The story I have not told, Fibs and Me

Fibs unloads from Maisons-Laffitte, September 3, 2012

A year and one month ago, Fibs, who raced under the name Fibs and Flannel, a 2007 foaled chestnut gelding by Tobougg out of Cayman Kai mare Queens Jubilee, stepped down off a horse transport truck onto the courtyard of a private owners stable, almost in Normandy. This was not of consequence to him. He had travelled much in his young life, from the farm where he was bred and cavorted next to his mother in Yorkshire.  A rather fortunate young man, he was in good hands and had only a short hop to make to his trainer Tim Easterby's yards at Habton Farms, Malton, North Yorkshire, and he would go on to travel to England's racetracks, Newcastle and Ripon, Haydock, Beverley and Hamilton, Warwick, Catterick, Doncaster, Carlisle, Musselburgh, Southwell, Kempton, Lingfield and Wolverhampton.

His maiden race was Monday, May 4, 2009 in Newcastle at a mile on good to soft conditions. There were 8 2-year-olds entered. I try to imagine him then, when he hadn't yet travelled 20-something times to the racetrack and won a few. Was he nervous? Did he try to bite the groom? Swivel his head around on his neck, ears just a little too far back, whites showing as he fixed his eye on that soul? Did he object to the tight girthing of his tiny little racing saddle? Was he eager to join the pounding hooves in the distance, his ears pricked and trained on their efforts? What did he think of the grandstand sounds that he could hear, while everyone else was concerned with the cleanliness of his nostrils, the shine of his coat and whether his vet papers were in order? Did he prance, stepping out to walk with his hot walker? Or did he walk with his head down and relaxed, already a professional, a little bit bored? What we know is that he ran.

"Dwelt, towards rear, pushed along and headway halfway, ridden and no impression final 2f"

I think I saw something like that 3 years later in France. He finished 5th. 

In July, in Haydock, he finished 4th of 6 horses, beaten by one of his father's other sons, Petougg, out of Soviet Star mare Piroshka, foaled just 8 days after Fibs. Petougg never won again. In fact, he only raced two more times. One wonders what happened in that third race, on September 25, 2009. Nothing catastrophic. He "raced towards centre, tracked leader, joined leader halfway, ridden and every chance 2f out, weakeded inside final furlong". Nothing to explain why he never raced again, unless there was something in a tendon, an accident in his box, a sudden colic, something that would endanger his further training or end his life. Such is the life of some horses, their owners and trainers. So many of them.

It was as a 3-year-old that Fibs and Flannel would come into his own and earn a little something of his training fees, hay and oats, breaking his maiden on April 22, 2010 in a class 5, 7 furlongs 100 yards race on good to firm track conditions, a length and a quarter in front of the second place finisher, Ginger Grey. If I understood betting outside France, where everything is a sum "contre un", I could tell you that his morning price was 11/4 to Ginger Grey's 8/1 with some idea of that that meant. It doesn't seem that it was a complete surprise that Fibs won that day, certainly not after his first appearance as a 3-year-old a week earlier, when he placed second on the same track.

Perhaps Fibs was at his peak then, when he went on to win his next race on May 2 at Hamilton in the Totepool handicap,  having "Tracked leaders, smooth headway to joing leaders 2f out, shaken up to lead inside final furlong, pushed out, readily opened". Looking over his life performance makes me smile a little bit, although I wasn't smiling so much when I was his next-to-last owner of his career. From that 2nd place and the two wins right on its heels, Fibs faded. He went on to run 12 more races under his training, never doing better than 3 4th places and 2 5ths, and 4th and 5th don't bring home a check in the UK.

He changed hands, going on to race three times for trainer Tony Coyle at Zeebrivia Stables, also in Malton. Maybe he thought he knew what to do to get the zing back out of Fibs. Having had Fibs for a year, I think I know that this was somewhat illusory. Fibs decides for Fibs. He has a certain arrogance that makes the sweetness sweeter.

In the Rocket Ron Rapley 70th Birthday Handicap on November 15, 2011, a class 5 mile race for 3 yos on the fibersand, Fibs finished 12 in a field of 14, in which he "Chased leaders, led after 3f, headed over 4f out, ridden and weakened over 1f out". How, exactly, do you finish 12th in the last furlong? Pride goeth before a fall. C'mon, Fibs.

Then, three weeks later came the Play The Big Money totejackpot Today Hanidcap, a 6 furlong race for 3 yos on the fibersand on December 6. There was modest progress. Had anyone inquired if the young man wished to race? He drew the 9th and finished 9th (he's witty that way), "Outpaced, always behind". He had dropped from opening at 9/1 to 33/1.

Tony Coyle entered him in the Southwell Racecourse Selling Handicap for 4 yos on January 3, and Fibs must have smelled something in the air, woken on the right side of his box, finished his alfalfa; Fibs finished first in a field of 6 at 7 furlongs on the fibersand, and he went home to Saville House Stables with Willie Musson.

"Chased leaders, went 2nd 3f out, led 2f out, strongly pressed closing stages, kept on well"

He opened at 9/4.

Sadly for Mr. Musson and his new owners, this would be his last win. He did not, however, run poorly for Musson, with  three 3rd place finishes, a 4th and a 5th in 7 races in a mere 2 1/2 months. It was enough to attract the attention of a bloodstock agent friend in Maisons-Laffitte, who had travelled to Newmarket for the Tattersalls Guineas Breeze Up & Horses in Training Sale 2012 looking for likely prospects for the summer season in France. Until that day, I had never heard of his existence, but after that day, my life changed forever, and my blog, as anyone who has followed will have noticed, languished.

I had no business buying a race horse. My husband will be the first to tell you that, although he wasn't quite the first to know. He was, but not quite with full conscience and say-so. I don't know what got into me. I didn't know that when I get an idea into my head, I carry it out. I also didn't know that I was so fanciful in my interpretations of "possible" and "likely" as far as outcomes go. I further had no idea of what risk really means. 

It all seemed so rational, but risk by definition is anything but rational as I was brought to recognize. Talk of papers and past performances, the prospects of UK horses in France, where the prize money actually pays something of the training costs, and why so many UK horses come to race here, making them stars in the claiming races. I had put a toe into racing as an owner registered with France Galop with Elbow Beach, although she raced under owner Kay Minton's colors and we made the decision to send her back to her owners in England when a respiratory problem was suspected. It was time for her to return, anyway. She later went on to get her hoped-for win in a class 5 handicap, The Follow Mecca Swansea on Facebook, in August of the year, improving her desirability as a broodmare.

