Amanda Luby

I have enormous respect for TDN writer Chris McGrath and Wayne Lyster. One's an outstanding journalist and eloquent writer who works for an essential trade publication; and, the other's built a highly-successful breeding operation. I, nevertheless, must respectfully disagree with their characterization of calls for replacing dirt tracks with synthetic surfaces as "hysterical." While I cherish racing's dirt traditions (my goodness, Man o' War is my favorite horse of all-time), I'm also mindful of existing data that explicitly show that synthetic racing is the safest surface in the U.S. Numbers...

In racing, there is nothing more horrific than watching a horse break down in front of you. My heart goes out to every person connected with each of the horses that has lost its life in this manner and to each fan who's witnessed this. As my husband said after Maple Leaf Mel's tragic end, "They're just innocent animals!" He left immediately after her death, horrorstruck, and, fortunately, was not at the track on Travers Day. Like countless other casual fans who've seen such awful things, it is unlikely that...

I didn't realize how badly I wanted Jena Antonucci to win the GI Belmont S. Saturday until Arcangelo slipped up the rail and drove past National Treasure under a perfect ride by Javier Castellano and I started screaming at the TV and feverishly clapping the horse onto the wire. It wasn't until Arcangelo crossed the wire first and Javier pumped his fist in the air that I started jumping up and down, tears streaming down my face, that I realized how much it mattered to me, a nearly 50-year-old woman...