HAPPY KENTUCKY DERBY DAY//Update: The Perfect Mint Julep//Update 1.1: Wait ’til Next Year
May 6, 2011
The 137th Kentucky Derby will be run tomorrow at Churchill Downs in Louisville. Up to twenty (depending on late scratches, such as UNCLE MO this morning) three-year olds will be racing a mile-and-a-quarter, the first time these young adults have been asked to go that far.
My money will be on DIALED IN (shown above winning the Florida Derby at Gulfstream Park on April 3), trained by the incomparable Nick Zito (upper right) and ridden by the brilliant Frenchman Julien Leparoux.
To celebrate Derby Weekend, I’m taking time off from my Sarah Palin watch.
I leave you instead with this story I wrote for Sports Illustrated in 1969 about my first Kentucky Derby, forty-eight years ago.
Enjoy the weekend! NBC will have live Derby coverage starting at 5 p.m. EDT tomorrow.
By the way, Nick Zito says Bin Laden deserved his fate. DIALED IN was not available for comment.
UPDATE:
Henry Watterson, founder of the Louisville Courier-Journal, and a man described almost a hundred years ago as “the last of the great personal journalists,” settled once and for all the debate about the recipe for the perfect mint julep. He wrote:
“Pluck the mint gently from its bed, just as the dew of the evening is about to form upon it. Select the choicer sprigs only, but do not rinse them. Prepare the simple syrup and measure out a half-tumbler of whiskey. Pour the whiskey into a well-frosted silver cup, throw the other ingredients away and drink the whiskey.”
UPDATE 1.1
That’s how it goes in racing. They are horses, not machines. DIALED IN never got into the race.
Who knows why? You’d have to ask him, and he ain’t talking.
But the Derby, won this year by ANIMAL KINGDOM, always produces good stories:
a) Graham Motion, the British trainer, learning early last week that his bigger horse, TOBY’S CORNER, hurt himself in training and could not run in the Derby–then saddling lesser light ANIMAL KINGDOM, who won at odds of 21-1.
b) John Velasquez, one of America’s top jockeys for the past decade, learning last week that his horse, probable favorite UNCLE MO, had diarrhea so bad that he had to be scratched from the race.
c) Robby Albarado, the regular rider for ANIMAL KINGDOM, getting thrown from a horse he was riding last week and being injured badly enough so that Motion had to find a new rider.
d) Motion, the day after UNCLE MO was scratched, signing the suddenly unhorsed Velasquez to take Albarado’s seat aboard ANIMAL KINGDOM.
Result: ANIMAL KINGDOM, Motion and Velasquez win. Albarado, nursing a broken nose, loses.
I hope Velasquez, a classy guy, will give Albarado a share of the $125,000 he’ll receive for his two minutes and two second display of expertise.
Why do I love horse racing? It’s like opera.
Why do I love opera? It’s like horse racing. Except in opera you know the winners and losers ahead of time.
And how is the Kentucky Derby like bad sex? Prolonged buildup, mounting anticipation, excitement cresting to fever pitch–and then in two minutes it’s all over.
Posted in Joe McGinniss, The Rogue | 
Tags: bin laden, dialed in, florida derby, gulfstream park, horse racing, julien leparoux, kentucky derby, louisville, nbc, nick zito, uncle mo
27 Responses to “HAPPY KENTUCKY DERBY DAY//Update: The Perfect Mint Julep//Update 1.1: Wait ’til Next Year”
We all need mental health breaks, from time to time. Enjoy! And we can only hope that you-know-who doesn’t somehow end up at the festivities in a white t-shirt and baseball cap. I would hope she would be home spending Mother’s Day with her children – all of ’em.
Enjoy the day…I do hope the quitter twitterrer doesn’t crash in festivities again, but she is lurking in the area, so be careful! Seeing a Kentucky Derby has been a dream of mine since I read my first “The Black Stallion” book 45 years ago! I’m sorry that we don;t get more coverage of the races leading up to the derby. I used to have a horse picked out weeks in advance…now I choose my favorite during the post parade!
Best of Derby Days to you, Joe!
Mr. B is a dedicated, devoted follower of horseracing, so I just forwarded your post to him. He’s spending Derby Weekend with the guy who’s been his best friend since preschool. One of the first phrases our sons learned was, “Don’t throw good money after cheap trots.”
Glad for your break, but hate to see your interest in horse racing.
How come? What’s wrong with horse racing?