I had done all the paperwork, gone to Nanterre for my interview with the racing and gambling police, and chosen my colors, which I had stitched up at Petitpas in Maisons-Laffitte, and which Agata modelled for us on May 25, 2 weeks after Fibs and Flannel, Tattersalls hip number 35, arrived in the yard at Gina Rarick's training facility, on the morning of his first equivalent of a breeze in France. I had already made my decision in the days just after his arrival. I would buy Fibs and hope for his success, which we thought quite likely, despite the drawback of his not being eligible for the French bred premium, for which some UK horses are. Two months, we figured. The French like to see the horse run a few times before making a bid in the claimers.

"He's good," Gina had said, sounding, just possibly, agreeably surprised. "He's straight, and he has a large stride."

Shortly after, my cell phone rang and Gina's name appeared on the screen.

"Hi, Gina," I chirped.

"This is the 'Houston, we have a problem' call," she greeted me. My heart sunk. Before he'd even been entered, Gina had seen signs of EIPH, or bleeding, after fast morning work. It was 45 minutes later, and when he lowered his head to eat his hay, but it was a trickle of blood from the nostril. In the USA, Lasix is administered, and it's training and racing as usual. In France, and anywhere else in the racing world, it's close to a catastrophe; horses are neither trained nor raced on Lasix. They show signs of pulmonary haemorrhage after strenuous effort, and some herbal remedies, a bit of rest and a change in training is tried, but mostly a future other career is envisioned.

Gina would enter him anyway at Saint Cloud for June 2, but his training would be lightened. Hopes were nothing what they were. I was left to consider my luck, which was decidedly bad. "He's good" and "Il est bon" swam in my head along with "Houston, we have a problem" and "bleeder".

He ran at Saint Cloud in the Prix du Mesnil-Villement, a one mile Course E claimer for female jockeys. He looked good before the race, and he got an appalling ride. Coming out of the final turn and into the homestretch, Carla O'Halloran up, Fibs suddenly veered from the rail, cutting all the way out past the horses following to the very outside, like a satellite broken from its orbit. It was hard to fathom. No point in making any further effort, she pulled him up, and he jogged over the finish line. Somehow, he did not finish last. We said the things you say to each other in those situations. Given 33/1, "la note de course" resumed his race "n'a joué aucun rôle". 

"Je ne sais pas ce qui c'est passé," said Carla, "mais il a un bon moteur."

Later, while he was grazing in the grass on the backside, a trickle of blood made its slow way down his left nostril.

Gina entered him in a conditioning race in Compiègne July 2, and hoped for the best. My insides were in too many knots to make the trip. I watched from home as Fibs took to an early lead with Yannick Mergirie up. My heart had sunk a little. Hadn't Gina wanted him held back in the pack as was his wont? Here he was flying out front, a gorgeous streak of golden red with my colors flashing orange and claret in the bright sun, the pack hard on his heels. Could he hold it? I prayed, fervently, my head in my hands and my heart in my throat. I knew not to let myself hope for it. They hardly ever do, not without gaining any lead with a turn of foot coming out of the last turn. His lead never increased, and halfway up the backstretch, he was overtaken by all the ten other horses in the pack, Two for Two, Art of Dance, Saglawiyah Asil -- I watched the names I had studied when I did his paper, determining his greatest threats, pass him, followed by Bernenez, Don Salsa, Lucky Jon and Hi Shinko, a horse Gina had trained, and then the horses who had seemed to have much less chance of winning than he did, Alexiana, Echappée Belle and Manamo du Fray leave him to shine crossing the finish line last.

My phone rang. Gina's name flashed on the screen. Yes, he had finished last; no, it wasn't that big a problem that he had gone out front, he had wanted to; Mergerie was hugely impressed with his motor. Maybe, maybe we should enter him in a lady amateur jockey race in Dieppe later in July with his exercise rider up. They hadn't seen any recent evidence of bleeding, and he had just shown something we suspected, that we had reason to know was in him. I heard hope.

"No," I said. "I have an offer for a leasing contract on him. I have to accept."

...

This was not, in hindsight, the best decision to have made at all. It was the decision I felt I had to make, given everything, including my own panic. I had misunderstood risk. I had failed to understand that risk in racing depends entirely on the depth of the pockets of the owner, and given that mine were actually sewn shut, I had had no business imagining that because breaking even is about the best anyone can hope -- and what should make any owner of race horses happy, but far, in fact, from what happens in the vast majority of individual cases, in which money is lost, --  it was what would happen for me. Breaking even is facilitated by owning several horses and diversifying one's risk exposure; I owned one single horse, and there was something going on with him.

On July 12, I signed the contract, and Fibs went to the yard of trainer Jérôme Clais. I researched every horse he had raced in the last 3 years, and I knew I had no reason to hope to see any return on my 15% interest. But, it was worse than that. He ran once in Deauville in late July, and then every entry was scratched. Three of them. I called my contact and said, "There's something wrong, either with Jérôme or with the horse."

"I'll go right over this evening and see what's up."

What was up was that Jérôme was out of money, which happened oftener than could be hoped. There were some 10 horses in his yard, not all of whom were being fed and exercised. Fibs had fallen into the unhappier lot. He was standing in his box, the lights out. The contract, I said, is broken. We're getting him out. Fibs is retired.

...

I still watch the races and imagine Fibs on the turf or the fibersand. I watch him in the field, and I see him standing on the grass on the backside at Saint Cloud, his head high in the air, his ears pricked toward the hooves pounding their way to the last turn, I see him walking proudly in the presentation ring, accepting his jockey like the Queen of England accepts the adulation of her people, and I see the photo in the newspaper of him crossing the line first at Beverley, April 22, 2010.  I wish that for him again because I believe Fibs was suited to it. He was not a graded winner, his victories were not at Ascot and Longchamp, but when he wanted to, he could turn it on, stretch out his legs in a magnificently huge stride and fly over the sand, his feet touching earth only an instant before taking off again.

Fibs and Flannel wins at Beverley, April 22, 2010

I did not know that I was saying that Fibs would come home to me, out here on the edge of Normandy. It took some days, conversations with my husband, and phone calls, but on September 3, 2012, Fibs and Flannel stepped off a horse van from a racing yard one last time and settled into the fields of the "boucle de la Seine", not very far from Giverny and Vernon,  and La Roche-Guyon. And all because of my name on his certificate of ownership with les Haras Nationaux and a barely audible and formed promise to look out for him made when things started to look not so good. In my heart, I always knew I'd want to keep him, but in my mind I knew it would take more than what was in my heart, or maybe just that alone.

