I'll Have Another Barely Escapes Assassin Horse (Shadowy Steinbrenner Cabal Update!)

At Belmont Park today, a still-unidentified horse took a gallop at I'll Have Another, just nine days before he makes his run at the Triple Crown. The mysterious horse, possible awoken from a Manchurian Candidate trance by a secret word ("oats"), threw her rider and ran down the track, directly at I'll Have Another, who was just out for a morning canter.

Mere inches stood between I'll Have Another and certain doom, but he nimbly avoid the barreling horse with a move no doubt learned from his time studying self-defense with the Lipizzaner stallions in Vienna. Her plan foiled, the horssassin was corralled by track outriders. His murky handlers must again meet in their volcano hideout and plot their next strike at The One.

Update, 3:45 p.m.: The loose horse has been identified as three-year-old filly Isleta, co-owned by the Steinbrenner family. How deep does this thing go?!

Photo by Bryan Smith, Daily News. More photos here.