Heard that a reporter in passing DIALED IN’s stall, asked what he thought. Dialed In responded ‘Whinny ‘YEA’ Neigh’
That’s just a wonderful Derby story, Joe. Being a KY native, I really enjoyed it.
At the 1967 I won $150 on a $5 bet for long shot “Proud Clarion”. I’ll never forget it – I was 16 years old and the night before a fortune teller told me that I’d marry a handsome man and my lucky number was 7. I forgot about the handsome man, but remembered the number when placing my bet! And it was Proud Clarion.
By 1968 my sister was in college and I hitched my own ride to the Derby with the kids she brought home with her. Getting out of the car who did I run in to but a very tan Richard Nixon, who was gearing up for a Presidential run. Can you believe that the only President I ever got that close to was a Republican??!!
Anyway, your writing was already in prime form, even when you were in college. I’m looking forward to “Rogue”!
I remember Proud Clarion well. A Darby Dan Farm horse, like Chateaugay. I was there. Pouring rain, muddy track. Bobby Ussery rode him. Darby Dan’s Damascus was the favorite. Congratulations!
A Pay-lin free Mothers Day! How apt~
We’ll be watching the Derby from far away AK and rooting for Dialed In!
Mmmm, nothing beats the smell of fresh straw and horse flesh.
Enjoy, and thanks for the fun blog, Joe. It is a catharsis for all things $arah.
Dear Joe,
As caretaker of one of the many hundreds, if not thousands of decedents of The Late Great Secretariat circles my pasture, I am reminded daily of this beautiful creature we have been gifted.
I see in his eyes that of his Great Grandfather, strong, loving, whimsical at times with the determination like no other I have come across.
I am also reminded of the great sacrifices he has made to display this gracefulness in sweat and grit, and the will to keep going with stamina that outshines the human spirit.
Graceful these creatures are we ask to have such beauty, speed and agility
They have given us their wings to fly upon the heavens
Speeding hoofs, pounding hearts, ravaging battles, bloody ends to ones wars and travels
Although you have bought me, you do not own me… For I am Horse.
I am here to give strength to man, for without me you see man would have little
I am the one that has stood beside you from the beginning, the first travels to the last battles… For I am Horse.
I ask for one thing and that is your kindness in your return
Use me with compassion, for inside my soul lies the blood spilled from your fellow man
If you use me up until I am no more, cry not for me… For I am Horse.
We all need a mental health break from all things Palin and I think her family needs it the most!
Mr. McGinness, (sorry can’t call you by your first name, raised to respect my elders)
I guess I have several problems with horse racing but I will list just a few. Horses should not even be broke to ride until 2 years of age, because of the damage that can be done to the skeletal system and other things. The the racing trade pays farms to keep their mares pregnant and lactating so they can put foals(purebred) with those normal horses, the farms in turn usually dump those (original) foals or just sells them to slaughter. There is so many thoroughbreds being dumped and taken to slaughter houses. For awhile not sure if it is still going on the breeders just turned thoroughbreds loose in the wild after their usefulness, those horses can not survive in the wild.
My horse is not 17years old, with one eye. I have paid more money in the world to keep this horse as comfortable as possible and try to save her last eye, we’re on a prayer now. Now think how many horses actually make it to 4 years old as a racehorse, that has not made money.
I am sorry when an animal or person is just threw away when they appear not useful or able to give any more is just wrong in my book. Yes horse racing is a business but to what length does it go before it is just wrong.
Thanks for asking and as I said before, I am truly glad you are taking a break because you do delve with the craziness in your world.
Tewise (is my real name)
O/T but here’s my favorite Kentucky newspaper story, from a book called My Bad: The Apology Anthology.
“It has come to the editor’s attention that the Herald-Leader neglected to cover the civil rights movement. We regret the omission.”
The Lexington (KY) Herald-Leader apologizing for the forty-year-old policies of the then-separate papers the Herald and the Leader to relegate coverage of sit-ins, marches, and the like to brief mentions in a column called “Colored Notes.” July 4, 2004
We used to have Kentucky Derby Parties every year with a hundred people or more, several televisions set up around the house and yard, tons of food, lots to drink with Mint Juleps, of course, although I never acquired a taste for them. We also had blackjack, roulette, and craps tables set up. The race was the excuse for the party, not that we really needed one, but in 1991, we had our chance to go as friends of my parents had a horse running in the Derby. It was really unlike anything else I’d ever been to. From the parties leading up to the Derby to the day of, with the women in their hats and dressed to kill, it was a thrill like nothing I had ever seen before. I remember my brother, who was home on leave at the time from the Air Force, walking around the stables that belonged to my parents’ friends and saying that their horses lived far better than they did. I don’t think he was exaggerating, either. The horse barns were immaculate with every modern amenity. I knew what my mother meant when she had said to me prior to our going on the trip, “horse people are just a little different from us”. She was not being unkind, just telling the truth. Their priorities are obviously different. Although the Derby was definitely something I would do again in a heartbeat.