Our story since then is the one I have not told.

....

Fibs and Flannel, first canter and new colors

Fibs and Flannel, Piste Jaune at Maisons-Laffitte, May 25
In flight

If I was an owner with Elbow Beach, it's true that it was nothing like it is now that I am an Owner, officially approved by and registered with France Galop, and the owner of Fibs and Flannel, by Tobougg out of Cayman Kai mare Queens Jubilee (in the year of the Queen's Jubilee, a sign perhaps), making purchase decisions, ordering my silks, signing contracts, and, yesterday, standing on the mound of grass alongside the piste jaune, waiting for my horse to come blazing up and past us where we take stock of the horse's action, respiratory effort, relative speed and power.

It's where we realized the issue with Elbow Beach that we believed explained her lack of turn of foot in the homestretch. It's where we realized that Fibs is fast. Fast, I hope, enough.

Full reach

When he arrived in the yard in Maisons-Laffitte from Newmarket May 7, I went out to see him the next day and found a horse dripping with muscle in the shoulder and hind quarters, with a nice deep chest. Even I could see that this was a horse built for the mile, 8 furlongs, 1600 meters.

"Up to maybe 2000 here," said my friend and trainer now Gina Rarick, "But, we'll start him at a mile."

Good, consistent milers are rare enough, and it's a good length race to run well here, and he likes the turf, and runs just about as well on the fibersand. There would be plenty of options for him.

"I watched the video of his last two races in England again, and I think he was just losing interest. They are hard on them over there. I think all we have to do," said Gina "is make him happy."

This is the yard to do that, and it's the part that makes it the hardest if you're in the clamining races, with the chance of losing the horse to someone willing to bid higher than the price at which you are willing (or able) to defend. King Driver has a blue plastic soccer ball in a net that can be hung from the wall of his box or held by Agata in a game of tug-of-war, her hand and arm to his teeth and neck.

Everyone gets pets (except the stallion) and company, music during evening stable and individually adapted meals, according to the horses' needs and tastes. The boxes are squeaky clean and fresh, the straw plentiful, the hay tasty, and both are free of dust to bother the throat and lungs.

Owners wield pitchforks and walk their and others' horses, take the news of the yard, show up for each other's races, bring carrots and photos. The gate is always open, except when it is time for the afternoon nap and peace and quiet reign.

The other bit of work was to develop his back muscles and help him heal a sore spot along his spine, just before the croup, from where the saddles in England bothered him. He ran with his head up and his back hollow. Here, he would strengthen his back and learn to run with his head down while carrying a jockey.

Fibs did not move into the yard as the fanciest horse, nor as the most expensive horse, the horse in whom anyone could have the highest hopes and expectations. He arrived from the spring Breeze Up & Horses In Training Sale, Lot N° 35, not the best sale with the best horses. That's in July. But, the sale was taking place, Sebastien was going and returning with horses, and with the departure of Elbow Beach, I was without a horse. I could see what Sebastien had shipped over and if Gina thought anything was worth training, or I could just wait until July.

His race history was good enough; his paper was alright; but, he could be up for sale at the Tattersall's spring sale because there was something developing, something wrong, or not right enough, or because the barn needed to make room for younger, more promising horses that hadn't reached their ceilings yet. Racing is relative; he could be useful in the claimers and handicaps, but only seeing him, watching him move, going over his legs and feeling who is is would tell.

Gina gave the nod; Fibs was a horse who might well do what we hoped, and, so, he stayed in the yard under my patronage as the possibly useful horse, a horse who might bring in more in a claimer than was paid in Newmarket, and his papers and shipping.  A horse who might help me acquire a better horse still, or who would at least work and pay his bills in exchange for good care and the chance to run.

Yesterday, the yard's regard for him climbed a notch the second he passed us, standing alongside the piste jaune.

"He's good," said Gina, sounding, just possibly, agreeably surprised. "He's straight, and he has a large stride." I definitely heard satisfaction.

He'd cantered, what the French call galloping, the speed work, with Hard Way, and Gina turned to Hard Way's two other owners, she herself being the third, as well as his breeder, and pronounced him ready for Longchamp June 11. At that moment, I hope I might be forgiven my selfishness, I only had ears for what she had to say about Fibs, eyes for Fibs. Hard Way, as much as I adore him and am enchanted by his story, seemed a million miles away, somewhere out in Fibs' orbit.

We made our way over the other side of the piste jaune to the trail alongside, the place where Gina asks her questions and finds out what the exercise riders have to say about the horses' performance, while they turn in lazy circles around her, and Ludovic on Hard Way and Agata on Fibs trotted peaceably up toward us, where we waited.

"Il est bon," said Agata, and I got lost behind my camera lens, watching them turn about Gina, half-hearing the conversations around me, and the words He's good. He's good. He's good. Il est bon, il est bon, il est bon turned around and around in my ears.

Later, Agata came up to me in the yard and said, "Il avait encore a donner. Il aurait pu prendre Hard Way à la fin là et vient avec Hard Way devant. Il est bon."

Il est bon, il est bon, il est bon.


You don't let them actually race in speed work, though. Hard Way was the one set to gallop out front, and Agata's job was to gallop Fibs, staying back. Let one get along side another, and you've got a horse race, not a morning speed session.

My silks were ready at Petitspas on the main street in Maisons-Laffitte, making and selling everything you need to train and race a horse, and we headed off to pick them up, my heart a little bit in my throat. I could always change them if I hated them. I had had such a hard time making up my mind, but I didn't want to have to go through that, show myself as anything but decided and knowing my mind, at least for the choice of my colors.

Monsieur greeted us like he always does, and we followed him through the workshop, smelling of leather and full of scales, tools and an assortment of different machines for sewing everything from fabric to leather, where his assistant looked up from where he was working at the long bench along the windows of the courtyard and smiled toward us, to his office, from which he emerged with a smile and a clear plastic bag in his hand. Neatly folded inside were my racing silks. My colors.

I imagined them up on the wall at Deauville or Longchamp. I have no right to, but no one does not imagine this. I saw satiny golden orange and a color like a deep claret wine, so close to "win", shining through. I hardly dared form an opinion, but it seemed generally favorable around me. We drove back to the yard, and Gina pulled into her place in front of the gate.

