Tue, 21 October, 1997
Hi Al,
I need to apologize for how terribly long it has taken me to get this
edition of TRN out. My theory has been if it's not one thing, it is
twenty--story of my life.
Well, Lone Star is back open for it's fall Meeting of Champions, as they
entitled it. This is a mixed QH/TB meet with a few Paint, App, and Arabian races tossed in for good measure. Quite frankly, the TB races seem purely to be token races--all the quality lies with the QHs. Not only are there QH stakes, but there are several graded QH stakes--a status which has not yet been achieved for the TB meet (I think that is due to the rules governing grading of stakes by the different ruling bodies, and not due to poor quality on the part of the TB races).
Lone Star has been upholding their spirit of ingenuity in marketing
horseracing. I love it. One of the biggest weekends every year in Dallas is the weekend of the Texas vs OU college football game held here. This is a long-lived rivalry that arouses strong feelings in both sides. Not to be left out, Lone Star held a "Texas v Oklahoma" type weekend as well. The very first race to be held was a 870 yd match race between a Texas QH and an Oklahoma TB. The Texas QH smoked the Oklahoma TB by about 9 lengths. Although it is not uncommon to see a QH hold off a TB at that distance, I have to wonder how those two particular contestants were chosen....Another race to follow was a stakes race pitting Texas-bred QHs against OKlahoma-bred QHs. I have to admire the imagination that goes into planning racing events which utilize outside events and harness them in a way that draws new racing fans.
Lone Star is now using television for more than just advertising
commercials. On Saturday mornings at 9 a.m (Central time) KXTS airs the
Lone Star Park Report. This report is put on by LSP, and is hosted by Dave Appleton and Gary West. This show previews events and racing coming to LS and gives a recap of the previous week's racing. I enjoy Gary West's insight--although he is not perfect, I feel he has a better grasp of what is going on than some of the other people that handicap the races. I don't particularly care for Dave Appleton's stage presence, but hopefully he just needs a little more experience.
This past weekend was the Texas Fall Mixed sale, although I never would
have known, as Fasig-Tipton didn't send my catalogue out until very late--I just got it yesterday, the day after the sale. I haven't had a chance to go through the whole catalogue or to get the fax results of the sale, but my initial impression was that the mares, at least, were not such a good quality (with an occasional exception). I will take a better look at the catalogue and the sale results, and report that next time.
Well, this edition of TRN was long in coming, and is going to have to be a bit shorter on information than I would like, but if I don't get this out now, my computer will surely crash again. I want to thank all the readers of TRN that have been e-mailing me, urging me to write more. It is nice to hear your comments, and I appreciate your following.
Jill
The Running Horse (http://www.isd1.com/)