Tuesday Backstretch With Gordon

Let's start with a spelling bee this morning. S-T-U-P-I-D. Let's use it in a sentence. Gordon is S-T-U-P-I-D because he left his umbrella in the car this morning after arriving at The Red Mile and it started to pour as he made his way around the backstretch.

Yes, you can say ‘Hi, Stupid' to me when you see me as it was a drenching morning at the racetrack. I got soaked and I am now going to need back-up shoes for my back-up shoes after making my way through the mud puddles. For those keeping score, the rainy days over the past couple weeks are far outnumbering the non-rainy days. The forecast calls for the rain to finally stop tonight, and by the time Thursday arrives for the afternoon race card, A HIGH OF 78 AND SUNNY!

I had made my way to the back of the barn area when the light mist turned to a downpour. I ducked for cover in Bob Bencal's barn and he was sitting and talking to Tom Merriman and Fred Grant. Freddy just got here for the last week of racing and the yearling sale, and I told him that I missed stopping at his barn and grabbing a donut. Tom told me that his brother Jack's house up in Inkster, Mich., recently burned to the ground, with a vintage car stored alongside also a casualty. Thankfully, nobody was home at the time.

Right across from the Bencal barn is the barn of the president of the Kentucky Harness Horsemen's Association, so despite the rain I traipsed over to say hello. The president of the KHHA thanked me for the mention yesterday, but please note that since I wrote yesterday he had used up his quotas of mentions, I'm not using his name.

People have asked me over the past couple of days if I've spoken to trainer Robin Schadt about the controversial DQ of Odds On Equuleus last Saturday night. I hadn't yet, but I made my way over to her barn this morning. There's a lot of firepower in that barn as Casie Coleman and Linda Toscano are also located there. I'm not sure, but is there a reason that this is a "female only” barn?

I talked to Robin and again, because she has filed an official appeal, I don't feel it proper to discuss some of the things that were said. Robin told me she had read the earlier Backstretch columns and she agreed with my approach. "It's just too bad that this happened because it's put a black cloud over the racing and the sale because it's all everybody is talking about,” she did tell me in summing up the conversation.

As I left and waved goodbye to Andrew, he said he'd see me at the sale tonight out at Fasig-Tipton. This is the first night of the sale that runs through Saturday. It will be a chance to see good friends Randy Manges and David Reid, who operate the sale. It will also be different because of the absence of Geoff Stein, who died last March.

I wanted to head over to Barn 33 to see Mark Austin, whose wife Julie and kids made it Lexington yesterday. I saw the Austin family at dinner last night, and it was nice to see Julie, who used to sit in my office at Hazel Park eons ago during the races and help out on occasion. But since the rain kept coming down, the trip was scratched.

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