"Do you want to take the silks home?" she asked.

"You usually keep them, don't you?" It occurred to me she thought I might want to show them to my husband. "Keep them here with all the silks."

"OK, I'll keep them with the others," she said, drawing back her hand and the silks shining in the sunshine through their plastic packaging. We started to cross the street.

"That way there can't be any problem; everything is here and ready."

The trainer brings the silks to the race in the little pouchshe has just for that purpose, leaves them in the cubby near the jockeys' locker room, and brings them back to launder them after the race. We turned to cross the street.

"You don't want to take them into the house?" I said.

"No! Let's take them over to the yard; we always show new silks off to the yard," she added, laughing.

It's true. It is a big moment. New colors coming into a trainer's yard means new business: a new owner, another horse, more racing opportunities and business. There are endless moments to mark and to celebrate in racing, even the sorrier ones, like a race that doesn't go according to expectations, when a jockey doesn't follow his orders or a horse has a bad day against tough competition, and none is to be missed. Ever.

Gina walked down to the barn and ripped open the plastic, turning to hold up the casaque in the bright noon sunshine for everyone's inspection. I watched from the safety of my camera lens. Agata voiced her approval and her surprise at finding that she approved.

"C'est beaucoup mieux en vrai que sur papier!" she pronounced, a huge smile across her face, "Le satin brille et ça change tout!"

I realized she had carefully hidden her fear that the silks would be hideous from me, but because they were shiny, and not just muddy ink on heavy ivory paper, or what it looked like on the simulator on the France Galop site, whichever she had seen, they had saved themselved from being awful, and even pleased.

"J'avais vu les échantillons des tissues chez Petitpas," I offered, by way of hopeful explanation, "alors je savais que ça donnait autre chose que sur l'écran de l'ordi ou papier." I had seen the cloth samples at Petitpas, I explained, so I knew what they would look like. Sort of.

"Et, je voulais que ça brille au soleil, que se soit des couleurs heureuses qui se voient."

She nodded, still smiling, and went to take the silks from Gina and pulled them over her head. I turned to Mark and added, "And I have the horse, as it happens, to go with them." He raised an eyebrow and smiled, nodding Yeah.

It was true; he shines like burnished copper, a bright, shiny centime in the sun, and the colors are perfect for him. It is just another coincidence.

Watching Agata pull the silks into place, I thought, I even have an enthusiastic and beautiful exercise jockey to model them for me, and got back behind the lens. She went to shut Milly's box door against the strong sunshine and heat and mugged for me, laughing and celebrating new colors.

"Il fallait oser le faire, mais c'est bon," she concluded, folding them back into their clear plastic bag and setting it on the bench alongside everything else one needs to care for race horses in Gina's barn. "C'est vraiment bien."

"C'est ça qui compte le plus," I told her, "que tout le monde les apprécie car l'on travaille tous ensemble." The whole yard wears the owners' colors, so it's best, I think, if everyone likes and is proud of them.

I feel like I might be a little bit crazy. I am not the person of whom you think when you think of a thoroughbred race horse owner; I am far from from it, possessing some of the qualities, but lacking the main one, the wealth, but there's something driving me. I don't make a lot of impulsive decisions; I can't afford to, but I am doing this for the experience, for the pleasure of being around these animals and everyone who is also compelled to be around them, for whatever lessons I will learn, and for whatever stories I will have to tell.

Because, you can't know the stories until you live them, and you can't tell what you haven't lived.
....

Fibs

Tattersalls, N° 35

Fibs And Flannel (GB) Ch.G. by Tobougg (IRE) x Queens Jubilee (GB)Consignor: Saville House Stables (W. Musson)

The Tattersalls Guineas Breeze Up and Horses in Training 2012 sale was set to begin at noon in Newmarket, 1 pm in Maisons-Laffitte, and on the edge of Normandy, where I sat in front of my laptop. It wasn't the sale at which we had intended to make a purchase, not being a favored sale, but we hadn't expected to be sending Elbow Beach back to Newmarket, either, which left me, quite unexpectedly and in a terrible irony, without a horse the very day I became an official owner with France Galop.

That Saturday, the vet Jerôme, trainer Gina Rarick, Thierry, Lisa and I stood at the place where Elbow made the noise, and waited for her to gallop past, Agata on board, just behind Guilain on Deep. We held our breath in absolute silence, waiting to listen to Elbow's, and past she shot, but not really on Deep's heals. Jerôme nodded. It was enough for him.

"Oui," he nodded again, looking from Gina to me and meeting my gaze, "j'ai entendu le sifflement. Elle corne."

She was whistling.

And she wasn't finishing her races. Her last time out in Maisons-Laffitte April 16 in the Prix Arreau (photos), she'd been out toward the front coming up the homestretch, and then she seemed to get smaller, receeding back into the pack like a balloon running out of air in super slow motion, almost imperceptibly. Was she slowing, or was everyone else speeding up? She finished far from the win she was here to get, 11th in a field of 13. Only 2 horses crossed the finish line behind her.

I watched from a distance as jockey Fabien Lefebvre dismounted and spoke with Gina after the race, surrounded by the crowd of hopeful supporters who had come to the racetrack to watch Elbow run that day. I knew what he was going to say, and so did Gina. I watched his body language as he described ber behavior, unwilling to enter the gate; we'd all seen it on the big screen. Elbow had tried to desist from starting without a fuss, first backing away from the gate, then shaking her head "no", pulling back steadily, insistently on the lead.

Yes, said the track handlers, You're going in. No, said Elbow. She didn't rear, she didn't throw; she just kept resisting until their combined force, hands joined behind her hind quarters, Fabien pulling on her tail, overcame her resistance. But, it wasn't just orneryness. Watching her,and having watched her other races, I was convinced she had her good reasons and knew she knew no way to tell everyone pulling, then pushing, other than by resisting.

She broke fine and ran a good race, until they were right in front of the grandstand.

I watched Fabien describe, gesturing with his hands, lowering and shaking his head, lips pressed together, how she just dropped back coming up to the post. It wasn't merely that she lacked turn of foot, which she was supposed to possess in abundance, coming from a family of winners and here to collect her win to make her programmed offspring more valuable in the yearling sales; she lacked the breath to accelerate and make her attack. Of all the horses out there, it was Elbow who lacked the ability to suck in enough oxygen to sustain her effort and go for that final one to overtake her competition and win.

We didn't know this yet, but we suspected it.

