This comes courtesy of an "anonymous ex-Asbury Park Press employee":

Perhaps there's a reason the Asbury Park Press is on its 5th sports editor in five years....

Reasons the enclosed botched headline is particularly sad:
1. The paper used to win awards for its horse racing coverage - before budget cuts sent Bill Handleman, the award-winning horse-racing writer and columnist to cover local govt.
2. It was a daytime event, nowhere near a deadline - and still went unnoticed.
3. The page designer spent probably a half hour on that silhouette effect on the left - instead of fact checking the front page jump headline on the right.

That silhouette looks lovely, though. For more pictures of the winner, Summer Bird, and other Belmont memories that don't involve port-a-potty races, The Times has a nice gallery.

*****

Good morning. It's Monday again. Just another story.

As you may have noticed from his incomprehensible post-race interviews, Borel is from the South. Louisiana, specifically, where tiny, podunk "bush tracks" provide the gritty foundation for horse racing in America. Borel learned to ride as a toddler and not in some grassy pasture with a cowboy leading his horse by a rope. He was racing thoroughbreds down double-wide dirt tracks with no turns at 8 years old—for $4 a race, 17 races a day. (And sometimes he would race against a chicken, for some reason.) But then the nanny state had to go and ruin all that.

No other region in the continental U.S. offered kids as young as 8 the opportunity to learn the balance and subtle artistry it takes to ride a reckless, 1,200-pound animal. Riding racehorses is sort of like skydiving-there's only one way to learn how to do it.

And if you could do it on a bush tracks, sometimes with your bare feet in the stirrups, sometimes on a horse's bare back, surely you could do it on a sanctioned track with an ambulance following behind....

Veteran horsemen say the end of the bush track, and rules requiring all jockeys to be at least 16, are major reasons the sport is dominated by jockeys from the Caribbean and South and Central America, where informal racing still allows children to ride.

"It's like kids and basketball in the inner city," said Hall of Fame trainer D. Wayne Lukas. "The riders from Puerto Rico and Mexico and those places, they still grow up with horses all around them."

Actually, it's not like that at all, but point taken. Latin riders are dominating our good 'ol American boys and there ain't no turning back. Those crazy Puerto Ricans ride horses everywhere and how is little Johnny supposed to compete with that when his helicopter parents are constantly trying to protect little Snowflake from broken collarbones and horseshoes to the face?

It also probably doesn't help the jockey industry that 20% of our youth population is morbidly obese.

Hardly a star student, Mr. Borel dropped out of school after eighth grade. ("It was pretty clear I wasn't going to be no doctor or no lawyer," he said.)

Look at what those fat bastards are missing out on!

The Racetrack Education of Jockey Calvin Borel [Wall Street Journal]

Join me, won't you, as I live blog the broadcast, culminating in the mile and a half run at history.

- Rick Reilly wants Big Brown to win the Triple Crown so Eight Belles will be remembered. Hmm, sure. Also: "Big Brown. I love that name!" It is comforting to know supposed experts choose to root for horses in the same superficial reasons I do.

-Hey, it's Shaq... dressed as a jockey. Because that worked really well as a commercial.

-Hey, mawkish stories about 9-year-olds. Just what I want out of horse racing. Thanks ABC.

-"Can you guarantee a victory?" "Uh, yeah, sure." Most emphatic.

-Wanted expensive women and the drugs, did you Dutrow? Usually it's the other way around. And, hey, he could have bunked with Kimbo Slice in his car way back when.

-Hank Goldberg and his pinkish hue are going with Big Brown. Shocker. Of course, given his NFL track record, Big Brown should pull one of those runs straight to the infield.

-OH NOES! THEY MAKE THE JOCKEYS WALK UP TWO WHOLE FLIGHTS OF STAIRS FROM THE TRAINING ROOM TO THE FIELD!

-Anthony Garguila has the Sinatra swagger and the Manning haircut. Definitely a winner with this crowd.

-Brent Musburger: "The most important furlong is THE FINAL FURLONG" Thanks, Brent. I suppose the finish line is the most important line, too, right?

-Was Big Brown just called a beautiful athlete? When did Dee Mirich start announcing these things?

-GO HORSIES GO!

-Big Brown hanging at third after a half mile. A close pack at the front with Da' Tara, Tale of Ekati and Big Brown.

-Aaaaaand there goes Da' Tara

-Sorry steroid horse

-Welp, sorry history buffs. No triple crown this year. Oh yeah, and the ton of people who lost money. Sucks for you.

- "I had no horse" says jockey. Sounds like a problem.

-Dutrow shies away from interviews after guaranteeing a win. Um, wanna tell him to screw himself, reporters? Maybe try to hold him to his braggadocio bullshit? Cowards.

What to watch while hoping there's not a twist at the end of this one...

• In Progress: Chicago Cubs at Los Angeles Dodgers. [FOX] Sumo wrestlers yesterday. Today, samurai?
  
• In Progress: UFC 85. [Pay-per-view] MDS is holding a live blog over at Fanhouse.
  
