No great surprise: Sea The Stars retired

His connections at one point had said chances were "50-50" that the certain European champion, recent Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe winner Sea The Stars, would run in next month's Breeders' Cup Classic in the United States.

But I'm unsurprised at Tuesday's news that the 3-year-old Cape Cross colt has been retired. In fact, through absolutely no particular genius or prescience, I had predicted it.

I'd have to say that owner Christopher Tsui and trainer John Oxx have made the right choice for the horse. By European standards, there was nothing left for him to do. And American sentiments and standards really weren't relevant since Sea The Stars is almost certain to land at stud next spring in Ireland.

After losing in his debut at age 2 -- fourth under a blanket, in an 18-horse field, to three future graded-stakes horses -- Sea The Stars never lost again in eight more starts. All six of his races at age 3 were Group 1 stakes, and of course he won them. That included an historically unprecedented annexation of the English Derby-Guineas "double" plus the Arc.

While not at all surprised, I cannot say that I take the news of his retirement without disappointment. I wanted to witness Sea The Stars on the track at age 4. Might he have been even better? Of course, beyond the prospect of catastrophic injury, his connections had to consider that the horse might've come back to the field a bit and found a way to lose a few. Having won the very biggest races in England, Ireland and France, it's difficult to imagine that much of any win streak continued into -- or all the way through -- 2010, would have elevated his stud fee significantly.

Under the circumstances, retirement almost certainly is the best business decision for the Mr. Tsui and the best decision in the interests of the horse, if not the ideal outcome for fans.

So if you do desire to watch Sea The Stars perform at age 4, you now must be prepared to hand over a very serious, albeit as yet unannounced, price of admission.

And bring an approved mare.

Facebook ... finally

After 21 days, I'm officially alive and well on Facebook. Finally.

I'm not sure which of my last-ditch moves resulted in my worldly existence being successfully rejoined with the social-networking-account-in-limbo (that "the Facebook team" swore didn't exist). I sent an e-mail Monday morning requesting help, noting my confirmation code and linking to the "ghost" me on Facebook as I had many times before -- but this time from a different e-mail address, in case the first address I'd tried to use had been blacklisted from all the snippy correspondence I'd been sending.

And, I did something I've never done before; I contacted Facebook's Media Relations department to note that I was working on a column about my troubles signing up for Facebook (which would have been an extension of the blog post linked above, only for my newspaper) and said I would just like to ask someone a few questions about their customer service.

By late Monday afternoon I received a personal e-mail from "Justin" -- of the Facebook team -- noting that he'd reset the password and I could now access that account. You know, the one that didn't exist.

Now that I'm active, I have a question.

Why's it easier to make friends on a social networking site? I have 23 already. ... Of course, a significant percentage are relatives, and they're sort of stuck with me.

Anyway, to the rest of you Facebook users ... see ya over there.

Poll: STS over Rachel, 2-1

The votes are in, and my readers, at least, heavily side with Sea The Stars over Rachel Alexandra as the "best horse you won't see" at this year's Breeders' Cup.

Truth be told, Sea The Stars isn't definitely out of the Breeders' Cup. Owner Christopher Tsui says it's 50-50 whether the Irish-bred Cape Cross colt will run for the first time on an all-weather surface in trying to win the Breeders' Cup Classic at Oak Tree at Santa Anita in November.

But I figure he won't be there.

Sea The Stars is riding a seven-race win streak, five of them in Group 1 stakes. It's an historically unprecedented season, as well. He was not only the first horse since Nashwan in 1989 to win the English Derby and Two Thousand Guineas "double," but surpassed that feat by becoming the very first to go on and win the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe. He should be hands-down European champion and has little or nothing to prove by winning the Breeders' Cup Classic among a field that is likely to include among its favorites a pair of horses he's beaten several times before: Rip Van Winkle and Mastercraftsman.

Of course, Rachel has had quite the historic 3-year-old campaign of her own. From record-setting romps in the Kentucky Oaks and the Mother Goose Stakes, to beating colts in the Preakness Stakes (first filly to win since Nellie Morse in 1924) and Haskell Invitational, to becoming the first female ever to win the Woodward Stakes against older males, Rachel is easily the Eclipse 3-year-old filly champion on this side of the pond, and the leader in the clubhouse for Horse of the Year.