There was no way not to suspect the possibility of a wind issue now that she was fit, which she wasn't when she first arrived from England, having cooled her heals 10 days in a horse walker, waiting for the weather to permit a channel crossing, and that after having been out of racing training since her last race, October 10, 2011, 3 months before. She stayed back in Maisons-Laffitte when the others left for Cagnes-sur-Mer, and only joined Gina and them in her assigned box there when she'd had more preparation, and when I flew down for her first race, February 2, and she came in 4th, we were thrilled. Here was the proof; this filly was scarcely in race form, and she'd got a 4th place finish and brought home a check to pay her oats and training. All we had to do was keep up the work, except her next two finishes were 4th and 5th place, when by all rights should have been blowing past the others, and we weren't seeing the turbo kick in. More worryingly, Agata was reporting that she was making a noise at 1000 meters in her twice weekly morning gallops.

I thought about all that while I watched Fabien describe the race, looking disconcerted and dismayed for the first time. In the noise of a race, hooves pounding the turf, jockeys shouting, he wouldn't have heard the noise, but he felt its effect. The worst, he said, the thing that puzzled him the most, he told us, was her behavior before the race; she didn't want to race, and she hadn't the last time, either.

Later, at the Pur Sang for beers, we talked again about Elbow's performances, coming around to "the noise" and the wind issue.

"I think we need to get her scoped," I said, sounding every bit the horsewoman I am not, and then we went all through it again before Gina nodded.

"I'll call Jerôme and let's get her scoped."

Jerôme, as it happened, said that there was still time that day to do it, since she had raced just a few hours before, and we met at the yard.

The endoscopy of her pharynx showed little, except for a slight asymmetry of the cartilage of the larynx. Enough, however, to consider doing an endoscopy during fast work. That said, not being her owners on paper and a mounted endoscopy being costly, Jerôme suggested coming during her next gallops to listen for the noise, confirmation of which, that Saturday morning in April, was enough to send her back to her owner for further testing, and leave me without a horse in the yard.

I didn't go, although I thought I would, to see her off.

This is what sometimes happens in racing, like in jumping, and you have to get used to it or leave the game. We are their stewards, the time they are in the stables and working for us; we love them, care for them, feeding and grooming them well, exercise them, and even play with them (ask King about his soccer ball in a net), but when it's time for the horse to move on, move on to an appropriate next place and owner he must. I did think, though, of Elbow the morning she stepped onto the van for the journey back to Newmarket, and I believe that were she to come back to Maisons-Laffitte, she'd remember us and be glad enough to see us again.

We were good to her, as all owners, trainers, lads and exercise riders ought to be. She received the care she required and was raced with consideration. She got her hay, oats and water, and would have received any therapeutic treatment she needed, but nothing as a matter of course, and now it would be up to her owner to make the decisions in her racing career, depending on what the tests would show.

Elbow, before her last race in France at Maisons-Laffitte

I said good-bye to Elbow Beach across the kilometers from my home on the edge of Normandy, and suddenly the July sales seemed terribly far away. Gina hadn't been enthusiastic about the breeze up and in training sale at Newcastle in a couple of weeks, but just as suddenly, whatever would be up for offer seemed more interesting, and our eye turned to the 3-year-old colt Benbecula by Motivator (who, like Surrey Storm, calls the 2000 Arc winner Montjeu papa) out of Shirley Heights mare Isle of Flame after watching the N° 6 Motivator colt Esles (out of Dehere mare Resquilleuse and ridden by Christophe Soumillon) charge past his competition and the finish line in the 5th race of the day at Saint-Cloud May 1. We were watching from a table in the owners and trainers lounge, and Sebastien grabbed the Tattersalls catalog lying on the table by his hand.

"There's a Motivator horse in there?" I asked.

Oui, Sebastien nodded, riffling through the pages as fast as Esles had gone through the competition, and pointed to a pedigree "There."

The horse's name was Benbecula, and the dams had produced a good amount of black type. I watched Sebastien confirm mentally his place on his short list, and I made a mental note of my own to speak with Gina once she returned from wherever she had gone.

That we were interested in this colt was, in hindsight, less surprising by a great deal than that we thought we could ever possibly acquire him. My budget was small, and ought to have been a good deal smaller, and he had two 2nd place finishes in 4 starts. Still, he had no wins yet, and it was April. Perhaps no one was paying attention.

The first lots to go at Newcastle May 3 were encouraging, as horses sold for under 5,000 guineas, some not making reserve at just 5,500 or 5,800 guineas, and then came a bay filly, Cape Safari, who got a top bid of 37,000 guineas and didn't make her reserve.

"Oh oh, here we go now," I typed, watching the bids climb.

"Yup," came Gina's reply on facebook messenger, "The really good stuff sells for much more."

We were watching the live sales on the Tattersalls site and talking by chat, and Gina had Sebastien on his mobile by text message. She'd be calling him when Ben came into the ring. Then, four horses sold for 3,500 gns and less. My hope and courage returned, until N° 28, bay gelding Knockgraffen Lad by Forestry out of Miss Dahlia, turned a couple times around the sales ring and the bids were already soaring over 20,000 gns. The words "28 is obviously worth something!" appeared in the little window.

"No joke."

The top bid was 34,000 gns; he didn't make his reserve; the sale went on, and then another horse in which we knew Sebastien was interested, N° 41, entered the ring and was knocked down for 10,500 gns.

"We'll never get Ben for 8,000," I typed.

"No, I don't think so," came the reply.

"Not even 10,000."

I bit my nail to smooth off the ragged edge I'd left from biting it and typed "Did Seb buy?"

"No, I'm sure he didn't get that one. Too much.
He bought 35, though, too."

I looked up 35, 5-year-old chestnut gelding Fibs and Flannel by Tobougg out of Queens Jubilee that went for a reasonable price. Lots of starts, a regular performer with three wins.

"What do you think of him?" I asked.

"I don't care for Tobougg."

I put Fibs and Flannel out of my mind, with an asterisk. We were nearing number 50, Benbecula, who, to make a short story even shorter, was out of my range before the call even went through. If you care to make on offer, however, you may: he didn't make his reserve when the bidding ended at 45,000 gns. We weren't, it appeared, the only ones paying attention, nor were we likely the only ones to have come across the blurb on him in spankthebookie.com.

