Still California (Chrome) dreaming

November 7, 2014

Our old friend California Chrome was back in action this past weekend for the Breeders’ Cup but it was a case of “close but no cigar” as Chrome finished third, a half-length behind winner Bayern, who may take Horse of the Year honors away from Chrome as well. (There was some controversy about Bayern bumping against Shared Belief out of the starting gate. But hey, stuff happens. The winner is, in the end, the winner.)

So now it’s on to Chrome’s career as a 4-year-old. Will he get stronger or fizzle? His owners have said they’ll be choosy about the races he’ll run in his 2015 campaign. It used to be that racehorses had the speed and endurance for the Triple Crown, the Breeders’ Cup and any race you might throw at them. Now they’re bred for speed and stud fees. Nothing like the quick kill, though you could hardly accuse Chrome’s people of that as they continue to race him.

Who knows if Chrome will get better or if we’ll see a Triple Crown winner again. We may just have to wait for “Criterion,” the third novel in my series “The Games Men Play,” about a racehorse trying to win the Triple Crown.

It’s told in part from the viewpoint of the racehorse. Given the subject matter of the first two books in my series, people keep asking me, perhaps not entirely facetiously: Is the racehorse gay? ...

Close, but no Cigar: The humanity of four-legged creatures (and the inhumanity of two-legged ones)

October 17, 2014

Am I the only one who is seriously disturbed by the rumblings that came out of the recent meetings between NFL commissioner Roger Goodell and his 32 bosses, uh, owners of the league’s teams?

Apparently, the league is considering the assignment of disciplinary actions to an outside committee, even though Goodell says his primary responsibility is to safeguard the integrity of the game. So wouldn’t the safeguarding of the game’s integrity require taking responsibility for disciplining miscreants? (An aside: This is a misuse of the word “integrity.” Goodell really means the game’s honesty. All integrity means is wholeness. The league could be wholly good or wholly bad. Either way it would still have integrity.)

English lessons aside, the real problem here is the absence of leadership. NBA commissioner Adam Silver had no trouble getting rid of former Los Angeles Clippers’ owner Donald Sterling after his racist remarks. So why should Goodell have trouble executing the new personal conduct policy the league is going to come up with? ...

Jessica Springsteen: She’s ‘the Boss’

September 15, 2014

Another Sunday, another equestrian event, this time the $200,000 American Gold Cup and Longines World Cup Qualifier CSI4* - W, presented at Old Salem Farm in North Salem Sept 14 by the farm and Stadium Jumping Inc.

The event, which capped five days of competition, saw Jessica Springsteen of her family’s Stone Hill Farm, lead an American sweep. Aboard her equally superb mount, Vindicat, Springsteen was flawless riding early in the draw and combined precision with speed in the jump-off to determine the winner among the immaculate riders. Laura Kraut out of Stars & Stripes road aggressively to give her a run for her money aboard Andretti. (Aren’t these horses well-named?) Katherine Dinan, riding Nougat du Vallet for Grant Road Partners LLC, captured the bronze.

Springsteen – yes, she’s the daughter of Bruce Springsteen and Patti Scialfa – has been trained by one of the best, Old Salem head trainer Frank Madden. ...

Polo and the essence of modernism

September 10, 2014

It was a sparkling climax to the season at the Greenwich Polo Club Sunday, Sept. 7 as Royal Salute held off a surging Casablanca 10-8 in a taut match for the Royal Salute Cup.

The match, spectators were told, featured the highest quality polo in the Northern Hemisphere, with Facundo Pieres, the No. 1-ranked player in the world, the legendary Martin Aguerre and Peter Brant, the Greenwich club’s founder, anchoring the team for Royal Salute, the Scotch whisky company, while Nick Manifold, who oversees the club, and 9-goaler Hilario Ulloa (10 is the highest ranking) doing the honors for Casablanca, a polo-gear company that has a store on tony Greenwich Avenue.

If you’ve never seen this ancient sport, which dates from the Persian Empire, then you’re missing something. Polo is fast, exciting and, I suspect, more than a little bit dangerous. Just to see the horses thunder down the green expanse (10 football fields), the riders swinging their mallets as they sometimes mix it up – nose to nose and haunch to haunch – is, well, thrilling.

And did I mention sexy? Polo players are among the most attractive, masculine men in the world. ...

Greenwich Polo Club update

July 3, 2014

There have been a few changes in the Greenwich Polo Club’s lineup since I last reported on the start of the season on June 1.

The July 13 match will now feature local artists and their works.

On Aug. 31, it’s the Virginia’s House of Hope Charity match from noon to 5 p.m. The second annual “Benefit of Hope” will have an open bar, tastings, entertainment and the time-honored tradition of halftime divot stomping, all in support of the charity’s Tugboat Program, which provides qualified candidates from underprivileged backgrounds with a career start in the maritime industry. (After the three-week program, each student is certified to work as a tugboat deckhand, which could ultimately lead to becoming a captain with a six-figure salary. House of Hope guarantees that each graduate is hired.) Tickets are $350 VIPs, $250 individuals...

The fault in our stars? More thoughts on California Chrome and the ‘unfairness’ of life

June 9, 2014

So Cinderella turned out to be just as unpalatable as her stepsisters. By that I mean that the world is a little less enamored of Steve Coburn since he started crying foul – repeatedly – after his horse, California Chrome, lost his Triple Crown bid at the Belmont Stakes to Tonalist, who didn’t run in the Kentucky Derby or Preakness.

I never thought Coburn and the partner were interesting. I mean, how classy can you be when you name your venture Dumb Ass Partners? No, what was fascinating, beautiful, a dream, was that bright as a penny of a horse with his blaze and four white socks and curiosity about us two-legged types and poise and smarts and heart and in the end, none of it was enough.

And that’s heartbreaking but such is life. I still agree with Coburn, though, that it isn’t fair to come into the Belmont all fresh as a daisy and play spoiler. And I see that plenty in the blogosphere were thinking what I was thinking: You have to play every round of the French Open to get to the final.

The end of a California (Chrome) dream

June 8, 2014

How is it that you can fall in love with someone you don’t know?

What if that someone were a horse?

Millions of us fell in love with California Chrome these past few weeks and millions of us got our hearts broken as he finished out of the money in Saturday’s Belmont Stakes, which increasingly seems to be won by a horse you don’t care about. This year it was Tonalist, who didn’t run in the Kentucky Derby or the Preakness. He’s named for an art principle. (In more than 30 years covering the arts, I never once used the term tonalism. Let’s just admit it’s a pretentious name, and leave it at that, shall we?)

Anyway, CC’s more voluble owner, Steve Coburn, did Chromies no favors...