Deep Ocean wins one

Trainer Gina Rarick on Deep Ocean,
Maisons-Laffitte, December 22, 2011

I nearly opened a bottle of champagne to celebrate, but, since I am alone, I decided to opt for Hard Way's nutritional supplement of choice, a Guinness in honor of the son of Sinndar, Deep Ocean's victory today at Lyon Carré de Soie in the 8th, the Prix Président Buffaud. And not just any victory: a victory by four lengths.

If you're going to win, you might as well do it in style. 

Deep's usual jockey Gérald Pardon was on board and stayed warm and safe just behind the front runners until the final turn, when he asked Deep to step on the gas on the outside, and Deep made it look like a romp in the park, accelerating easily and overtaking, little by little, everyone in front of him, like a stealth bomber, until there was no one between him and Gérald and the post and room for three good-sized horses between him and everyone else. 

He looked like Usain Bolt in the last few meters, and if he were a man and not a horse, I swear he'd have looked over his shoulder and pumped his fist on his well-muscled chest as he loped over the finish line. 

It was Deep's day, and whether Paris-Turf keeps up with all the horses or just the several solid favorites, we in and around trainer Gina Rarick's yard at Maisons-Laffitte knew that it was but a matter of time before the four-legged and feisty ATM carried the day and brought home the biggest check. 

Let's take a look, though, at Paris-Turf's prognostics. 

In a field of 15 runners, 7 were given favorite. In order of finish, they were: Caroz, trained by Jean-Pierre Gauvin; Le Falgoux by Cédric Boutin; El Mulino by Thierry Larrivière; Successful by Bernard Goudot; the venerable El Vettorio, a 9-year-old German gelding trained by Cédric Boutin; the nearly as venerable L'Impressioniste, both in terms of age and prize money won, by Fabrice Chappet; and the equally venerable Théorique by Mathieu Boutin.

And, what did Paris-Turf have to say, quite precisely? I translate:

Caroz has had a chance to rest up since his last race and seems capable of fighting for the victory. Le Falgoux, who's back on a race track on which he has never disappointed, the regular El Mulino, and and Successful, capable of good things on his best days, can get in his way, barring his success. The eldest, El Vettorio, L'Impressioniste and Théorique, also deserve credit. Blamar and Poletto are not to be neglected.

And Deep Ocean? Where is Deep in all this? 

Deep, as it concerns him, was mentioned as a "regular chance". He and I snort in their general direction because Deep, as it concerns him, did indeed leave them all in his dust.

And, Paris-Turf, what did they have to say about this, once everyone had a chance to taste Deep's dust? 

For Caroz, favorite for the win, and who didn't class: "Among the front runners until just after the last turn, conceded midway up the homestretch and was clearly dominated."

Le Falgoux, in 9th place: "After waiting in the middle of the pack, didn't finish badly on the inside, just behind the leaders."

El Mulino, who did not class: "Front runner after the first turn, maintained his lead until the last 400 meters and then fell back."

And, Successful? He finished 2nd: "After waiting in the middle of the pack, on the rail, had some difficulty breaking out in the homestretch, and then finished fast, but well behind the winner Deep Ocean."

As for El Vettorio, L'Impressioniste and Théorique, they finished 3rd, 8th and 6th, respectively.

Reserved for Deep, the winner: "Coming up on the outside line, in Livia Noire's wake, took the lead just coming into the homestretch and flew to the post, winning brilliantly."

Deep Ocean and jockey Gérard Pardon pass the post

So, do not, I say, forget this fils de Sinndar, Sinndar, qui, portant les couleurs de l'Aga Khan, a été vainquer de l'Arc de Triomphe 2000, beating the favorite Montjeu and denying him his chance at back-to-back Arc victories. 

My partner in Elbow Beach, for her time racing with us in France, pointed out that Sinndar is racing under the number 5 in the Arc, like Deep Ocean and three other of the horses who won in the nine races yesterday at Lyon Carré de Soie.

I can recognize that there are many horses out there racing, many horses with excellent papers, some who have exploded onto the scene, others who have more quietly taken their place, racking up the places without lighting up the boards with victories like so many diamonds in a rivière, who have, nonetheless been oh so thoughtfully paying their bills and making a little extra to slip under the straw bedding, but, now, Paris-Turf, and everyone else, take notice: Deep Ocean, on the right track -- ideally, right-handed --, in good form (which he is, make no mistake, trained by Gina Rarick) and ridden by Gérald Pardon is no "regular chance"; he is a favorite.

Still, this is a horse who, at 5  years old and in 2 years and a month or two, has run 20 races, won 3 and placed in 10, which means he has won or placed in 13 of 20 starts for a 15% win percentage, 50% place and has a 65% chance overall to bring home his oats, straw and trainer's fees.

Enjoy his dust. 

In the story of thoroughbred racing, it's royal dust. Pure gold.

....

Ghost mist

Mist moving across the field

I suspected only afterwards that it might be dust from the tractor I could hear somewhere out of camera range, but I don't think so. It was too white, too light, and it had that particular ghost-like quality, spiraling up from the field in columns of vapor as it drifted, rapidly, from east to west below my balcony and terraces.