She's definitely not running in the Breeders' Cup. Principal owner Jess Jackson has made that clear for months, and recently confirmed that her Woodward win would be her last race in 2009.

But at least Jackson says we'll see Rachel on the track in 2010. Sea The Stars is destined for stud duty in Ireland without running at age 4.

Both horses staged historic campaigns. Both were clearly the best of their age and gender -- Rachel perhaps best of both genders -- on their respective continents. And since a majority of my readers are Stateside, I figured a poll between Sea The Stars and Rachel would have relatively close results.

I was wrong. It appears that even American fans are beginning to realize what racing and bloodstock experts have noted for some weeks now -- Sea The Stars is one of the best Europe has seen in ages. He garnered 37 of the 56 votes cast, for 66 percent. Rachel had 18 votes for 32 percent. (One vote was cast for Some Other Horse, namely Caribbean standout Sicotico.)

Of course, the some of the same superlatives used for Sea The Stars can be said of Rachel Alexandra. There have been some great 3-year-old fillies over the past 20 years -- Ashado, Silverbulletday, Go For Wand and others -- but it's hard to ignore that Rachel has done things even the likes of those champions never accomplished.

It will be a bit anticlimactic not to see Rachel and Sea The Stars (presuming he doesn't) running in the Breeders' Cup.

Still, there should be some very good races. And if an American horse manages to rebuff the British Invasion in the Classic, it will be an historic Breeders' Cup weekend in its own right.

For Yanks, Gitano Hernando's upset in Oak Tree's Goodwood Stakes an upsetting Classic preview

No doubt Gitano Hernando's victory in Saturday's Grade 1 Goodwood Stakes at the Oak Tree meeting at Santa Anita is considered an upset.

But there's also little question that it serves as an unsettling foreshadowing to the Breeders' Cup in November for anyone fielding an American horse in the Breeders' Cup Classic.

The 3-year-old Hernando colt was only Group 3-placed, with a recent conditioned-stakes win on an all-weather track at Wolverhampton to his name, when he departed Italian-born trainer Marco Botti's string at Newmarket in England to be stabled with Paddy Gallagher in California. Then Gitano Hernando at 18/1 upends a field of the West Coast's best in his first U.S. start for owners Team Valor International.

The upstart Brit-bred's victims included 4-year-old multiple Grade 1 winners Colonel John and Tiago, recent Pacific Classic S.-G1 winner Richard's Kid, this year's Kentucky Derby winner Mine That Bird, dual Grade 2 winner on the Cal circuit Informed, G2 winner and G1-placed Tres Borrachos, and Grade 3 winner and multiple-G1-placed Chocolate Candy.

Only the additions of a Well Armed -- who had surgery in August -- or the likes of Rail Trip and Einstein -- whose connections decided not to prep them again between the Pacific Classic and the Breeders' Cup -- could have made that group any more accomplished. And take note that fourth place in the Goodwood, as it did in the Pacific Classic, went to Parading, a former G2 winner on turf.

If Jess Jackson needed any more supporting evidence for his decision months ago to skip this Breeders' Cup with Rachel Alexandra, he certainly keeps getting it. It's too soon to know whether synthetic tracks everywhere are playing specifically in favor of turf-bred horses -- after all, Gitano Hernando also broke maiden at Wolverhampton and is now 3-for-3 on synthetic and just 1-for-4 on turf; he has not been equally successful on both surfaces. But it certainly seems that California's synthetic tracks can often tilt toward the turfers.

Gitano Hernando isn't nominated to the Breeders' Cup, and Team Valor would have to pay $250,000 to supplement him to the $5 million Breeders' Cup Classic. But his win should have U.S. horses quaking in their Queen's Plates even if he isn't supplemented to racing's "world championships."

That's because Europe is sending much better than him to Santa Anita next month. Whether or not hands-down European champion Sea the Stars races in the Breeders' Cup Classic.

Rip Van Winkle, a Galileo 3-year-old who has won half of his eight starts including two straight British Group 1 races (and who has suffered three of his four losses in races won by Sea the Stars), is likely Breeders' Cup-bound in hopes of escaping Sea the Stars' shadow.

