Oh The Excuses

- I got an email from a reader who told me that he/she has a small piece of a Team Valor horse, and thus receives their newsletter. It seems as if the stable has an excuse or three for the poor performance of Oh So Awesome at Gulfstream the other day. For one thing, he bled "as bad as a horse can bleed—5 on a scale of zip to 5." More descriptively, he "gushed....Team Valor has not had a horse bleed this bad in years," according to the newsletter.

In addition, the stable's co-owner Barry Irwin was quoted as blaming the jockey:

"Because the colt drew a good inside post position, Prado wanted to be able to take advantage of it, [so] he tried to rush the colt into a contending position leaving the gate. It did not work, as the colt failed to respond. This colt has no early speed and when you try to rush him and make him show some, it takes him right out of his rhythm.

"If that wasn’t bad enough, Prado made a second, and probably worse, error when he prematurely put the colt into a drive down the backstretch. Oh So Awesome responded this time, but instead of heeding Kimmel’s advice to stay wide at all costs, Edgar drove him right up into a pocket, where the colt [proceeded] to dissipate his energy and get frustrated.

"I have learned that most horses bleed badly when they are made to do something that is physically and emotionally uncomfortable."

And, Irwin didn't seem too thrilled with his trainer either.

"I like [John] Kimmel and he generally is thoroughly professional, but as Oh So Awesome was preparing for this race, Kimmel was at a vet convention in New Orleans, after which he went on vacation with his son. And now he is watching him run on television. This is not exactly what
we had in mind when we gave the horse to him."

No mention of global warming or Bill Clinton as being at fault, but perhaps those will be excuses for next time.