It is all gone now, at 11:30 am. The sun is warm enough to have burned it all off, the trees screening the Seine from view have reappeared, and I am going to see if the cold snap in January killed my motorcycle battery or not.

Wish me luck.
....

Morning mist

Bareness in the morning mist

Pleinchamps.com says that it is 9° with 81% humidity this morning in our department. I don't think, however, that they are using our neighborhood as the reference point. I stepped out the door this morning to take the photo, and I saw the mist swirling in front of my eyes, like the finest rain. It was probably moving down toward the ground, but I can't be certain.

There is also a field backed by a line of trees out past the ones you can distinguish in my photo. I know they are there because they were yesterday. And all the days before. And, it was quiet last night. No one came and bulldozed them into the general whiteness that contrasts so strongly with the bright sunshine of only two days ago.

The birds are quiet, too, concentrated on building their nests with whatever is lying about. I am hoping the new, bright blue tarp on the lovelier named petite maison than it is in reality, protecting the walls and furniture from the rain that collects in the soggy, ruined roof, won't catch their eye like the old green one did. I thought it was just the combined elements of rain, wind and sunshine that destroyed it, until I found so many birds' nests made of it as I pruned last year. It was ideal camouflage for them, up in their trees and shrubs. Bright blue, let us hope, might be a recognizable thing to avoid in their nest building habits.

Although, I have found red thread, or string, in another's moss nest. Christmas decorations, no doubt.

The narcissus is nearly in bloom over in its corner, seen through the swirling fine mist. I cut down the largest branches of a small tree, shrubby sort of thing just beyond it that produces lovely flowers in May, leaving the stump in place. Partly because it is hard to remove. Partly because I am sort of hoping a reasonably sized bush will develop and offer us its flowers again.

Today, though, I am heading off to take a horse to the farm where she will continue the convalescence of a foot bone she broke, kicking her wall after a good exercise session and a vigorous roll, some ten weeks ago,  so she can get back to the business of training and racing. For now, she is frisky, having spent all that time shut up in her box, with a special shoe to protect her healing bone. I am looking forward to stopping by the yard, even for a few minutes; the garden and guilt from the lack of accomplissement of my various home renovation duties have kept me away from the people, the horses, and -- while I can still say it -- my Elbow Beach, or half of her, anyway.
....

The Collared Doves favorite trees,
a Tulip tree for sitting and Bay Laurel for nesting

First frog, and a foal for Zenyatta

First frog of the spring

The sun lit the slats in the metal shutters of my bedroom window with the brightness and intensity that announces a beautiful morning, encouragement to get out of bed, in spite of the aches and the pains from yesterday's labors in the garden. It has been 3 years since the last time I pruned the linden trees down to the ham-fisted main branches, and so it was time to do them again, lest the linden trees overtake us and leave us in the dark. I did one in the morning, and the other in the afternoon, going up and down my wooden ladder and wielding a 3-ton 45-inch chainsaw at arm's length.

I now have two very large stacks of 3 to 4 meter long branches of which to dispose, and I need to find someone who can come and feed them into a wood chipper for a modest fee.

Come summer, there will be a whole new crop of wand-like branches growing from the bumps at the end of each solid branch, sending forth a dense canopy of large leaves.

Taking note of my bruised state, little didn't hurt, I rolled gingerly out of bed and made my way, stiffly, to the coffee machine, but the lure of the warm March sunshine was too strong, and I got the fish food instead and headed out to feed the fish and see how nature had been faring since my first exploration and photography session earlier this week, after I had lifted finally the soggy mat of linden leaves off the planting beds, prying them gently from the fresh green spears of the new tulip and hyacinth leaves to expose everything that the warming soil was sending up for another round of the eternal display of nature's simple glory. 

These are the days when you can feel the activity in the soil and the leaves, the energy unfurling progressively more vegetable matter, the chloroform machine working at full tilt, catching the sun's rays and radiating the purest, most joyful green from the effort. I hum right along with the plants and the blades of grass of my garden and all of nature beyond; I began my day brimming with energy and enthusiasm. 

I bent down and called the fish over for breakfast, waiting for the one large female I know is principally responsible for the healthy growth in population since the devastation wreaked by some cracks in the converted fountain's low walls and a sudden, terrible freeze one January, when the water level was too low killed dozens of fish, leaving 4 miraculous survivors. 

She eats first, and she and everyone else know it. She swims right up to my outstretched pinched thumb and forefinger, a koi stick presented to her, and we struggle to get it in her puckering mouth. Some mornings we get it on the first try;  other times, she's either too hungry or too overexcited to get it on anything like the first try, and we nearly give up, but that would be sending a poor message, and so I never admit defeat. She will get it or no one will eat, which is out of the question. 