Conditioner Aidan O'Brien has confirmed that European 2-year-old champion of 2008 and four-time Group 1 winner Mastercraftsman -- a recent Group 3 winner in his first try on an all-weather track at Dundalk (in a B.C. Dirt Marathon win-and-you're-in) and also three times a victim of Sea the Stars in his four defeats -- is likewise headed to Santa Anita for the Classic.

Both Rip Van Winkle and Mastercraftsman were clearly superior 3-year-olds to Gitano Hernando in the U.K.

And, apparently the 12-furlong distance of the Breeders' Cup Turf has spooked the connections of Eclipse turf champion-contender Gio Ponti into a run at the Classic instead. Gio Ponti was upset by Interpatation in the mile-and-a-half Joe Hirsch Turf Classic at Belmont his last out, and his camp has decided not to attempt 12 furlongs again at Santa Anita.

Certainly America's best main-track horses will be there for the Classic, including those from the eastern half of the country such as Grade 1 winner Macho Again and three-times G1-winning 3-year-old Summer Bird. But neither has any promising synthetic track form to hang his bridle on. And we've just seen the Best of the West (minus Rail Trip) beaten over the Pro-Ride course by what previously had been an unequivocally second-tier Euro.

So America's hopefuls are stuck with a Breeders' Cup Classic in which the upper crust of likely contenders -- heaven help them if Sea the Stars shows, plus Rip Van Winkle, Mastercraftsman, Gio Ponti, even the aforementioned Einstein -- are all Grade- or Group 1 winners on grass. Which might mean unbeaten Zenyatta, though a synthetic-track monster in her own right, is better off stuck running against mares again in the Please-Change-the-Name-Back-to-Distaff.

And certainly it could be that all the main-track Yanks will be stuck looking forward to 2010 when the Classic gets back onto real, live dirt at Churchill Downs.

Day upon day of 'Revenge'

To start off a Friday, just a short note to thank Steve Byk for the invitation to take part yesterday in his "At the Races" talk show on SiriusXM radio. He was a good and gracious host, and I don't just say that because he apparently agrees with me on Joe Drape's story about I Want Revenge.

Thanks also to Steve for not only mentioning this blog, but for spelling out the URL as a big helper to those who have no clue what its name references.

I'm not completely confident I got across the entirety of my thoughts (and that I didn't occasionally sound like a moron) during the 20 minutes or so that we were on the air, but if I failed in any way, it wouldn't be Steve's fault. I do think I was pretty clear with those thoughts in my critique of Drape's story and in the evolving comments thread taking place thereafter.

It's a bit staggering that my opinion on something an Eclipse-honored New York Times reporter wrote has taken on such a life of its own, with hundreds of hits coming into this little corner of the blogosphere the past few days. Those visitors are largely due to referrals from Equidaily.com, Raceday360.com and Paulickreport.com. But as my Sitemeter counter allows me to track, a good number of visits also are the result of individual readers believing that my post was worth reading such that they've introduced others to this blog through links in message board and discussion group chats at sites like Thoroughbredchampions.com and Byk-founded Derbytrail.com.

To those readers, I also offer my thanks. While the bustle and the furor of the past few days will likely settle down, some of you will probably continue to visit and read in the future, and I appreciate your readership.

Someone even said they were a "big fan" of mine, which makes them a member of a very exclusive -- that is to say, quite small -- club.

Of course, the next person along in that discussion group questioned my motives for rebutting Drape, calling my critique "way out of whack" and suggesting that "something else is at play." Perhaps, the writer suggests, I'm involved in a "disagreement over drugs or making vet records public."

Is the writer suggesting I'm a surrogate for big pharma? Or just vets and trainers who practice "win-by-needle?" ... Your guess is as good as mine.

But there's nothing like a good conspiracy theory to try and take down an argument that you might find difficult to dismantle on its merits.

Postscript: It merits mentioning that, a few days after this post, the person who wrote the message board post referenced above -- about an argument being "way out of whack," etc. -- has contacted me privately, with her full name (which many Internet-frequenters won't do), and noted that her comments were directed to someone else on the message board and not toward my blog on the subject. I had not read her comments that way (nor had someone else on the board who responded), but it is appropriate at this juncture to add that tidbit of information, although I will not rewrite the original in order to maintain the blog's historical integrity. (In other words, so you won't come back and wonder where the original ending went.)