I took scant comfort in having my horse sense (alright, Seb's and Gina's) confirmed, and, I ruminated, at least I didn't have to deal with the ache of losing him by a couple hundred lousy guineas. Seb had bought two horses, Fibs and a horse who went for less still. Gina sent the photos. In them, neither looked like much, but then again, the angles were bad. No, Gina said, the first one wasn't all that compromised by Seb's cell phone photography; the one to look at was N° 35, Fibs and Flannel, and I set to thinking about it.

Ludo on Fibs and Flannel, behind Seb on Sabys Gem and Agata on King, Rond Poniatowski, May 8

I headed to the yard to look him over, stood in the Rond Poniatowski with Gina and watched him trot, then canter, did yards of mental calculations, consulted my instincts and measured my mettle, and yesterday I made my decision and we fêted it with two bottles of champagne between Gina, Seb, yard owner Chantal, and myself (Gina's husband Tim stuck with scotch, just like their friend Brian, who we waved down as he drove by; it isn't difficult to make a merry drinks party in Maisons-Laffitte). 

My husband wasn't divorcing me for it (I actually suspect he is finding all this rather intriguing, despite his normally conservative constitution), and as they say, nothing ventured, nothing gained. Sole owner of this red gelding, dripping with muscle in his shoulders and hind quarters -- needing to build up the back -- and built to run a mile, with four legs in training, I am venturing it all. As Gina says, all we have to do is make him happy, and he'll run for us. They've been hard on him, and we'll make him happy.

Let us hope that this is fun. It might at least provide moments of mirth in the retelling, over cans of cat food at meals in my diminished retirement, because, suddenly, all I want is a horse; my kingdom for a horse.

God help me, and Inshallah.
....

Groomed and in his luxury suite, Fibs waits for dinner

For more photos of Fibs and Flannel, click here.

For Hard Way and Elbow Beach, it's back to the racetrack

Prix René Couétil, Lisieux April 15
Tania des Ongrais

Perhaps it was the stiff, cold wind blowing across Normandy from the north. The horses were nervous before the race. We knew Hard Way was a handful -- Lisa got permission to have his gentleman rider mount before entering the presentation circle and get him out again before he had completed a full turn, and still he bounded out and put Guilain Bertrand through a rodeo to remember --, but they nearly all were.

Twisting, turning, rearing and rocking, determined to rid themselves of their riders, or just let something out, something to do with the excitement before the race, the wind, and the smells carried on it, but it only lasts a moment, and then everything is in perfect order. A warm-up followed by the orderly procession of 14 obedient and civil horses to the tape start, and they're off.

Hard Way got a good start and then sat out near the front in second or third position for most of the race with a steady race pace. Guilain moved him into the rail coming into the last turn, and they came out and into the homestretch in front, but the most experienced gentlemen riders were just behind, and made their bids. Maxime Denuault up on Sandinnar, the Aga Khan Stud mare and half-sister to Deep Ocean, saw the hole to thread between Guilain and the rail, while Florent Guy up on Quadriller, trained by Jehan Bertran de Balanda, squeezed him on the outside while the winner, Sabletory, ridden by Jean-Philippe Boisgontier, came up strong on the outside with the Gérard Augustin-Normand horse, Saint Aubin ridden by Mathieu Brasme threatening from behind.

Cire du Fray thought about it, but Hard Way wasn't going to let another horse past him and finished 5th, 4 3/4 lengths behind the winner, Sabletory, followed by Saint Aubin, with a nice showing, coming on strong from behind and overtaking the leaders through the homestretch, Quadriller, and Sandinnar.

It was Guilain's second race ever. A chance to gain race experience, while for Hard Way, it was a training session in his preparation to hit the Paris racetracks after 18 months in a retirement he decided he didn't want. Seeing him in his box at Gina Rarick's yard in Maisons-Laffitte, or in the training center of a morning, I didn't get it, but watching Hard Way spring out of the presentation circle and race was a revelation: the cream puff turned into sound and fury, a whirling dervish only to settle right back into his lovable, affectionate self off the racetrack again.

A crushed vertebra wasn't enough to stop Hard Way. He'd encased it in calcium and set it aside, making it clear to his trainer that he wanted to be in his old box in the stables on the rue Champaubert, and, preferably, on the nearest Paris racetrack.

He'll have his chance in about three weeks at Longchamp.

For now, I have to get in the car and go see another horse race. One Elbow Beach in whom I have a half share. Elbow is running her first sprint since her arrival in January from England, and today will tell if she is what her pedigree says, a sprinter at 1100 meters, or if she is the exception to her family's rule and a miler. She'll start in the third race at Maisons-Laffitte with one of the best values, but variably rated, depending on whether you're consulting Geny.com and Paris-turf.com, which have her at 11:1 odds, or ZEturf.fr, which has her at 26.3. Geny gives her an outside chance. I'd be delighted with a great and safe race, and a place.

We'll be running, like yesterday, against horses -- the two top favorites Gandalak and Dampierre -- owned by His Highness the Aga Khan and Gérard Augustin-Normand, respectively. Jockey Fabien Lefebvre, who knows her well, will be on board. I  have butterflies in my stomach.

There was question of lunch at the racetrack before the race, but this is the most nervous I have been before a race, and I think I'll scratch that and hope for reason for a little champagne after.

For the photos from around the racetrack at Lisieux yesterday, click here.
For the battle up the homestretch in Hard Way's race at Lisieux, click here.
....

Hard Way and Agata, after the race

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

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

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

First race, a place for Elbow Beach

Elbow Beach after the race at Cagnes, Feb 2

It has been almost a week since the first race horse in which I have a couple of legs ran her first race in France and came in 4th at Cagnes-sur-Mer in the Prix de l'Ile Sainte Marguérite. Turfoo had given her 5th place. Our trainer Gina Rarick didn't expect her to place. She was short on work. Very short on work.

Elbow had spent a week or so in mid-transport from her trainer's in England, Dr. Jon Scargill's Red House Stables in Newmarket, Suffolk, at a stud closer to the English Channel, walking and trotting in a horse walker after being off training since November and placing 10th in her last race, a 1400 meter race in Salisbury on October 10. The weather had turned bad, the seas were heavy with strong gusts of wind, and the ports were closed. Elbow would have to cool her heals and put off seeing France until things quieted.

Looking at her race history alone does not give a prospective owner, or part owner, the chair

Elbow Beach is off to Cagnes

Elbow Beach and Hard Way, Maisons-Laffitte 

How many people get to say "My horse is racing next week"?

