Belmont named an overnight stakes race on the 25SEP09 card after 11 year old gelding Spooky Mulder. The Spook raced 84 times, won 34 races and earned $950K. What the numbers do not show is that he was born with tremendous courage. His gameness set him apart from other racehorses. There were many races were he looked beaten, but then he would pull victory from the grasps of defeat.
Among the cold hearted track degenerates the Spook had a cult following; these are among the most captious hardboots one could attempt to please. The Spook melted their hearts like they were made of butter. While other horses generally have brief careers Spooky Mulder held his form from his first race in 2001 -a $30K maiden claimer at Turfway; he won his first race- to his last win at Monmouth in 2008. In between he won dozens of allowance and claiming races. He finally won an elusive stakes race capturing an overnight stakes at Delaware in 2007.
It was nice to hear from Jason Blewitt on the "Belmont in 30" broadcast that Spooky Mulder has been retired to Scott Lake's family farm. The measure of racing's humanity is in the respect afforded to horses like Spooky Mulder in retirement. It seems like Spooky Mulder will have a fine retirement with lots of friends to race against on the pasture in Annapolis Maryland.
Best Of Spooky Mulder
Power cap- existential handicapping
Showing posts with label spooky mulder. Show all posts
Showing posts with label spooky mulder. Show all posts
26 September 2009
29 April 2009
15SEP 2001
The 15th of September 2001 is the day 11 year old gelding Spooky Mulder broke his maiden at first asking at Turfway in a 30K maiden claimer. 8 years, 81 races and 33 wins later he is still racing. He is entered at Belmont on Saturday for a 35K tag as a main track only in a 6 furlong turf sprint. He is an amazing gelding and I don't think I know of a horse that has given so much for so long at the track.
17 May 2008
Is Overbreeding to Native Dancer Responsible For All Of These Breakdowns?
Very interesting article by William Nack on the overbreeding to Native Dancer and how that is causing so many breakdowns in American racehorses. They just may be on to something, so I did some work on pedigree query researching the pedigrees of every high profile breakdown victim of the last few years. Every single one of them had multiple crosses of Native dancer in their pedigree, representing massive inbreeding. It inspired me to take a closer look at pedigree and breakdowns.
On the flip side I did some research on some of our old warriors. The iron horses that have campaigned year after year, virtually injury free. Out of a selection iron horses like Evening Attire, Spooky Mulder, Naughty New Yorker, Broad Brush, Say Florida Sandy and Arromanches only Broad Brush is free of Native Dancer blood so it is very hard to even find a horse out there without the Native Dancer blood. However most of the old warriors are not inbreed to Native Dancer like the tragic breakdown victims Eight Belles, Barbaro, George Washington, Mending Fences, and Pine Island. Most of the old warriors had balanced pedigrees with sound influences like Damascus well represented in the pedigree.
On a similar note there is the offspring of Unbridled and how it relates to Eight Belles. On youtube they have the ABC pre-race coverage of the 1990 Belmont Stakes available for viewing. It it an interesting watch as you can catch a glimpse of the game before drugs like Lasix were legal everywhere. Before the Belmont Stakes the hosts of the coverage openly doubt the favorite Unbridled's ability to race in New York due to the lack of lasix in New York. At the time New York was the only triple crown jurisdiction to restrict the use of lasix. As they hit the 3/8th pole Unbridled spit the bit. Did he spit the bit because he could not race on his anti-bleeding medication? The horses effort was completely unlike his derby triumph 5 weeks earlier when he had the benefit of lasix. Unbridled is of course the Sire of Unbridleds Song who retired unsound early in his three year old season and is the sire of Eight Belles. Could this be a case of a unsound, drug addicted sire passing his unsound genetic DNA to generation after generation?
On the flip side I did some research on some of our old warriors. The iron horses that have campaigned year after year, virtually injury free. Out of a selection iron horses like Evening Attire, Spooky Mulder, Naughty New Yorker, Broad Brush, Say Florida Sandy and Arromanches only Broad Brush is free of Native Dancer blood so it is very hard to even find a horse out there without the Native Dancer blood. However most of the old warriors are not inbreed to Native Dancer like the tragic breakdown victims Eight Belles, Barbaro, George Washington, Mending Fences, and Pine Island. Most of the old warriors had balanced pedigrees with sound influences like Damascus well represented in the pedigree.
On a similar note there is the offspring of Unbridled and how it relates to Eight Belles. On youtube they have the ABC pre-race coverage of the 1990 Belmont Stakes available for viewing. It it an interesting watch as you can catch a glimpse of the game before drugs like Lasix were legal everywhere. Before the Belmont Stakes the hosts of the coverage openly doubt the favorite Unbridled's ability to race in New York due to the lack of lasix in New York. At the time New York was the only triple crown jurisdiction to restrict the use of lasix. As they hit the 3/8th pole Unbridled spit the bit. Did he spit the bit because he could not race on his anti-bleeding medication? The horses effort was completely unlike his derby triumph 5 weeks earlier when he had the benefit of lasix. Unbridled is of course the Sire of Unbridleds Song who retired unsound early in his three year old season and is the sire of Eight Belles. Could this be a case of a unsound, drug addicted sire passing his unsound genetic DNA to generation after generation?
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