Bittersweet!

Dear Partners and Friends,

Yep; we had a little bitter and then we had a little sweet.

Rock Shandy flat bounced off his last race. He went from a 90 Beyer to a 65 Beyer. Sometimes when a horse improves too much, too fast as he had you see this one-time major regression. Peter Miller had a rabbit in the race to try and create a speed duel with Firing Line, but it was Dortmund that challenged on the front end and Victor Espinoza said Shandy was pissed about being rated behind the rabbit. With Dortmund and Firing Line both running Beyers of 103, it didn't matter whether our boy was pissed or not. He wasn't going to run with them yesterday.

We will see how Shandy comes out of the race and make a plan. Tomorrow he will have a full body nuclear scan and full blood panel. If he is okay physically Peter and I both believe we should  go easy with him and point to a 100 point race on April 4. A top three finish gets him in the Derby, and if that doesn't happen we will make money with him.

And then there was the sweet homebred, Finnegan's Wake, winning his third straight Grade II. Does our boy like SoCal or what?! He has now earned over a million dollars. A colt that Donegal Racing paid $30,000 for.

Best guess is that Finn will run in yet another Grade II on March 21 going 1.5 miles at Santa Anita, and then maybe take a look at the Grade I Woodford Reserve at Churchill on Derby Day.

In the meantime, we have the biggest day in the history of Donegal coming at us Feb. 21 with Danny Boy and Puca likely to go at Gulfstream Park, and Keen Ice and Irish You Well likely to go at Fairgrounds. More on that in the next day or two.

We had a great crowd at Santa Anita yesterday and a great time. Hope you were able to watch on FoxSportsTV.

Jerry