This morning she was a little late arriving, and my attention drifted off to the others, swimming about in front of me, others heading across from under the old stone sink where they have their hide-away, and which has served as the favorite spot for the frogs, who have come to make the fountain-turned-fish pond their home. She caught me by surprise, suddenly there in front of me when I lowered my gaze again, and ate her koi stick on the third try. I turned the container, sprinkled a generous serving for everyone else, and watched it float out from the center. I love the "fish pond". 

Yesterday, a neighbor's little girls discovered it; I told them there were frogs, too, but they were still asleep, down in the sediment from the decomposed leaves that fall into it and the aquatic plants. They asked when the frogs would wake up, and I said soon. Perhaps in a couple more weeks of this warm early spring sun. They are not like the other neighbor's children, little boys, who run around the fountain and stick their arms in, pulling on the plants. They nodded and returned to watching the fish swim about, and I had a feeling that soon was maybe sooner than I had said; it was the right weather for the frogs to wake up.

Squatting next to the fish breakfast party, I saw movement over near the mossy edge of the stone sink. It didn't move like a fish; the plant leaves disappeared below the water and surfaced again along with the head and large, globular eyes of the first frog of the spring. As if the day did not promise enough wonderful things, with the aubrietta in flower on the tall wall behind the gazebo, the transcandentia sending up its first purple-edge leaf swords, and both the biathlon and the nordic-combined world championships on television, the frogs had woken up.

I said hello, quietly, and asked it please not to move while I went for my camera. They take fright easily, some eventually learning to relax around us, others never failing to dive into the water directly I or anyone passes by them. He, or she, granted my wish, for a moment. In another second, he had ducked back into his watery place to hide, and I went off to see what was sprouting in the garden.

Now, it was time for my coffee and my morning email, Twitter and Facebook correspondence, and to upload my photos and consider a blog post. My old laptop takes its sweet time to boot, time to check the day's events on Eurosport, and when the first Tweets scrolled past, there was news of Zenyatta. She had given birth! A dark-bay colt, the spitting image of his lovely mother. 

As if the day needed another miracle to remind me of how beautiful life is. Sweet, intelligent and wondrously gifted and large-spirited Zenyatta, The Queen, had given birth to her foal with Bernardini, just hours ahead of her due date, under a full Kentucky moon, and her fans were rejoicing a new hope, another racing phenomenon to love and admire and cheer on, born of the intermingling of proud parents' proven genes. 

For now, it was quiet in her box, a mother kissing her long-legged, gangly, adorable newborn child, full of the promise of his family history, everyone who loves and cares for her daily at Lane's End Farm nearby to witness another legend opening its next chapter, and the season of foaling beginning with the greening and unfurling of the grasses.

....

http://www.zenyatta.com/diary/diary-post-454

For Surrey Storm, the handicap might be her size

Surrey Storm's lovely backside, Cagnes

She's a lovely 3-year-old with papers to make one dream, justifiably, but she's small, and that changes how you have to pilot her through the field.

I haven't been following this closely enough long enough to know just how much this is going to figure in the trajectory of her racing career, but it doesn't seem to be irrelevant. On the other hand, I have been following this just closely enough long enough to realize that first impressions have to be analyzed and parsed far more minutely for the information that really matters.

You didn't win, and you didn't place, well, it feels like a loss, even if you weren't the very last one past the post. You placed when you really thought you had a chance to win, and it feels the same way. You placed, but less well than you expected, yeah, the same. It's a horse race. It wouldn't be a race if the outcome were certain before the gate opened, otherwise, you could all just save everyone a lot of time and travel and just stay home, have the check deposited into your account with France Galop. In a race, things happen; what's important is what happened, and how that compares to the past and your expectations, and how you will develop the game-plan to get everything possible out of the horse.

Today, Milly, the yard name for Montjeu filly Surrey Storm, ran against some horses she has met on the racetrack here in France before, and she met some new ones. She did not better her performance against her old friends, Coolita and Tangoka; but, on the bright side, neither set the track on fire, either. Coolita finished some two lengths ahead of Milly and one out in front of Tangoka, but three and change behind the winner, Joly Berengere with Ioritz Mendizabal up for trainer Maxime Cesandri. By no means shaming to Milly.

Incidentally, it was Joly Berengere who delayed the course by several minutes when she broke from her stall before the gates opened, following the track employee who ducked away before the start. Cesandri's explanation of his filly's behavior was amusing: it's a bit of a family trait, not "méchant", or "bad", just a little, he shrugged, "bébête, "silly".

So what happened in this race? What does it signify for the next decisions to be made in training and in racing for the sometimes Fleet Fairy? Not having it from the proverbial horse's mouth, I can only hazard my own semi-educated guesses, but I'll take a stab.

I watched the video, stopping it and moving it backwards periodically to look at details again to try to get a sense of what was happening throughout the race. One drawback with camera angles is their tendency to flatten depth of field at critical moments; it's very difficult to judge distances and see the details, since un cheval en cache un autre, rather like, we are warned at train crossings here in France, trains; one horse hides another and her jockey. It's clear enough from the grandstand to the backstretch, and then when they switch cameras to a side or slightly to the rear angle in a turn, and once again when they are closing on the post, but a lot can get lost in that analysis.