It's an extraordinary thing; in my life, anyway, and it makes as little sense, if you study the arc of my life, as one could imagine. You would have to have known me when I was very little and read about Alec Ramsay and Harry Dailey and Shêtân to begin to imagine I could find my way here. You would also have to know that I sometimes do unexpected things, irrational things, things that may or may not make sense once we can look back upon them from a comfortable vantage point years hence. Or, even next week, after Elbow Beach runs her first race in France at Cagnes-sur-Mer.

My horse is running next week in the hippodrome-on-the-sea, and it is an extraordinary thing, an exciting and thrilling thing. Anything is possible; every door is open; and, it could go anywhere. I have no idea, and that is just fine.

The word came from Agata today, "Elbow a volé aujourd'hui. Elle a trop bien bossé!!! On va s'amuser avec elle à Cagnes."

Elbow ran another gallop this morning on the piste jaune, where the fast training work is done at Maisons-Laffitte, along with the piste noire, which is no longer black since the sand was changes, but no matter, and she was stronger still than she had been in the two previous work-outs. She flew. She worked better than ever, and Gina Rarick has found a race for her next week, 1600 meters on Thursday. It's 100 meters more than she has been used to doing, but Agata, who has ridden her in most of her training, and all of her fast work, doesn't think the extra 100 meters will pose any problem for this gray dappled 3-year-old filly with the white face, and with character to spare.

The night I met her, her first at Gina's yard, she made an impression. Her box full of women and a black Labrador retriever, she showed everyone interest, moving her white head about on her long ash gray neck. Nothing escaped her attention, everything merited her curiosity. Over the next month, she won our affection and our respect. A young mare who uses her neck the way a mother uses her hands on her baby, she stroked my back and my legs with her neck, a horse's way of hugging you, running her muzzle over me. Like with Sunrise, I could stand at her box door and press mine to hers and feel her press back against me, blowing gently into my face.

And then, quite of a sudden, after her last splendid fast workout Monday morning, she swung her head and clocked me. I heard my nose crack. The sound of cartilage moving to places it should not be with respect to the attributes of one's face. My hand flew to my nose, protecting it, testing it, and I shouted at her. Had I the presence of mind I ought to have had, she'd have had a whack back, too. I chose to believe that she didn't mean it and hurried over to Agata in the barn to tell her my war story. I had been baptized.

"Ah oui!" said Agata, "Ca se voit!"

"Hé oui, et ça se sent aussi!"

She assured me it wasn't turning too blue, nor was it swelling much, yet, and I followed her to the medicine cabinet, where she soaked a square of gauze in something and handed it to me.

"C'est de l'arnica. Essuie ça partout sur ton nez." I did as instructed. It smelled sharp. "Tiens, prends-en 5." She handed me a little plastic vial, tinted light blue. "C'est de l'arnica."

I held the gauze to my nose and turned the vial about, trying to figure how to get the whatever they were out of the small hole in the top.

"Non," said Agata, taking the vial, "tu le tournes, comme ça." 5 little round white pellets dropped into my available palm.

"Je les avale, comme ça?"

"Non," she corrected me, "tu les mets sous la langue, et tu les laisses fondre, comme ça."

I slipped them under my tongue and waited for them to dissolve, hoping the bruise would never appear. It didn't, nor did the feared swelling, but the nose is still tender, however, that is nothing next to Agata's fesses, after Triple Tonic was through with her a little later in the morning, having succeeded at dumping her on a third, or so, violent turn of the hind end. Ah, them's the breaks in this business. If you hear a report of a crater discovered on one of the allées of the park at Maisons-Laffitte, Agata commented the next day on Facebook, know that it was no meteor. No. It was Agata's butt.

I think we have not one, but two horses ready to race: Elbow Beach and Triple Tonic, who has lost most of her 3-year-old season due to nagging viral infections, but who now seems ready to attack her 4-year-old season with a vengeance.

Who says fixation d'abcès is an outmoded treatment in this day of penicillin? Ask TT.




And, so, I'm off to Nice for a day or two next week. Gina has looked up cheap flights (I am not a wealthy owner, nor will I be one for long, just yet), and all that remains to be seen is making sure my dogs don't get bladder infections waiting for someone to let them out to relieve themselves in my absence. I think my husband will cover that. There is no way I want to miss my first race as an owner, even if I can't be listed as such yet by France Galop. Like Agata said, we're all -- Gina, Agata, me and her other owner for her time here in France -- looking forward to having some fun, while it lasts, and perhaps to making a bit of money, thanks to Elbow. Her other owner will be flying over from the States to see her race a little later in February,.

I have the champagne packed. All I need is the blue stuff.

Meanwhile, the yard's favorite ATM-on-four-legs, Deep Ocean, ridden by his usual jockey, Gérald Pardon, took 5th in his first race back in his native south of France, beating two horses from his old yard before he moved to Maisons-Laffitte in November. While he was believed to have difficulties running "left-handed", which Gina believed was actually due to other factors that happened to coincide with left-handed race courses, that seemed to bother him less than his starting position on the inside, and his over-trimmed feet from his new shoeing down in Cagnes. Imagine trimming your nails past the quick. He ran on that.

Which might also explain his unruliness, out of character for him, prior to entering the starting gate. He was a handful.

Oh well, nails grow and boo-boos heal.
....

Elbow Beach, January 22

Elbow Beach, "canter"

Guilain and Hard Way

When you take a terrific photograph and find one little thing missing, it's enough to ruin the photo. Sam walked by, looked at the series from this morning's visit to Gina's yard, and said, "That's a great photo. Too bad you don't see his eye; it would be perfect then." Now, all I can see is the eye you can't see behind Hard Way's mane. I keep it for its other qualities, and the fun we were having when he and Agata got back from Hard Way's and Elbow Beach's "canter", or gallop on the piste jaune at Maisons-Laffitte this morning.

Elbow was being a little silly walking up the road to the training center the other day, lost her balance and brushed her ankle against the sidewalk border, skinning herself like a little kid, which she is. Yesterday, the "canter" -- the French call canter "galop de chasse" and gallop "canter" -- that was supposed to take place and motivated me to get up out of bed and make the predawn drive to Maisons-Laffitte, my husband getting himself up out of bed and following me to make it an outing, was cancelled since she had a little inflammation from her boo-boo.

The "canter" was rescheduled for today, come what may, but instead of taking it side-by-side, race style, Agata and Gina decided to keep Elbow behind Hard Way and take it a little easy. Just in case. Having already lost one of the yard's best hopes for the winter season in Cagnes-sur-Mer, Satwa Sunrise, in a claimer on opening day, having another, Magic, down for several months (1 down and 2 or 3 to go; I can't remember. It's awful either way), seeing teeny, tiny Milly flounder on the fibersand in her first race in France, Elbow just has to get fit, avoid injury and race to win, or at least to place.

