EAS Weeks 7-9

Hello Again!

Sorry for the delay in posts. I was without internet for a few days and my parents came to town so I was finally able to go to all of the tourist spots.

We went to Keeneland racetrack which is the most beautiful racetrack I have ever seen! It has such a different vibe than Churchill Downs. I think it is important to visit both tracks as you get a different experience from each. Keeneland also has it's legendary track kitchen where you can grab breakfast while watching the horses workout in the mornings. I took a picture of the iconic jockey statues and of course hit up the giftshop.

 Afterwards, we went on a tour at the Winstar stallion barn. My parents don't know much about the racing industry so they were amazed by how grand the stallion barn was. It looks like a mansion from the outside and is the cleanest barn I have ever been in. The stallions are also pretty awe inspiring to look at! They brought out Tiznow for us to look at and then we got to see the other 21 stallions in their stalls and learn all about their racing history. Of course, everybody on the tour couldn't wait to snap a shot of Pioneerofthenile who sired last year's triple crown winner American Pharoah! All of the tours to see American Pharoah have been sold out all summer so meeting his sire is the next best thing. We also got to see the breeding shed, where the stallions breed up to 3 times a day during the breeding season. It is definitely a tour I would recommend going on if you are ever in the area.

Winstar Stallion Barn

Tiznow

Buffalo Trace Bourbon Barrels

You can't come to Kentucky without going on at least one bourbon tour so I took my parents to the Buffalo Trace distillery in Frankfort. There is a lot of history at this distillery since it's located in the state's capital. They even have a ghost tour once a week in the evening where they tell stories of all the ghosts that supposedly hang around. We didn't do that tour this time but it's on my to-do list for future visits.

I am still traveling up to Churchill 2 to 3 times a week to collect data for my summer project. We now have data on 42 horses and 16 of them have double data sets. Our goal was to get 50 horses by the end of the summer so we are almost there! At the beginning of the summer there were mostly 3 yr olds in training but now there are more 2 yr olds that are starting to train. Testing the 2 yr olds is slightly different than the 3 yr olds. Since many of the 2 yr old haven't raced yet, we use our results to help predict how they will run, whereas with the 3 yr olds we compare our results to their current race record. Having an idea of how the horse will perform before it's ever run, makes it twice as exiting to watch their first race and root for them! Since we have quite a few double data sets now, I have also started to evaluate the wind test on it's repeatability. I look at the results from both wind tests on the same horse and see if they match up as expected. There was a professional photographer out at the track who snapped a few photos of the some of the horses wearing our wind test hoods in action. I think the horses look like super heroes when they wear them!

On days that we don't go to the track I'm either at the office analyzing the data or traveling to other local farms. I've gotten to see a vast array of the farms here from ones established within the last decade to ones that have been around for 100 years. They are all beautiful and unique in their own way. The Fasig-Tipton yearling sale was here in town last week so I got to go to that as well. I had been to Thorough bred sales in the past but none were this large. Our team was kept pretty assisting buyers with which horses to purchase. When a buyer is interested in a particular horse the team would perform a heart scan and conformational analysis on it and report back to the buyer. I got to practice doing a heart scan which is much harder than it looks. It definitely takes lots of practice to get used to maneuvering the ultrasound probe. Luckily, I had a good colt who was very patient with me and stood still for a long time.

I have 3 more weeks left of my fellowship and will be using most of that time to wrap up my part in the summer track testing project. I'll probably be up at the track a lot gathering more data and will hopefully be able to finish my study on the repeatability of the wind test. This summer really flew by but I guess that's what happens when you're kept busy and having fun!