spotlight than they might have under normal circumstances – and normal circumstances were certainly not the order of the day there, either.

What should have been a reasonably straightforward running [...]

A Janus-Like Weekend

The long holiday weekend we’ve just exited was a case study in the highs and lows of the sport. It’s impossible not to be excited by victories like Zenyatta’s in the Milady or old warhorse Brass Hat’s in the Louisville; however, the sobering accident at Arlington involving Rene Douglas was the flip side of [...]

An Old Fashioned Melody?

The Arkansas Derby is being framed as an opportunity for redemption for Old Fashioned; he’ll be lining up next to Win Willy, the surprise winner of the Rebel and one imagines they’ll be watching for him this time. Perhaps the most interesting pre-race storyline from Team Larry Jones is the jockey switch from Ramon [...]

Derby Favorites

The first Derby horse I have a clear picture of rooting for was Genuine Risk; when she won, I figured this whole picking winners thing was pretty easy. The next horse I recall backing was Slew O’Gold, who finished 4th in 1983. I was back in form with Swale in 1984 (and was [...]

Big Brown’s Farrier Bills Worth The Effort

Although I was duly impressed by Bellamy Road‘s Wood Memorial victory back in 2005, I confess I never got on his bandwagon; I stayed with Afleet Alex, who had been my pick since before the 2004 Juvenile. (For the record, my Derby trifecta that year was Afleet Alex, Flower Alley and Bandini — while I [...]

Lane’s End A Polytrack Showcase?

With a field as wide-open as this weekend’s Lane’s End, it’s hard to feel quite as engaged as usual; it seems to be becoming less of a Derby prep and more of a showcase for Polytrack specialists. Halo Najib seems a deserving favorite, given his success on synthetics, but that makes a wager less [...]

Some Surprising Outcomes

None of the big names seemed to have it in them for the Rebel or the Tampa Bay Derby, but the spectacular non-effort of War Pass suggests this questions: did he pull an Afleet Alex (who was clearly never himself during his last-place finish in the Rebel) or is he becoming something of an awkward [...]

Normal Service Resumes

Apologies for the dearth of posts lately, I’ve been out of town and then very, very busy (and I don’t even get free press passes anymore, so that slows me down). The Eclipse Awards were as you would expect — no real news to report there.

I am very much looking forward to Sweetnorthernsaint’s return [...]

Hard Spun Spin?

By all accounts, Hard Spun looked great in his easy victory, but I am still wary of jumping on (another) two-year-old bandwagon at this point. While he is taking the increasingly-well-trod Smarty Jones path through Arkansas, he has yet to face serious competition of the sort Street Sense demonstrated he is very capable of [...]

Some Good News, Some Not So Good

Apologies for the lack of updates this week; I’m about to start a new job and so it’s been a bit hectic.

I’ve been looking for more details on Afleet Alex’s hernia surgery — it sounds as though all went well, but I am curious to know if this was a known issue or [...]

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