• Run, You Stupid Fucking Horse, Run: Belmont Stakes. At least I already know putting all my money on Casino Drive was a bad idea. [ABC] 5:30 P.M.
  
• MLB: Minnesota Twins at Chicago White Sox. Look for crowd shots of the Pants Party. [WGN] 7 p.m.
  
• Boxing: Kelly Pavlik vs. Gary Lockett. [HBO] 10 p.m. Youngstown be proud.

I think Big Brown will win by many lengths. Children should not take money from their mother's purse to bet on the race....but for those who do play it, the way to win money is to bet "horizontally" This means you need to figure out who is going to win races ahead of the Belmont and get lucky with a 40-1 shot as part of the Pick Three capped by Big Brown's win in the Belmont.

I heard the Japanese horse, Casino Drive, might not run. He's Japanese in the same way I am Japanese for having eaten at Maeda Sushi in Simsbury, CT last week. He's from Kentucky. Check the wires to see if he is in or out.
I like Denis of Cork to run 2nd to Big Brown.

Mayne also had this to say about controversial BB trainer Rick Dutrow, who is rubbing all equine enthusiasts the wrong way:

It's not like Dutrow calls for press conferences and reads from a scroll. He is just answering questions. People stand around for two hours and pepper him with questions and since he doesn't have much of a filter, you're going to hear him say some things other trainers don't usually say. Things like, "My horse is going to win."

Interviews Of A Lifetime: Kenny Mayne Would Like To Sell You His Finest Meats And Cheeses [Deadspin]

With apologies to the connections of Ichabad Crane, Ready’s Echo and Da’Tara, the 140th Belmont Stakes is a three-horse race. As everyone knows, Big Brown is attempting to become the 12th colt to win the Triple Crown on Saturday, and the first since Affirmed in 1978. Will he join titans such as Secretariat and Citation in the Hall of Fame, or will he be joining forgettables like Tim Tam and Kauai King in the Hall of Trivia? Let’s look at the 3 prime contenders:

1. Big Brown. He won the Kentucky Derby and Preakness handily, is undefeated, has won all five of his races by a combined 40 lengths and has yet to really run hard. On the downside, he’s dealing with a hoof injury that lost him some training time, isn’t really bred to get the Belmont’s onerous distance and has never faced adversity during a race. Also, in the karma department, this horse is clearly not the answer. Trainer Dicky Dutrow is a repeat offender of racing’s drug laws and has admitted Big Brown used to run on the same steroids used by Ben Johnson. Michael Iavarone, the principal of IEAH Stables, was fingered in multiple stock scams before entering the Sport of Kings. At least his jockey, Kent Desormeaux, is a decent fellow, if a bit brash and cocky.

2. Denis of Cork. Third in the Kentucky Derby, he was dead last in the backstretch of that race until passing 17 horses to get the show spot. He’s got the style to win this race (grinding away, Joey Knish style), still hasn’t reached his full potential yet, and has had 5 weeks off to prep for the race, which has been the winning route this decade. His biggest problem is trying to see how he’ll make up that nine-length gap from the Derby as a dead closer in a race with little early speed. He’s not only going to need to step forward, but he’ll also need Big Brown to run a poor race or get caught in a speed trap from the longshots. Not an impossible scenario.

3. Casino Drive. The new shooter and most likely upsetter of Big Brown, his mother foaled the winners of the 2006 and 2007 Belmont (Jazil and Rags to Riches). Although American bred, he was bought at auction by Japanese interests and made his first start in Japan, where he won by a dozen lengths. He made his second start in New York when trouncing a bad field in the Peter Pan four weeks ago, making the Belmont will be career start number three. While historically it’d be ridiculous to back a horse in his third start, conventional wisdom said the same thing about Big Brown making his fourth career start in the Derby, and he won easily. This horse is certainly talented enough to win, is bred perfectly for the distance and has the best distance jockey in the business (Edgar Prado) on his back; it’s just a question of overcoming his lack of experience and foundation.

So who’s it going to be? While a lot of the mainstream media thinks it’s a fait accompli that Big Brown becomes the first Triple Crown winner since Barack Obama’s high school days, in reality it’s a showdown between two horses with Tremendous Upside, with closer Denis of Cork ready to pick up the pieces if both fail to fire. Of course, Big Brown’s connections have totally ignored Denis of Cork and think Casino Drive doesn’t have a chance in hell. In a fine showing of ethnic sensitivity, Dicky Dutrow proclaimed: “All the Japanese people…thought Godzilla was dead. They’re going to find out he’s not dead. He’s here.”

Maybe it’s as simple as a Big Brown romp. But it’s a lot more likely that Big Brown’s cracked hoof, compressed racing schedule and breeding limitations will catch up to him with half a mile to go in the race. The feeling here is that we’ll see Casino Drive under a blanket of carnations at 7 p.m. on Saturday, with Big Brown quickly hustled off to the breeding shed for a life of sex and oats.