I loved your story, Joe. I have to laugh at the optimism of youth willing to travel a thousand miles from home to see a horserace without enough money to last a day or so. And, of course, you guys worked it all out and came home ahead of the game!
Well, my wife and I are having a Derby party tomorrow for four people. For many years, the Derby was bigger than Christmas for me. I covered it as a sportswriter, then, when working in Philly as a (non-sports) columnist and for several years afterwards, attended as the guest of Grace Kelly’s brother, Jack, a former Philadelphia city councilman. In 1977, I was there to write a piece for New York Magazine about Seattle Slew’s jockey, Jean Cruguet, who was a friend of mine. I wound up in the winner’s circle with Slew. Figured, “Okay, I’ve been to the mountain top.” No way to beat that without owning a Derby winner. So haven’t been since, although it was Funny Cide’s win in 2003 that led to my writing THE BIG HORSE.
Yes, “horse people are just a little bit different.” Some of the most rotten people around the world own the best horses. But almost everyone who works with the beautiful animals on a daily basis has some admirable qualities. P.G. Johnson, who never saddled a Derby winner, but who wound up becoming the subject of THE BIG HORSE was one of the finest men it was ever my privilege to know.
Thanks for writing. “Those were the days, my friend, we thought they’d never end…”
–Joe
Joe, I’m guessing you have read the book “Ruffian” by William Nack. I’m betting you and Nack might be good friends, given your love of the horses and both of you having been at SI.
Three years ago a friend of mine, who was with SI and is now at ESPN, reviewed Ruffian for a book group in which I’m involved. (We are waiting for him to write his own book, but for now, he provides us with great reviews of books by many of his sportswriter friends.) It was a fascinating story and his discussion of the book really made us so much more aware of the world of horse racing.
Thank you, Tewise, for the look behind the curtain. As usual, whenever money is involved, little else matters.
Joe, I hope you and your wife and friends enjoy a rousing Derby party! Personally however, I’ve never been able to watch it live after the heartbreak of Eight Belles in 2008. Once I find out that none of the horses were hurt, I love to watch the replays to hear the venerable “My Old Kentucky Home” and see the pagentry of the posturing suits and hats. Best of luck to Dialed In!
Few things more beautiful than horses. I look at them every morning in all the pastures around abouts as I drive, and its moving meditation. It’s a tossup between them the barn swallows and martins swooping around, the blue skies, and all the greenery of springtime.
Though most of the time the local beauties have their noses in the clover and blue grass and are munching their way through their days hard work.
Eating.
Lucky you, having had the opportunity to stand in the winner’s circle. I hope you and your wife enjoy your Derby party. We’re originally from the Philadelphia area, born and raised in Villanova. I still miss it at times after three years in North Carolina, didn’t think we’d ever leave the area, being the fourth generation born there but I do enjoy the quiet pace of life here in NC.
By the way, any chance you’re going to be in the Raleigh/Cary area of NC for your book tour? There are lots of fans here! I hope you’ll be able to work us into your schedule.
Thanks again,
Kate
Thanks for the mint julep tip…..I knew they were a little too sweet. Enjoy!!
I’m so impressed with this exchange. Thank you for printing Tewise’s post. I was struggling to keep my insulin resistant horse with chronic laminitis alive and comfortable when Barbero broke his leg in the 2006 Preakness after winning the Derby (as Tewise mentioned-it’s a risk to run these young horse). I was hopeful that more light would be shed on the causes of chronic laminitis and the scary increase in insulin resistance in horses. It’s very much like the rise in Type 2 diabetes in humans and has similar causes. Horse feed at that time was based on research for highly active horses such as racing or show horses, though most horses don’t need these high energy feeds. Additionally, the hays and grasses that we feed are all engineered to make cows get fat really fast (see Safergrass.org). Horses have evolved to work hard for sparse food. They are designed to graze for most of the day and their stomach acid lacks a shut off valve. Everything metabolic seems to hit in their feet. I was disappointed that diet was never discussed with Barbero, instead they resectioned his hoof. I am not a veterinarian and my horse was not a racehorse, just a kind-hearted, can-do Morgan. The IR took its toll, but when I finally put him down his feet were solid. With a wonderful team of vets, a very talented hoof trimer, strict diet, and lots of love he recovered from founder (rotated and sunken coffin bone) in both front feet. I’m still hopeful and it does seem the feed companies are providing more options for our companion animals. I am not that close to it, but the racing industry seems more interested in making them faster, not necessarily more sound.
