erinfinnegan: The Kentucky Derby

Irresponsible Manga Reviewer (

erinfinnegan) wrote,
@ 2008-05-08 11:22:00

The Kentucky Derby
The Kentucky Derby was pretty tragic. A filly named Eight Belles came in second, then collapsed with two broken ankles and was euthanized right there on the track. Keith (a Kentucky resident and derby enthusiast) said they used shoot them on the spot, which was unnerving. I had to look up why horses can't survive with broken legs. It reminded me of a movie I've never seen, They Shoot Horses, Don't They? from 1969.

Only three fillies have won the derby in 134 years (source: New York Times). Eight Belles was the first filly to run the Derby in nine years. She won five of her nine career starts in her short three year life. I'm pretty sure only three-year-old horses run the Derby.

Like many 12-year-old nerd girls with frizzy hair, I went through a phase about horses. I read nearly all the books in the Black Stallion series, all of which were total crap after the first one. My enthusiasm for horses manifested in a series of riding lessons and an obsession with the Kentucky Derby. In a junior high computer class we had to create a database (possibly in Lotus 1-2-3) so I created a database of Derby winners. On a family vacation to the south I forced my family to visit the Derby museum at Churchill Downs.

The Black Stallion never ran the Kentucky Derby in the book, but his daughter totally did in The Black Stallion's Filly. My favorite book from the series was the bizarre The Island Stallion Races, which had to introduce a sci-fi element in order to get the Black Stallion's rival off a desert island so they could race officially.

My enthusiasm for horses dwindled as I kind of realized I would never own one, and I kind of didn't ever want to own a horse. What gets me about my 12-13 year old obsession is the total innocence of it. I didn't know anything about gambling, for example. I didn't know anything about the infield parties, as described by Hunter S. Thompson.

No horse has won the Triple Crown since Affirmed in 1978. I'm super-annoyed, since I was born in 1979. I keep waiting for another horse to win it.

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paulfear
2008-05-08 03:57 pm UTC (link)

well, the day before the derby is the Kentucky Oaks, they had a horse in that race, or one just before it was run that suffered the same injury as Barbaro and will likely get put down as well. so, two on one weekend. i doubt many people in crowd notice, especially the infield as that is more like spring break or a girls gone wild video shoot.

i'm from kentucky and grew up next to two horse farms and a cattle farm. there for i hate cows and horses with a passion. race horses especially, they're more inbred than the russian royal family was. they keep breeding this horses out of the same blood lines hoping to get the next coming of Man-O-War or Secretariat and end up making extremely brittle and feeble creatures.

my sister was born in 1973, the year Secretariat won the Triple Crown and i was born in 1977 the year Seattle Slew won the Triple Crown, i was actually born the day Seattle Slew won the Kentucky Derby. wee ha.

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syringavulgaris
2008-05-08 06:11 pm UTC (link)

1. Yes, only three-year-olds run in the Derby.

2. But did you have a Breyer horse collection?

3. On my 16th birthday, Mom made me a race-course cake, with horses and everything. She printed out a race program to go with it, each horse being a different flavor of ice cream, with the jockey being whichever family member liked that flavor. Best. birthday. evar.

4. I have mint now and meant to make mint juleps for Derby Day, but forgot.

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erinfinnegan
2008-05-08 07:35 pm UTC (link)

2. I had a dozen or less Breyer horses, (including the Black Stallion set), but was never a serious collector. My 100+ My Little Ponies were a more formidable collection. On the aforementioned vacation there was a Breyer collectors' show going on, which we perused.

In retrospect I wonder if the Black Stallion thing eased a transition from My Little Ponies into... I dunno, high school?

I left a few Breyer models out around my room through high school, and people always, always commented on them and asked if I had gone through a horse phase. I put so many of them away! I didn't think the accusations were fair.

3. That is literally the coolest cake I have ever heard of. I thought my custom Fox Trot (comic strip) cake was awesome but that might Win.

4. OMG Keith couldn't find mint for love or money on Derby Day!!! I need your mint... for late juleps. How long does it keep?

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	syringavulgaris 2008-05-08 07:58 pm UTC (link)
	Well, I have a bunch of mint growing in the backyard, and will continue to all through the season. Once picked, if you wrap it carefully and keep it cool and damp I imagine it should keep several days. (Reply to this)(Parent)

melengro
2008-05-08 08:29 pm UTC (link)

LOL HUNTER S. THOMPSON. I wish I could get away with half of the shit that he did. Er, without the drugs.

That article about horse's legs and laminitis and the heart was quite harrowing to read. It made me feel so sorry for Eight Belles, Barbaro...oh, God, my own horse phase may be over, but I still love them, and it hurts me to see these things happen.

HORSES ARE SUPPOSED TO LIVE FOR THIRTY YEARS, NOT THREE, DAMN IT!

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	erinfinnegan 2008-05-08 10:55 pm UTC (link)
	I dunno, man, live fast, die hard! (Reply to this)(Parent)

ltsk
2008-05-08 11:08 pm UTC (link)

I've always hated watching horse racing, even as a kid, as I knew they killed the horses on the track when they "broke down" (like a car! get it? *uck*) and that they were cruel to them, they overbred them, they killed them to win bets or get insurance, etc. (Having older, horse-loving sisters and a horse-loving mom, I learned a lot about horses and racing that maybe most seven-year olds shouldn't hear.) My mom likes to watch the big races, though, and I'd heard they were going to race a filly in the Derby, so I had to watch.

I knew Eight Belles wouldn't win with Big Brown on the track, but I was still rooting for her, and when she came in a respectable second, I cheered for her.

I haven't been able to keep myself from reading all of the articles I can find about Eight Belles my mom's NYT (she gets it delivered) this week. It bothered me because 1) I always hate it when one of the horses gets injured, 2) she was an excellent horse, and 3) it was a sincerely fucked-up injury. One of the large animal vets I've heard interviewed said he'd never heard of a horse coming up with that kind of injury a quarter of a mile after it's passed the finish line. Something was sincerely wrong.

You know it's perfectly legal to give the horse steroids? So not only are they overbred to have large, powerful bodies on over-thin legs, but their bones are weakened by the 'roids.

I really don't like people in horse racing. I'm sure they're mostly nice, but....

Edited at 2008-05-08 11:10 pm UTC

(Reply to this)

	readilbert 2008-05-09 03:36 am UTC (link)
	For a second, I thought it was Julie who post this :\| I read the same news in WSJ yesterday, it's just so sad. :( (Reply to this)

	nancaurelia 2008-06-10 07:03 pm UTC (link)
	Yeah, I read all those Black Stallion books as a kid too, and loved them. Apparently it is part of a girl's normal early-teen development to build an emotional attachment to a creature that's bigger, stronger and stupider than us. Oops. Sorry about that last part. Yes, it certainly was heart-breaking about Eight Belles. (Reply to this)

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