2013 Derby Day Nears
Occasionally she’ll think about the race and the biggest win of her career, the stuff of warm feelings and pleasant thoughts, except for that interminable wait. “It was intense, wasn’t it though,” says Lori Keith. The subject at hand, of course, is the inaugural Mystic Lake Derby first held in 2012 and Keith’s controversial win […]
Like Father, Like Son
If Brandon Meier wins the Kentucky Derby some day or, say, the Breeders’ Cup Classic, there is another lesser race that will command an adjacent spot in his memory. Riding with the bug in 2008, he was on a horse making the turn for home and came off the fence just enough to let the […]
Canterbury Inside the Numbers
Live racing at Canterbury Park starts Friday, May 17. Optimism is high for the 2013 season with full barns on the backside and a higher purse structure in place. This should be a good formula for larger fields and more competitive racing, which equals better opportunities for large payoffs! Let’s look back at the 2012 […]
New Attendance Record Set and Handle Up 25%
Just like that it was over. A horse named Vini Vidi Vinci won the 11th race on Monday, bringing the 2012 live racing season to a close. The name is a corruption of that note of humility in Latin from Julius Cesar, who proclaimed that “I came, I saw, I conquered.” Vini, Vidi Vinci did, […]
Record Crowd of 17,053 Enjoys 2012 Festival
The Festival of Champions began 20 years ago as a rebuke to track management at the time, as a demonstration by horsemen that the Ladbroke Corp.’s marketing strategies and ideas about live racing were wrong. They’ve been proving that nearly every year of live racing since, often most notably on Festival day, but never quite […]
Canterbury Jockeys Make Plans
Some of the trailers are lined up like sentries on the backside, ready to receive their cargo when the meet officially closes on Monday. They have been swept out and lined with fresh straw in anticipation of the awaiting trip, to farms where their cargo will be turned out or to other racetracks where they […]
Previewing the Festival Quarters
The end of the meet is upon us, but 2012 will go out in style with the Minnesota Festival of Champions this weekend! Two of the restricted Minnesota-bred stakes races will feature quarter horses: the 18th running of both the Minnesota Quarter Horse Derby and Minnesota Quarter Horse Futurity. Sunday, September 2nd: Minnesota Quarter Horse […]
Wearing Many Hats & Cleaning Many Silks
It’s a wonder that Nate Quinonez doesn’t dream in Technicolor given the kaleidoscope world of hues and paint palate combinations that inhabit his life much of the week. For 2 ½ hours or more before first post each day, and at periods throughout the card, Quinonez is occupied with sorting and cleaning the correct silks […]
Aroney Evokes Racing Nostalgia
The moment passed without fanfare or celebration beyond the most perfunctory of acknowledgement, a picture in the winner’s circle without even the horse’s owners present. Then again, this was a testament to someone else altogether, a former owner who had a prominent part in Minnesota and U.S. racing history. It was a special moment tinged […]
The Turf Chute Makes Its Debut
Not many in the sizable crowd of over 7,000 Thursday realized they were witnessing a small bit of Canterbury Park history, a footnote perhaps to much more that has happened since racing debuted in 1985, yet something to remember nonetheless. No one said one day they will bounce a grandchild on a knee and recall […]