She also needs to do this because she is the horse in which I have two legs, the front or the rear, or the near or the far side; take your pick. I'll take any two, as long as they are healthy, strong and fast. Very fast. Elbow is a sprinter, running the 1200 to 1500 meter races, and she has come to France to add value to her profile as a brood mare, worthy of the better covers, by increasing her chances of adding a few more wins to her racing career by having her start her 3-year-old season early in Cagnes. Normally, she will return to England in March, unless we can negotiate an additional race or two, or three, in Saint-Cloud and Chantilly for March.

She was to arrive a week before she did, but heavy winds and rough weather closed the Channel ports, and Elbow Beech spent an extra week walking and trotting in circles in the horse walker. She lost muscle she'd need to win, and Gina made the decision to keep her in training in Maisons-Laffitte, under Chantal and Agata's watchful eyes in the yard and Agata's knees on her shoulders on the track. Soon, the call will come to bring her down, or have her loaded into the STH horse transport truck and sent.

Meanwhile, I am left to imagine any number of possibilities. Elbow could give us all a thrill, make our season and add a little extra shine and cachet to Gina's reputation. But, Elbow could disappoint us; she could come up short, even just short of that. All the elements could be there and in place, and still she might not win; or, something might still be missing, but she'll turn out to have that special something in her spirit or heart that corrects a little missing muscle or an odd turn of foot, which, aside from losing balance from time to time out walking up the street, she does not have. That you can't know until you let them go on a racetrack and see what happens, although I felt certain that I could sense it in Sunrise the first time I went with her to Deauville.

For now, it's Schrodinger's cat, which would make a great name for a horse, except that it leaves room for a little doubt.

My ownership paperwork has gone to France Galop. I have chosen my colors, and even decided on the rug and the colors for the browband of the bridle. I'm not telling. It would be nice to see my silks on the jockey's back, but mostly, though, I hope to see the horse whose training I at least help finance bring a little glory to the yard.

Agata and Elbow Beach

Today, I stood on the grass mound between the two pistes jaunes, and I waited in the quiet morning. I listened to two birds turn in the sky overhead, crying out to each other, and perhaps other birds, somewhere, and waited for the dark spots to appear in the distance. As I arrived, hooves thundering on the sand announced the arrival of another line of horses out for a "canter". I crossed the track and trained my lens on them. When they had past, blowing in cadence with their pace, I watched for them to turn and reappear, coming up the other side. They didn't, and I turned back to look back to the west and squinted.

The tractor dragging the harrow appeared on the far horizon and approached at a funereal pace. All morning the tractor pulls the harrow the length of the tracks, for walking, for trotting, for cantering, and for galloping. all morning, every day of the week. I prepared to greet the driver, when he'd eventually pass. An intentional , single nod of the head and a smile. He'd perhaps raise a hand from the wheel to say good morning back.

"Il doit en faire des kilometres, le type qui conduit le tracteur," my husband had said yesterday, watching the tractor make its way around a curve and down a track Sunday morning.

I watched him approach, and then, two horses appeared, tearing up the sand. They passed him, and kept on coming. I squinted again and thought I saw a streak of white. Elbow. I removed the lens cap and zoomed in, the horses came closer, and I could see the gray-spotted chest above the dark legs and the bright pink stars on Agata's helmet. I wanted to put the camera down and just watch them. Listen to them. It only lasts seconds before they have approached, streaked past, hooves throwing sand up behind their flying tails, and disappear into the dimness of the morning light at the end of the piste. Gone.

Agata on Elbow Beach

And then, they reappear, coming back up the far track. They have made the turn at the bottom, undistinguished by my eyes. I put my lens cap on, walk down the wood planked steps and cross the parallel stretch of piste to go and wait for them, listen for their four-beat galop de chasse come toward me. Usually, I stand there with Gina. Before Christmas, New Year's and now Cagnes, perhaps with another trainer or two, who would chat with Gina about their horses while we waited. Today, there was only I to ask how they breathed and moved, how quickly they recovered. I am no trainer, but I asked, and I was offered the graciousness of a reply.

"Comment va sa respiration?" I asked Agata, feeling a little nervous. I didn't wish to appear like I thought I was more in a position to ask than I was.

"Impéccable," said Agata. "Elle a récupéré plus rapidement aujourd'jui que la dernière fois, aussi," she added. I felt grateful for the extra information. Elbow was making progress.

"Et Hard Way," I said to Guilain, who puts up with me very sweetly, "ça serait super s'il pouvait aller à Cagnes et courir," I said.

"Il va tout seul, lui," came the reply: he goes all on his own, that one.

Not to Cagnes, of course, but on a racetrack.

The problem with Hard Way, and why he hasn't left already, is that he is a lot to handle in training, and Gina needs someone like Guilain to do the speed work with him, only there isn't certain to be someone on hand to do that work when she needs it done down there. Hard Way, Gina has explained to me, lays all his weight, all 600 or so kilos, in your hands, and you carry him. He doesn't use the bit to support himself and run, and that is exhausting. But, with Magic injured, Sunrise claimed, Milly being new to anything that's not turf, tiny and uncertain, it would be something to see Hard Way back racing, in Cagnes, and Elbow taking a victory would be a dream come true.

After they cantered back off, I looked left and then right, crossed back over the pistes, headed through the gate, look left and then right again and climbed into the car to drive back over to the yard and start Magic's box. I slipped her halter over her nose and fastened it behind her near ear and turned her on her good hind foot to attach her to the short lead at the rear wall, only she moved easily. Sometimes she moves with a pronounced limp and hop still. She stood there and worked her bit, rubbing it against the concrete wall. I went and emptied the wheelbarrow, the better to fill it again.

The sun was just beginning to light up the patches between the trees in the park when I dumped the first wheelbarrow of hay in the pit and forked it up onto the lovely, squared pile. It was rising straight in front of me through the trees at the end of the stable when I stuck my head out, sometime later, hearing their hooves clomp back into the yard. I grabbed my camera, and ended up with two series: the red series of Guilain and Hard Way and the blue series of Agata and Elbow Beach in my favorite studio, Gina Rarick's yard in Maisons-Laffitte, and some of my favorite subjects these days, Gina, the horses she trains, and the people around them.
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