Not This Time

Always in the bridal party, but never the bride, it was finally her time in the Sunday feature at Keeneland. Having been the runner-up against elite company last year, In Our Time (Not This Time) put it all together in the lane and kicked home smartly to secure her career-first graded black-type in the GII Giant's Causeway Stakes. Traditionally found at the head of affairs, the Not This Time mare hit the board seven times from eight starts last year with her seasonal highlight reel including a runner-up effort two...

Miller Racing's Claret Beret (Not This Time) hit the front at the top of the Oaklawn Park stretch and refused to be pulled back by a charging Nitrogen (Medaglia d'Oro) to win the GI Apple Blossom Stakes, a 'Win and You're In' for this year's GI Breeders' Cup Distaff at Keeneland. The now 5-year-old mare has shown a remarkable uptick in form since being claimed by Saffie Joseph Jr. just about one year. Since winning her first start for him at Gulfstream, a $70,000 handicap race by 19 3/4 lengths,...

As we acknowledged a week ago, the contributions made by these horses to what we can turn into a narrative are wholly random. But it has meanwhile felt almost as though Gun Runner wanted to prove otherwise, after watching Into Mischief's feisty response to the spectacle of Not This Time stealing an early march in the general sires' table. Gun Runner's role in that exchange was to retreat sulkily to the wings, lamenting the injury to his top Classic prospect Paladin. Well, he's obviously too good for that. On the...

Keeneland's spring meet has kicked off and the GI Kentucky Derby is less than a month away. Let's take a look back at the recently concluded first quarter of 2026, where we got to enjoy 78 (19%) of the 410 graded races scheduled domestically for this year. Thus far in 2026, the 78 graded races already run can be categorized as six Grade I events, 21 Grade II, and 51 Grade III. Eight tracks across the country hosted graded races, led by Gulfstream Park's 24 and Santa Anita's 22. There...

Further Ado (Gun Runner) announced his presence with a jaw-dropping 20-length maiden win at Keeneland last fall. The 'TDN Rising Star, presented by Hagyard' returns to Lexington as the horse to beat in Saturday's GI Toyota Blue Grass S., good for 100-50-25-15-10 points to the top five finishers on the Road to the Kentucky Derby. The Spendthrift Farm colorbearer was a workmanlike winner of the GII Kentucky Jockey Club S. at Churchill Downs Nov. 29, then kicked off his 3-year-old campaign with a solid second-place finish behind The Puma (Essential...

Payson Stud's breeding program has been a fixture in the Thoroughbred industry for more than four decades, built by the late Virginia Kraft Payson. Since Mrs. Payson's passing in 2023, trustee Christian Erickson has carried her legacy forward, and I've been fortunate to serve as bloodstock advisor to the program. Our goal in recent years has been simple: upgrade the broodmare band. That goal led to some of the hardest--and best--decisions we've made. Together with the team at Gainesway Farm, we sold foundation mare Summer Sweet, the dam of champion...

Well, he's not going to give it up without a fight. Yes, of course the whole narrative is random: he can hardly sit the boys down, tell them to get out there and remind everyone who's boss. But however unwittingly, Into Mischief has certainly obliged us with a dramatic and immediate response to the first serious test of his monopoly since claiming a first general sires' title in 2019. It has been clear for a while that the eventual succession was likely to concern Not This Time and Gun Runner,...

When Dubai welcomed the world to old Nad Al Sheba Racecourse for the first time in 1996, 'America's Horse' Cigar repelled what seemed an inevitable challenge from compatriot Soul of the Matter to help cement His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Makoum's goal of creating a worldwide Thoroughbred spectacle in the Emirates. The eyes of the racing public were on sprawling Meydan Racecourse Saturday for the 30th renewal of the G1 Dubai World Cup Sponsored By Emirates--at $12 million now worth three times original pot--and Japan's Horse of the...

TDN's Senior Racing Editor Steve Sherack provides analysis for Saturday's GI Curlin Florida Derby at Gulfstream Park and GI Arkansas Derby at Oaklawn Park. Both offer 100-50-25-15-10 points on the Road to the Kentucky Derby. Last Saturday's Results - Black Hornet (Essential Quality) looked to be making a winning move on the far turn, but cornered poorly and packed it in from there to finish eighth at 16-1 in the GIII Jeff Ruby Steaks. Blacksmith (Liam's Map) failed to get involved early and was a no-show sixth at 6-1 in...

Well, just take a look at the video--and then show us a horse more eligible for stardom, the year the soccer World Cup comes to America. As a yearling, he would roll a beach ball around his paddock 45 minutes at a time. Using his feet, his nose, arching his body. As a rule, other youngsters on the farm do no more than pick it up with their teeth, shake it. "And that kind of gives you the essence of this colt," Kris Gibbons suggests. "We just want to stop...

Caravel (Mizzen Mast--Zeezee Zoomzoom, by Congrats), who is owned by John Stewart's Resolute Bloodstock, lost her Frankel colt due to complications with her pregnancy, according to a tweet on X by the owner early on Thursday morning. In the post Stewart said, "It It is with great sadness that we report that Breeders' Cup champion Caravel lost her 2026 FRANKEL colt due to complications with her pregnancy. It was a freak issue that could not have been avoided. The Resolute farm team monitors all the mares very closely." On X...

After finishing fifth and seventh, respectively, in Saturday's GII Azeri Stakes at Oaklawn Park, Tracy Farmer's La Cara (Street Sense--Cara Caterina, by Bernardini) and Shortleaf Stable's Quietside (Malibu Moon--Benner Island, by Speightstown) have each been retired. La Cara, a homebred for Farmer conditioned by Mark Casse, won both the GI Central Bank Ashland Stakes and GI DK Horse Acorn Stakes in 2025, in addition to the 2024 GIII Pocahontas Stakes and last year's Suncoast Stakes. The now-4-year-old bay made two starts in 2026, finishing off the board each time. She...