Breaking from the gate, Milly ran easily enough with a nice action, overtaking several horses. Jockey Fabien Lefevbre settled her in behind the front runner and favorite, Zoe, flanked by Shiny Dream on the inside, with Distant Symphony a nose ahead on her outside in 3rd, followed right behind by Aponi in 5th. Coming out of the first turn, she's still in 4th place running alongside Distant Symphony, in "good position", as the announcer says, and a half length in front of Aponi.

The announcer remarks on the relatively easy-going pace of the race with Coolita showing a "brilliant" early effort, and Lady Ohara sitting patient on the outside at the rear of the pack. Joly Berengere begins to make her bid, overtaking Coolita and coming up on Zoe, who is still out in front, followed by Aponi in her wake. Right behind Joly Berengere is Distant Symphony, followed by Milly.

Just before the middle of the race, though, things begin to change, right about the moment that Fabien Lefebvre turns around in the saddle to look over his right shoulder at the horses behind him. There appears to be a jockeying for position. Held against the rail, it looks like Fabien is looking to see if he can move toward the outside without interfering with the horses just behind him and on the outside. It looks like there's a little contact and shuffling with Distant Symphony, whose jockey is looking for a way out, as well. Finally, he holds his place, and Milly drops back to the 8th or the 9th position, tight against the rail, where she stays, unfortunately, out maneuvered by the horses and their jockeys on the outside.

Where, in fact, she is pinned, until it's a moot point, but I am getting ahead of myself.

Coming into the backstretch, it's still Zoe in the lead by two lengths ahead of Coolita followed by Joly Berengere with Shiny Dream on her inside, followed closely by Aponi and Lady Ohara on her outside and Distant Symphony a half length behind. Then come La Jeremiah with Milly on her inside another length back, with Tangoka putting the pressure on them a half length behind.

The field is stretching out, and when the pace picks up 350 meters from the finish line, it's Coolita who makes a bid to outrun Zoe, with Joly Berengere and Lady Ohara on the far outside coming on strong. With 200 meters to go, it's three battling for the lead: Zoe, Coolita and Joly Berengere, followed tightly by Distant Symphony on the inside, Aponi in the middle and Lady Ohara coming up fast on the outside. Milly's still there, just behind Aponi.

Coming down to the post, the leaders continue their drive to the finish and gain ground on the rest of the entries. Milly loses some to Tangoka and Distant Symphony, some five lengths behind Zoe out in front, and then Fabien raises the whip twice as Joly Berengere takes the lead, followed by Lady Ohara on the outside, a nose ahead of Zoe on the inside, Aponi's a half length back, followed by another two lengths by Coolita a length ahead of Shiny Dream on the inside and Tangoka on the outside, just ahead of Milly, Surrey Storm in 8th place. She holds her pace, continues to stretch, and while she didn't overtake any horses, she wasn't passed, either. She simply didn't have it to pose a serious threat to the five crossing the finish line first, while Tangoka still looked to be within her reach. The question is why, because she wasn't exhausted.

The draw of the second position from the rail might have played into it, but she drew the number 1 spot last start and finished fifth, but it was with a smaller, more stretched-out field, in a race in which she was never seriously blocked against the rail and could have made a move to the outside at almost any moment, and did when the hole presented itself in the homestretch. It was an entirely different geometry. The only serious possibility of attack in this race came from the outside, as Lady Ohara demonstrated, and Milly couldn't get there.

The surface might have played a role, as well. Her last race was on the fibersand, whereas today was on a turf track judged soft by France Galop, and, then, there was the distance at 200 meters longer.

And, finally, or perhaps not finally -- I might have missed some things --, weight could be a factor. Little Milly carried an additional kg, equivalent to one place, over the distance, moving up from 56kg to 57kg, the weight most of the entrants was carrying. Only Aponi and Zoe were carrying less, at 54.5kg and 53.5kg, respectively.

The good points to take away were that she didn't give up, she held her own in the final stretch, and she was in the race, and Milly's 3-year-old season is young. She might suddenly become a big, strong filly, but she'll get stronger and she'll draw luckier places in the larger fields, and with each race, her trainer Gina Rarick will know better what to ask of her, and of her jockey, given the way the dice have fallen on race day.

Being the Fleet Fairy that she is, Surrey Storm requires a smaller hole to thread than a larger horse, and can perhaps do it more quickly, even she doesn't get "shuffled back" first.
....

Maybe Milly today: Surrey Storm races in Fontainebleau

Surrey Storm, "Milly", leaving Cagnes, February 17

This afternoon, the Fleet Fairy, Montjeu filly little Milly, or Surrey Storm as she's known on the racetrack, gets another start.

