The Broken

~Chapter Six~

        I put Cosmic's tack away and watch as Rick organizes Cosmic's tack a little more. His hair is a dirty blond color and his eyes are light blue. He's wearing jeans and a t-shirt, like me. I wipe off my jeans and tie my hair up once more before walking over to him.

        "Good racing," he says.

        "Thanks," I reply sheepishly. "You didn't do so bad yourself."

        He chuckles at my comment and sighs. "I've got another horse to breeze. I'll see you around?"

        "Yeah," I say as he begins to backpedal. "See you."

        "Bye," he says, turning on his heel and walking down the barn aisle and turning at the end, disappearing out of my sight.

        I bite my lip and turn back to Cosmic's stall. Now is as good a time as ever to get him some stuff. I grab hay that John had been storing in my foal's stall and throw a flake into Cosmic's stall, then grab his water bucket and take it to a pump and fill it. Placing the bucket back into his stall, I lock everything up and walk outside, squinting against the sun.

        I realize I feel like I can't wait for another year or two before riding my own foal. It's going to be a long two years.

        "Hey, you," I hear a male voice say from my right. I turn swiftly to see John. "What do you say to a few jockeying practices before you enter a race?"

        "Oh my gosh, really?" I say excitedly. "I would say yes."

        Even though I've already been through a jockeying school, it would be interesting to see another person's point of view to absorb more than one riding technique.

        "Cool," he says, patting my back once. "Be here at six tomorrow morning." John turns on his heel and walks off.

        I take a breath and release it, moving to walk out to the entrance and exit. I wave to Nathan before jumping on my bike and riding out into town towards the library. The town is small and I know mostly everyone that I see as I ride down the sidewalk. The library is in the middle of town and I find the building easily.

        I put my bike on the bike rack and walk up the three steps to the porch. There's a sign that says Open and I pull open one of the double doors and shut it behind me. The library is amazing for just being a library in a regular house. There are about two floors of many shelves of books - all in alphabetical order.

        I make my way up the stairs to the second floor, looking for a book on jockeying. I have to find out at least a little bit more about horse racing rules or something. Carefully, I pull a book off the shelf that’s a small children’s book on horse racing. It gives me little to no information that I don’t already know and I put it back. I grab another book that’s a bit thicker and sit on the floor, opening the book.

        It begins with explaining what the tracks usually are made of and the length of races. There’s flat racing, conditions races, and handicap races. I begin skimming over the text.

 

      Conditions races are horse races where the weights carried by the runners are laid down by the conditions attached to the race. Weights are allocated according to; the sex of the runners, with female runners carrying less weight than males; the age of the runners, with younger horses receiving weight from older runners to allow for relative maturity, referred to as weight for age; and quality of runners, with horses that have won certain values of races giving weight to less successful entrants.

      Conditions races are staged at all levels of horse racing, as all of the most important races in Europe are conditions races, the term may also refer to the races for the very best horses, which are split into four levels, namely:

     Group 1 (G1) – (Classics and other races of major international importance)

     Group 2 (G2) – (less important international races)

     Group 3 (G3) – (primarily domestic races)

    Listed Races  – have less prestige than the group races but are still more important than handicap races

      A handicap race in horse racing is a race in which horses carry different weights, allocated by the handicapper. A better horse will carry a heavier weight, to give him or her a disadvantage when racing against slower horses. The handicapper's goal in assigning handicap weights is to enable all the horses to finish together (in a dead heat).

 

        I take a breath and look away from the book. This stuff is going to be harder than I originally thought. Carrying weights like that is going to be interesting. I look back at the “conditions races” section.

 

     In North America, the best horses race in "graded stakes races" instead of "conditions races". The division is similar to that for pattern races in the rest of the world:

      Grade I

     Grade II

     Grade III

 

        I’m able to find out that the races in North America usually pay out to third place. It also seems to me that the highest ranked races that I’ll be competing in for now would be handicap races. Butterflies appear in my stomach and I take a breath, putting the book back on the shelf. There’s no need for me to be nervous yet.

        I make my way out of the library and jump on my bike, driving down the sidewalk again. I decide to stop for lunch at a cafe and park my bike outside. The door opens and a small bell dings as I walk in. I make sure I have my wallet as I walk up to the waitress. She smiles at me and sits me down at a table, handing me a menu and silverware.

        “Your server will be with you shortly,” she smiles at me.

        “Thank you,” I say, opening the menu.

     I decide on a cheeseburger and fries by the time I look up and see Aiden standing next to my table with an apron on and a pad of paper.

        “Aiden?” I smile, sitting upright.

        “Don’t start, Ellie,” he says exasperatedly.

        I begin giggling crazily and then sit upright again. “Sir,” I say in a British accent with a poker face. “I would like… the cheeseburger and fries.” I hand him my menu and he rolls his eyes as he writes down my order and walks away.

        I laugh aloud once and sigh, leaning back in my chair and looking around the restaurant. There are pictures of horses racing on the track in black and white and in color hanging on the walls of the restaurant. There are jockeys and records also. Aiden comes back with my food a few minutes later and I smile evilly at him and he rolls his eyes once more.

        When I finish, I tip Aiden a big amount and wave goodbye to him with a smile. The ride through town continues as I ride my bike home. My parents aren’t home and I wonder why they even try to enforce any punishment they have ever set out.

     I open the two doors and fall to the couch, now bored. Sighing, I decide that I’d better check out that book on racing and hide it somewhere before my parents get back.

     And so my journey begins.