It's not just the newspapers who are constantly spitting out erroneous information about the state of racing. Even that bastion of the industry, the Blood-Horse magazine, joined in the cause, however unintentional it may have been. 

    In an article by Ron Mitchell concerning the country's pari-mutuel handle for March, whomever wrote the headline didn't do the story justice. It read: "U. S. Wagering Up Nominally in March."

    Doesn't that sound uninspiring? Especially with the enormous numbers we have been tracking in recent weeks, like Gulfstream's record $32 million on Florida Derby day, and Tampa's record $12.2 million on Tampa Bay Derby day?

    "Nominally" doesn't get the heart pumping. But here are the facts, as revealed later in the article. "Equibase reported total wagering for the month of $854,900,215, up less than 1% from the $847,700,697 wagered in March 2015." Then, in the next sentence, came this: "The number of race days declined 9.04% to 302 from 332 a year ago and the number of races was down 8.47% from 2,844 to 2,603 this year." 

    It's like the Ocala Star-Banner's favorite hypothesis, reporting that an OBS sale was down, say, from $40 million last year to $30 million this year, when the average price last year was $40,000 and this year was $90,000 with only half the number of horses. 

    In actuality, the first three months of 2016 have been very good. The misconception also follows concerning purses. Total March purses, it says, dropped 4.90%. But the average daily purses of $238,538 showed a significant increase over the $228,168 of last year.

    Time to hire a new headline writer at the Blood-Horse. Anyone reading the headline in question without reading the story might be inclined to come to the conclusion the sport is dying. 

    IT'S TWO STEP TIME - When entries were taken for the Gr. III Horseshoe Casino Cincinnati Spiral Stakes, a few eyebrows might have been raised due to the presence of Get Away Farm's Two Step Time. The 3-year-old son of Two Step Salsa had won the $50,000 Heritage at Sam Houston in his last start, and was second in the $100,000 OBS Championship previously.

    Hardly the credentials needed where one might think an owner would ship a horse to a Kentucky Derby prep with a $500,000 purse. But Get Away's owner, Manny Andrade, had confidence in the colt he bought at OBS for $27,000 and couldn't get sold in two subsequent sales. Now he's glad he took Two Step Time home.

    With Mitchell Murrill (who?) riding, Two Step Time made a big run on the turn to move into contention in the 1 1/8th-mile race, but he was sandwiched between horses in the stretch and forced to steady. When Murrill (who?) got him running again, Two Step closed strongly, only to finish fourth by three necks The two who squeezed him were first and third. 

    Two Step picked up $23,500 for fourth, so at least he paid for the trip. He's 3-1-1 in seven tries with earnings of $116,750, but I have a sneaking hunch we haven't heard the last of him.

    Horses who have done well in the OBS Championship races have gone in to bigger and better things before, such as 2008 champion grass mare Forever Together; Three Chimneys Spinster winner Plenty of Light; multiple stakes-winner Buffalo Man; Coaching Club American Oaks winner Golden Bri; Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint runner-up Lady Shipman; Valid Video, winner of the King's Bishop and the last horse to beat Ghostzapper, and many others.  So it's certainly not out of the question for Two Step Time.

    

 

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