Saratoga Special Edition and What To Do With A F***

The latest edition of Down The Stretch features a slew of stories about Saratoga. Once a year, DTS editor Peter Gross makes the trek to Saratoga Springs to golf, gush and gamble. Gross loves the Spa. As a result, each year one issue of the paper will be stuffed full of Saratoga goodness.

We have Saratoga ladies in hats.

We have an interview with Tom Durkin.

We have four pages chronicling Peter's version of Fear and Loathing in Saratoga Springs.

The issue also contains insight into the editorial process of Down The Stretch. Last month I submitted a story about the hard-working men of the Woodbine gate crew. The gate crew is a rough-and-tumble group of guys who occasionally use a cuss word or three. After a brief discussion with Peter to get some direction on how to deal with the quotes, I was advised, "just write it as is." So, into the story goes the following quote from crew chief Drew Brown about unruly horses, "If they fuck around like this, we put them on the starters list."

And they're off, under a menacing purple sky!


A couple weeks later the paper is published and I discover that my fuck has become a fuss. WTF? Apparently, our Associate Editor believed that the cuss word was unfit for publishing. Fair enough...but fuss?

As part of the story, I was able to sit in the gate for a race and got this close


At any rate, the issue is now sorted and any further expletives to be published in Down The Stretch will be presented with asterisks. Fair as f***, right? You can read the full editorial for yourselves.

The starting gate is one big roller-coaster


Though there is a complete lack of cussing in this issue, I am happy to report that Perry Lefko thrusted the word "nads" into his piece on gelded trotter Lucky Jim and I giggled the whole time I typed the word "titillating" into my story about Woodbine jockeys who Twitter.

Tweet! Tweet! Pinto Pipes Up About Twitter!


About that, Woodbine jockeys Chantal Sutherland and Melanie Pinto are both Tweeting on a regular basis. If you click on their name links above, you can follow both jockeys as they Tweet straight from the Woodbine jocks room. There's also a shout out to tech wizard/horse welfare spokesperson Alex Brown.

Alex Brown takes a break from Tweeting to gate-school Jimmy Simms


It's a colourful issue of Down The Stretch, full of photographs and plenty of coverage of Woodbine's biggest races. I will happily post a copy of the paper to the first ten people who email me with their snail-mail address. You will find my email address in the top left hand corner of this website.

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Tomorrow, I'll take a look at the weekend ahead at Woodbine and also a sneak peak at the Alabama Stakes which will feature Woodbine's Milwaukee Appeal and Careless Jewel going head-to-head for all the glory.