She'll be wearing the number 4 and has drawn the second place off the rail in the Prix de Samoreau, the 5th race at Fontainebleau, a 2200 meter race for 3-year-old fillies who have never won. Like like the last time she raced, three weeks ago in Cagnes-sur-Mer in the Prix des Glycines, jockey Fabien Lefebvre will be up. She'll be facing Night Tango filly Tangoka by trainer Mathieu Boutin, who passed the post just nostril hairs ahead of her in their last race, and One Cool Cat filly Coolita, who finished ahead of her in the sixth spot in her previous start, the February 8 Prix du Bord de Mer. Neither of these fillies' papers can hold a candle to Milly's, with all her promise as a racehorse.

Then again, not many thoroughbred horses' can.

Milly's last start was a breakthrough for this dainty little girl, the beginning of the Surrey Storm that's been expected to break over a racetrack. Coming out of the last turn and onto the homestretch, Fabien asked her to decide to race, and she did. She returned to her home, trainer Gina Rarick's yard in Maisons-Laffitte, two days after that race, and this time she had a luxury spot on the STH transport truck and received the consideration of not being unloaded last of all.

Right now, she is walking, warming up for post time in less than an hour. She knows why she's in Fontainebleau, and she understands what the other horses walking around and around the warm-up ring are there to do, too.

As for Fabien, his dance card is nearly as full as Ioritz Mendizabal's, racing in 5 of the 8 races. Mendizabal will be up in the 5th, as well, on Policy Maker filly Joly Berengere, who finished fifth and third in her first two races in Lyon in 2011, but finished "non classée" in Cagnes in January.

As for I, I will neither be taking nor making any phone calls from here until the race is over. I plan on rooting loudly for our Fleet Fairy from in front of the television.

As one of her owner's would say, Inshallah.
....

The STH transport to Maisons-Laffitte leaves with Milly

The decision: Elbow Beach stays to race in France

Elbow Beach finishes 4th at Cagnes-sur-Mer

Elbow Beach was one of three horses trainer Gina Rarick had entered in Cagnes-sur-Mer that Saturday, February 18, and the best hope for a win. Her other owner, Kay Minton, and I were anticipating champagne flowing in Nice that evening, and why not? With Fabien Lefebvre, who knew her as well now as Gina's training jockey, Agata Tubielewicz, back in Maisons-Laffitte, and who had as much confidence in her speed and promise to take a race, up, it seemed like we had every chance to cross the post no worse than second.

We were a nice-sized party to cheer her on: three owners, me, Kay and Mark, with his wife, Cynthia, and a friend, and I had piqued the interest of the interior decorative painter, with whom I had the pleasure to talk on the train from Paris the day before, in racing, and he brought his young daughter for her first thoroughbred horse race. They arrived just in time to meet us coming out of the presentation ring, as Fabien rode Elbow off to the track, hoping not to be tossed onto the sand on his cul like Frédéric Spanu in the last time out. But hindsight is forewarning, and Fabien knew to anticipate what she might have reserved for him. The rest of us trooped up to the owners' and trainers' deck to watch the race.

The gate opened and six horses surged forward; everyone had a 5 in 6 chance of taking a check. All that remained to be seen was who didn't and how much each of the other horses took home.

Fabien settled her behind the front runner, Athaar from Rouget and the number 2 horse, favorite Nina Candela by Gentile, and rode the pace to the final turn into the homestretch, where Athaar would drop from sight into 6th position and Nina Candela would stretch into first place, followed by Lady Ana, Maria Christa, ridden by Ioritz Mendizabal -- who had just returned from a victory at Meydan in Dubai the day before, winning the S.O.G. Handicap on 2010 Prix Villapadierna - Derby Espagnol winner Platagenet in a phenomenal finish in front of front-runner Alhaain --, and Elbow Beach.

Manuka and jockey Thierry Thulliez flirted briefly with taking fourth from Elbow, but she wasn't having any of it. She also wasn't seriously interested in making a similar bid for third.

This second time past a French post was less glorious than in our hopes and the weather and view of the Mediterranean and sail boats out past the backstretch, but there were factors to take into consideration. First, there was the quality of the turf, which was poor, rutted and dry. Second, there was the distance, which was probably 100 meters too long at 1400 meters, particularly on that terrain. We sighed, took solace in the second to last check, which would pay her training fees, oats and straw for a few more weeks, and turned our attention to watching Strictly Rhythm and Deep Ocean run. In the end, Elbow proved herself to be the best hope of the day, although at 4th place, it would have been nice to see her more seriously challenged by her yardmates.




Then, there was the argument to make to Elbow Beach's owner in England, an argumentative essay entitled "Why Elbow Beach should stay to race in France". A victory was what he wanted, at least one victory before she was to be covered and begin her career as a broodmare, and we saw the logic in keeping Elbow here to do it. We weren't far, which was a lot to say considering that this was only her second race in the 4 months since her last race in England, October 10, 2011, and since she had gone out of race training. It was premature to expect her to win in maiden races in her current form. She needed time to eat well, train well and rest well, and she needed the experience she was getting. She did not so much need, perhaps, another trip back to England via Maisons-Laffitte to digest in the middle of that preparation and racing.