I love to watch them run though, and I can’t hold it against anyone who loves the races. I just can’t watch it live. Thanks for the update.
Found this in grandfather’s scrapbook. TOO DELICIOUS.
THE MINT JULEP CEREMONY
The preparation of the quintessence of gentlemanly beverages can be described only in like terms. A mint julep is not the product of a formula. It is a ceremony and must be performed by a gentleman possessing a true sense of the artistic, a deep reverence for the ingredients and a proper appreciation of the occasion.
It is a rite that must not be entrusted to a novice, a statistician, or a Yankee. It is a heritage of the Old South, an emblem of hospitality, and a vehicle in which noble minds can travel together upon flower-strewn paths of a happy and congenial thought.
Go to a spring where cool, crystal-clear water bubbles from under a bank of dew-washed ferns. In a consecrated vessel, dip up a little water at the source. Follow the stream through its banks of green moss and wildflowers until it broadens and trickles through beds of mint growing in aromatic profusion and waving softly in the summer breeze. Gather the sweetest and tenderest shoots and gently carry them home. Go to the sideboard and select a decanter of Kentucky Bourbon, distilled by a master hand, mellowed with age yet still vigorous and inspiring. An ancestral sugar bowl, a row of silver goblets, and some spoons and some ice and you are ready to start.
Into a canvas bag, pound twice as much ice as you thing you will need. Make it fine as snow, keep it dry, and do not allow it to degenerate into slush.
Into each goblet, put a slightly heaping teaspoonful of granulated sugar, barely cover this with spring water and slightly bruise one mint leaf into this, leaving the spoon in the goblet. Then pour elixir from the decanter until the goblets are about one-fourth full. Fill the goblets with snowy ice, sprinkling in a small amount of sugar as you fill. Wipe the outside of the goblets dry and embellish copiously with mint.
Then comes the important and delicate operation of frosting. By proper manipulation of the spoon, the ingredients are circulated and blended until Nature, wishing to take a further hand and add another of its beautiful phenomena, encrusts the whole in a glistening coat of white frost. Thus harmoniously blended by the deft touches of a skilled hand, you have a beverage eminently appropriate for honorable men and beautiful women.
When all is ready, assemble your guests on the porch or in the garden, where the aroma of the juleps will rise heavenwards and make the birds sing. Propose a worthy toast, raise the goblet to your lips, bury your nose in the mint, inhale a deep breath of its fragrance, and sip the nectar of the gods.
Being overcome by thirst, I can write no further. Lt. Gen Simon Bolivar Buckner – 1937
Thanks for the fun Kentucky Derby stories. I have a picture of my grandparents dressed to the nines heading to the “derby” . Think 1941 and we lived in New Albany,IN > my grandfather and my dad and uncle would head downtown in Vincennes to “play the horses” on Saturday afternoon. I had no idea what that meant;but, now have an idea based on “the Sting” only it was the real thing then. Our lake is out, the loons are back. We have a great photo of you photoing the loons . We can hardly wait for your book. I can guarantee we will be first in line to get it autographed. Meanwhile we have read all”all” of your books and thoroughly enjoyed them. Hope to see you again on the lake.
Love the way you weave these elements together so economically. You’re just a fine writer.
Two minutes??
I hope some small time betters made a bundle. I always go for the long shots myself, and root for the underdogs of the world.
At craps I’m better, but you can’t win for yourself, you have to bet small and allow others take advantage of a exceptional roll of the dice. Which is why I gave up on gambling big time.
Loved the results of the race myself, though sorry if you lost on your own choice.
Better luck next time.
Now as long as a scrawny nag called Sarah Palin gets scratched from the race.
He Joe,
You said: “And how is the Kentucky Derby like bad sex? ”
The Derby is like bad sex, because, as they say, “Even when it’s bad, it’s good.”