Met Mile

I had a family day at Belmont today. The wife, kids and parents joined me to watch a few races, including Met Mile. It did not begin well. We arrived as the 4th race was starting and I had not handicapped the race because I did not expect to arrive so early. The 8 horse was pulled up and stumbled awkwardly down the stretch. I looked at my program and saw that this horse, Belarion (Belong to Me), was ridden by Edgar Prado. Just over a week after the Preakness and Mr. Prado is pulling up another injured horse. It was sad. The 4yo gelding was vanned off and I do not know his status. They ignored the whole thing on the recap show this evening.

After that, the day was great. The weather was perfect and Belmont was actually crowded. The races were entertaining and I took a few pictures:





The Met Mile winner, Silver Train, getting saddled.














Mr. Pletcher saddling Bandini



















Mr. Zito prepping Sun King














Now this was interesting. Wilko jumped up on his hind legs in the paddock. Mr. Noseda decided to saddle him on the move. It reminded me of Mr. Matz and Barbaro on Preakness day.





Patrick over at Pulling Hair and Betting Horses recently wrote about taking his daughter to the track for the first time. Today was our first time out as a family and it went a lot better than I could have imagined. I look forward to many more days at the track with them.