For now, she'd at least have another chance in France in Deauville on Friday, March 2, with the caveat that it was a little soon, but the entry was too good to pass up. I sighed my disappointment; I'd known she'd run while I was skiing, but I would not cut my yearly and dearly anticipated ski trip with my son to Argentière short to return for it. I'd receive the news on the slopes of Les Grands Montets. The start time was 15h55 in the 5th, the Prix de Saint-Valéry with a starting field of 9 horses. By Gina's figuring, it was a field of four, including Elbow Beach, Perle Rose, Caracesca and Mephala, but by the horses' and their jockeys', Elbow was not included in that select company, and neither was Caracesca.

My cell phone rang at the bottom of a steep bowl of moguls the size of the ponies that lead the thoroughbreds to the gate in the States, and I struggled to yank off my glove, pull it from my pocket and hit the right area of the touchscreen to reply before she hung up; time is very limited in the moments after a race. I had just survived a near disaster with the help of a calm and collected stranger and had witnessed an avalanche on the face of the rock slope below les Becs Rouges across the Argentière glacier from the hors-piste near the black run, Pointe de Vue, and I was hoping all this excitement was portent for more. Elbow was running while some of this was going on, and had had her best chance of a victory yet this year. Perhaps, at worst, a second or third place; it was not unreasonable to hope, but, as Gina herself said, without the unexpected, it was not a race. I caught my breath and held it.

"Yes, Gina?"

"It was a disappointing fith. I've got to run to meet them."

"OK, thanks. We'll talk later. Go."

I let it out, and nodded to Sam.

"Fifth. Gina will fill me in later."

I am becoming a specialist in the finer points of interpretation of finish order, however, and I have learned that sometimes, perversely, or conversely to the laws of Good Sense, a fifth is better than a fourth. If there were such a time, and there is, this was one.

This time out, she was up against some stiff competition again, and her fifth place finish was by a nose only two lengths behind the winner, Perle Rose (poetic justice; I got to write that sentence), and Caracesca, ridden by Ioritz Mendizabal, did not take home a check, crossing the finish line just after Elbow. According to Gina's predictions, Mephala was in there with a third place finish, but Jabberwocky was in there, too, handing a second place check to her owner, and Miss Oury, at 43/1, had slipped in for the fourth, just nostrils ahead of Elbow's fifth with her far better 8.3/1 odds.

It was a race, and Elbow had gained ground, not lost it. The numbers don't tell all, or not certain numbers.

I was not privy to all the discussion, but the decision came, and it aligned with my way of seeing things: Elbow Beach needs a win, and, at this point, her best chance of getting it is here in France. Right now, Elbow will get a chance to catch her breath, continue her work and race again toward the end of March or early April, and I will not be anywhere but at the racecourse this time out.
....

Elbow at Cagnes, that's my baby

Disasters, averted and natural

le Mont-Blanc, from our room this morning

Sam turned and looked out from under his covers and saw this. Right on schedule, the clouds had made their appearance again in the valley of Chamonix Mont-Blanc. He turned back on his other side and fell back into a lightly sonorous sleep.

It was our last day. I'd walked the dogs and made my coffee, and we had a choice to make: head up and ski what was left of the day at 10:30 am, head up and ski four hours, or not ski. That, we said, during a moment when Sam was awake and eating the pain au raisin I'd brought back from the boulangerie, with the baguette "origine" he voted Argentières best this year for his sandwiches, would depend on whether the clouds continued to gather or not.

We'd had eight days of sublime weather and skiing, and to be very honest, we were both incredibly spoiled and pretty much satisfied; if it were going to be a very low visibility day, we'd as soon skip it. Finally, we'd go up for the last four hours of the day, and by the time we headed out of the hotel at noon, the sun was bright again in the sky, with a decent visibility up on the slopes of Les Grands Montets.

"See, Mom? We made the right choice."

I nodded and we headed down the road that threads the valley, from Les Houches at one end to le Tour at the other, dominated entirely by the monumental panorama of the Mont-Blanc heading down toward the parking lot at Les Grands Montets. That is another slight pomme de discorde between Sam and I: he insists on driving over, when we could walk it with our skis in 10 minutes, maximum. I know. I did it the first day, when we arrived, and I realized that I had forgotten my gloves.

Our first clue that our plan for the day was about to change significantly was the first sight of the enlarged parking area; every space, right down to the newest ones the length of the village from the chairlift and gondola up, was taken. The license plates told of day skiers from Lyon, Geneva and Switzerland. Tour buses were arriving one after another and disgorging groups of skiers, who trooped up the parking lot in Indian file, battling with the line of cars whose drivers were trying, mostly in vain, to find a place liberated by people heading down after a morning of skiing. The parking lot attendant who greeted us confirmed our impression of the situation -- hopeless -- and we joined the snaking line of cars, moving along only to turn around and leave.

In fourteen years coming here, we had never seen this.

There were vans of Gendarmes and police cars, and we sat in the car, the windows down, while the line of skiers filed past us on the right.

"Serrez à droit et laisser passer les voitures," called out their group leader.

"C'est boucan," said one of the gendarmes, shaking his head.


