Racing On

Chapter 5

Changing the story for third person to first person

~One Year Later~

Wyatt and I flew out to Santa Anita to see how Dante was doing. Mark had been calling me about once a week to tell me how he was doing. Mark said if every thing went well his first start would be in July or August.  Wyatt and I pulled into the Santa Anita parking lot and walked over to the stable area. We found Mark's barn and walked through until we found Dante. He looked very good. 

"Hello," Mark said walking over to us.

"Hi Mark," Wyatt said shaking his hand.

"He looks good Mark," I said with  a smile. 

"Yah he's been doing great. I had Ben take him out onto the track yesterday for a three furlong workout and he did very good. He is still very small for what I like but hopefully he will grow more and fill out more. Doc said he's one of the smallest two year old colts he has seen so far this year. His smallness doesn't seem to bother his running," Mark said patting Dante on the neck. 

"Got any idea on when he will start?" Wyatt asked.

"Probably the end of July if every thing goes good and so far every thing is," he said back. 

I left Wyatt and Mark to keep talking and walked around the barn to look at the other horses. 

'I wish I had more horses under my name. Maybe next year I can get to the Keeneland September Yearling Sales and find a couple of good horses,' I said to myself. 

I stopped at every horse I saw. I always had a soft spot for horses. I was always asked why I kind of left the industry after owning Take A Chance. I always thought owning him was the best thing ever and it was never going to end. Sadly it did end. He stands stud at Spendthrift Farms, which is only about a half hour away so I could always go visit him. I saw a man walking a horse and he looked very familiar. The man turned the horse around and saw me. He had a big smile on his face and brought the horse over to me.

"Hey Kate," he said with a smile.

"Hey Ben," I said giving him a hug.

"It's been a while," he said as we brought the horse back to his stall. Ben put him away and turned to me. 

"So who are you working for know?" I asked him.

"I work for Mark. That's one of his horses I was walking, Forever Young," he said nodding to the horse.

"Well at least you still work with Dante," I said with a smile.

"Wasn't planning on leaving him. As soon as we got her I asked Mark if I could work for him and stay with Dante. He said yes and know I'm here. I hot walk, groom, and workout horses for him," he said with a smile.

"Do you race at all?" I asked him. He seemed small enough to be a jockey.

"Nope. To heavy." he said with a laugh, "A racing jockey needs to be under 118, I could never get under 120. So I've seen Chad Smith run here. He's a really good jockey and should do well for Dante."

"You really want to ride him in a race, don't you?" I asked feeling a little sorry for him.

"I do but it's still great to be riding him in workouts and seeing him everyday," he said with a smile.

"So are you going to come back and work for me when hes done running?" I asked him.

"If you'll take me back," he said with a laugh.

"I would love to have you back," I said with a smile.

We heard foot steps coming our way and saw Wyatt and Mark walking towards us. 

"Hes been great here," Mark said with a smile. 

Mark decided to show us around his barn and introduce us to his horses. He had a lot of good horses in his barn and a lot of good young ones with great pedigrees. After the tour Wyatt and I decided to head back to the hotel and call it a night. We got to the room and I opened the door and immediately flopped onto the bed. Wyatt followed suit and laid half on half off me. 

"He looks great here," Wyatt said. 

"Yah he does. I really hope he has a good racing career. Its just his small size that scares me. I'm afraid that his size could lead to problems or even a break down," I said back. 

"His size doesn't mean anything. Seabiscuit was a small horse and he beat a Triple Crown winner. Great things come in small packages," he said. 

We both had a long day and decided to go straight to bed. Mark said that Dante was going to jog tomorrow morning and I wanted to have enough energy to go see him.