Pimlico paints its weathervane the colors of the winning Preakness horse. After this Preakness, the track should paint it the colors of Bodexpress.
Justify after winning the Preakness Stakes on his way to becoming the 13th Triple Crown winner. (That’s trainer Bob Baffert in the red tie.) With no Triple Crown on the line this season, the action remains centered on the fallout from Maximum Security’s disqualification at the Kentucky Derby. Photograph courtesy Maryland Governor’s Office.
April is the cruelest month,” T.S. Eliot began his poem “The Waste Land.” But T.S. — we hesitate to be overly familiar and call him Tom — what about May?
Threats to and from Iran, the continuing abortion divide, tariff wars, the stock market bouncing around like a knuckleball again: The only thing that is certain these days is, of course, uncertainty, making us all uneasy.
In the past, culture — specifically, arts and entertainment and sports — has provided stability in a destabilized world. But the real world keeps intruding on these parallel worlds that are framed differently by time and space.
Read More“Sleeping Hermaphroditus,” a second century Roman copy of a Hellenistic work, marble. Musée du Louvre. The mythical figure, child of the Greek gods Hermes and Aphrodite, was said to be both male and female.
The Court of Arbitration for Sport in Lausanne, Switzerland, has ruled that elite South African runner and Olympic champion Caster Semenya cannot compete with other women in endurance races, because her body naturally produces too much testosterone, giving her an “unfair” advantage.
Read MoreWhirlaway — the only Triple Crown winner to win the Travers Stakes — had a tendency to veer toward the middle of the track in races.
The fallout continues from Maximum Security’s DQ in Saturday’s Kentucky Derby. Co-owner Gary West filed an appeal that was quickly shot down and will not run the horse in two weeks in the Preakness Stakes. That’s a shame because it could’ve been a kind of redemption and Maximum Security could’ve joined Man o’ War and Native Dancer as one of the greatest horses to never win the Derby. (Man o’ War’s owner, August Belmont Jr. — the Belmont Stakes was named after his father — thought his colt too young for the Derby. And the Dancer lost the 1953 Derby to Dark Star in a race in which his jockey, Eric Guerin, was criticized for taking “that colt everywhere around the track except the ladies’ room”.) It was the only race that the Dancer ever lost.
Read MoreThose who were hoping that the 145th Run for the Roses would revive horse racing’s fortunes were jostled by winner Maximum Security being DQed.
And that’s why they call it a horse race.
After the favorite, Omaha Beach, was scrapped earlier in the week, the new favorite and winner, Maximum Security, was disqualified for drifting into the lane of War of Will. As a result, Country House — a 65-to-1 shot — was declared the winner. Code of Honor finished second and Tacitus, third.
Read MoreEnd of a quarterback, birth of an icon, as captured by AP.
Colin Kaepernick’s collusion case against the NFL is now one for the record books, though no numbers have been reported. Such is the way with private settlements. My uncle said he probably got $40 million. I think he got at least twice that. The NFL isn’t merely buying his silence in a suit that he may well have won. They’re saying adios to an activist player.
Read MoreColin Kaepernick (number 7) is set to throw a pass in Super Bowl XLVIII on Feb. 3, 2013.
“New England Patriots legend Tom Brady will be playing in his record ninth Super Bowl on Sunday, while the Los Angeles Rams’ 24-year-old signal-caller, Jared Goff, will be playing in his first. But no quarterback looms over the NFL like one who has not set foot on an NFL field since the 2016 season — former San Francisco 49er Colin Kaepernick,” Michael A. Fletcher writes on The Undefeated.
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