Boucan comes from the old verb "boucaner", meaning "to imitate the cry of a goat". Boucan being a dialectical equivalent to the French word for goat, "bouc", it, too, is associated with debauchery, from which derives the meaning "big noise", since bordellos were often noisy places. It further widens in scope to include a "tumult".

"What do we do?" I asked Sam. "Head on and see if the line for lift tickets is a nightmare, and if it is, abandon or leave you with the skis to get them, while I return to the hotel lot and walk back down?"

He shrugged. When we got past the boucan, we could see that the line was civilized and short in comparison to the state of affairs in the parking lot, but Sam shook his head.

"I don't know. We've had a really good week already, and if there are this many cars, it's going to be really crowded up there. Maybe we just let it drop. That's a lot of money to struggle in crowded pistes and lift lines."

He was somewhat pessimistic. We mostly ski off-trail when the conditions allow, which they should have done, and the lines move fast. It was mostly that we had not anticipated the mess, and our four hour passes were going to get us three hours of skiing at most. Sam has a sense of the value of things, even if he thinks in terms of Porsche 911 Turbos and Maybachs, and imagines his photography, line of clothing and concept store will fulfill his every "need".

"Are you sure? You won't regret it if we drive back and head to walk around Chamonix, or something?"

"Nah, let's go. We've had a good eight days. We can let it go."

Maybe we're just a little tired, too. The skiing is demanding, if you wish it to be and ski it that way, and the last run of the afternoon yesterday, I found myself on my stomach, clinging to the vertical face of a mogul field at about on 80° pitch, nothing but several meters of straight slide below me, followed by moguls the size of Smart cars.

This was far, far worse than my predicament of several days earlier. Or, so it seemed to me, anyway. The other experience was entirely mental; this time, I was absolutely physically stuck. Move anything, and I was going down half the bowl on my stomach, skis and poles God only knew where, and Sam was below me, looking blankly at me, doing my best imitation of a leach on a bare thigh.

We had done the descent twice already, and many times over the years, but each time it changes, accounting for snowfall, temperatures, and winds. This particular bowl is protected from the sun by a large ridge of stone wall to the east and by its own edge on the west. You drop down into it, and ski a well-worn track across the tops of several moguls before beginning your way down, turning back left. It is an impressive sight from the edge. Sometimes, you hear someone say "Oh, wow" in whatever language they speak, when they come upon it for the first time.

I'd had no problem before and followed Sam down in, only this time, I didn't have enough speed and stopped just before the top of a mogul along the track, my down hill ski came to a stop perfectly perpendicular to the slope, but my uphill ski had other ideas and I saw it there, the tip pointing up the slope and the back treacherously downhill. I was bent forward at the waist, my head somewhere between my two boots. Oh shit. Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit.

"Sam, I am stuck."

"Can you turn the tip?"

"I don't think so. It's too far away, and all my weight is forward."

"Can you slide back?"

"I don't think so. I don't know if I will be able to stop."

I might have been able to. I tried, a little. I pushed with my poles, trying not to lose the purchase of my left ski while I searched for the right place to stick my poles, but with the chest about 20 cm from the snow and your legs practically spread-eagled, that was no small feat. I slid back a couple of centimeters and called it quits. My downhill ski was beginning to slip. It went, and nothing whatsoever would be holding me in place. I could see exactly what I would speed down on my stomach, backwards, sideways, every which way, gathering speed until nature or a miracle stopped me.

"The only way out of this is if someone arrives to ski down," I said, trying to look back up to the lip from under my right arm. I could just see a little sky past the bumps above me, and my stupid ski tip right there. I was furious with myself, and rather scared, and then I saw movement. There was someone just dropping in. A man, he spoke in French. He slid to a position just behind and worked to get himself below me.

"Don't move," he said. "Can you hold on a little longer?"

"Yes. A little longer. Thank you," I replied, concentrating on not moving a muscle. Not one.

I breathed rapidly, and tightened my abdominal muscles; my gloved hands in the straps of my poles were useless. Everything depended on my legs, my skis and my abs, and now my savior. He was working at sticking his poles into the hard-packed snow below my downhill ski. I understood that he was hoping that they would help hold that ski, but if I began to slid, they'd only buckle under my 60 kg.

"They will only bend if I go," I said.

"Don't move. Don't move a muscle," he said again. "Should I remove your ski?" I thought a second.

"I don't know. It might not be the best thing. What do you think?"

"It might not."

Skiers know that you are safest with two skis. With only one, you will slide and then be able to do nothing, at least in similar circumstances, with your booted foot. Then, there would be the problem of getting it back on there.

"Don't move a muscle," he said again.

I felt him take my right foot and ski and begin to lift them. I was going to trust him. I had no choice. I was not going to move anything that he wasn't moving intentionally.

"What do you want me to do? Is there something you want me to do?"

"Don't move." I continued to breath rapidly and rhythmically, willing myself into the mountain.

Who says Lamaze is useless? Try an epidural in this situation and see what that does for you.

My foot and ski turned in the air and I understood that they were below what had been my downhill ski, and I could just see his tip between them.

"Can you lift your ski?" I understood that, too. He needed me to liberate him.

"Yes, but please, don't let yourself be hurt."

"It's okay," he said. I felt as though that leg no longer even belonged to me. I could see it, but I could hardly believe where it was. The feeling of it being at that angle on the vertical slope was all I could remember. I looked at how it was positioned, and I told myself what I had to do to move it. His ski slid back and was free.

"Don't move," he said again, "It's okay." He was positioning himself below me to brace me and working his poles out from below the ski he had tried to block.

"Okay. Can you get up now?"

"Yes," I nodded, "I can."

"Okay." He slid forward to make room for me. I took a breath, stuck my poles in, thinking how glad I was to have them, and stood.

"Can you get down now?" he asked. I understood that, too. He knew I was tired from that.

"Yes, I can. Thank you so much. You are a genius."

"I don't know about that," he said, "I just did what came to mind."

"Well, they were exactly the right things to do, and you really helped me. Thank you so much," I said, letting myself slide down next to where he had come to a stop by Sam, who had gone mute. It occurred to me that the poor guy thought I might run into him and send him down the mountain in turn as he skied away from me the instant I arrived just next to him.

I was just relieved. I was a little shaken, and once again I realized how important the mind is. You can use it to save yourself. I watched him ski down, admiring his turns, and I saw him stop from time to time and turn to look back at me, understanding that he was looking out for me. I felt grateful.

When we got to the bottom of the bowls and prepared to ski over to Pointe de Vue, just above the Argentière glacier, I heard a deep rumbling.

"Sam? Is there an avalanche?" I asked, turning to look at him. He looked back at me, and we both turned out heads to the rock wall below les Becs Rouges and Chardonnet past the glacier, where a torrent of snow and rock was cascading down the face of the mountain.

It was stunning. I had never seen the face of the mountain let go and slide down into the glacier; it was like a far more dramatic enactment of what could have been my fate, had that very calm and capable man not appeared. Luckily, in such places at that, these are the only people into whom you run.

The few of us who dotted the slope were all turned to face this feat of nature, our cell phones and pocket cameras trained on the cascading mountain surface. It slowed and gathered force once, twice, and then it gradually faded, the snow had turned to racing water from the heat of the movement.



We skied down to Pointe de Vue and stopped to look at what the avalanche had left behind. There, I saw my savior skiing toward the Refuge de Lognan and thanked him silently before we skied on down and back to the valley floor. Our skiing done, although we didn't realize it, for this year.
....

Sam, against the snow and sky

Maybe Today, for Elbow Beach

Elbow Beach at Cagnes-sur-Mer, February 18

This horse that seemed the cream puff, gathered and collected in her first days at Gina Rarick's yard in Maisons-Laffitte, but who turned out to be a little something else again in the saddling area prior to post time on both starts in Cagnes-sur-Mer in February, where she took fourth place in each -- I haven't written, yet, about the second race --, is set to race again today in the 5th, the Prix de Saint-Valéry, at Deauville.

She lowers her big head down to your legs and then rubs it up the length of your body to say hello, lingering a moment at our lower back.

Hello, Elbow. 

And then, one day, she moved that big, old head away, only to swing it back toward my unsuspecting nose, stuck directly in the trajectory of her swing. Agata fixed me up with some arnica, and I learned a lesson about Elbow that she hasn't failed to drive home in the saddling area before her starts. Last time it took three people, pushing with all their might, to keep her in the box to finish the job and get her saddle safely cinched for Fabien Lefebvre, who was up.

I won't, unfortunately, be there to witness the saddling or the race. I won't even be able to watch on the television. We are still in Chamonix Mont-Blanc, and even if we came down from the slopes for the race, we don't get Equidia here. I'll have to wait for the phone call to tell me how she did, and sign up to watch the video later.

Today, she has another chance for a win or a second place, but nothing's ever certain in racing, or as Gina puts it "of course, there is always the unexpected, which is what makes it a race."

There is always the unexpected, which is what makes it a race.

That, it seems to me, is one of the finest quotes from horse racing, ever.

It's a 1300 meter on fibersand for 3-year-old fillies who haven't yet won, and they will fly on the fibersand, so Elbow should be able to stretch out early, which Gina thinks is to her advantage. She has a good top speed, and Fabien Lefebvre, who knows her very well now and likes her action and speed, is up again. All good for us. Ioritz Mendizabal, who won at Cagnes in February and then flew to Dubai to take a first place there a day or two later, before returning to Cagnes to race again, will be up on Caracesca. I really wish I could be there to see this match-up.

We're hoping for the chance to keep her here in France long enough to race her on the 1400 turf on the "coude", or "elbow", at Longchamps, the track the most ideally suited, in Gina's mind, to Elbow's style of racing. Besides, how can you miss the opportunity to race Elbow on her eponymous stretch of turf?

C'mon, Elbow, do us proud today, and, please give everyone a break in the saddling box, alright?
....

Gina Rarick at Cagnes sur Mer, February 18