Horse race re-run: Foolin' 'round in the ol' breed barn

Another day of Triple Crown pageantry, another opportunity for me to re-run an old horse racing post. This one ran exactly four years ago today.

Looks like a beautiful day here in Western Pennsylvania. That means yard work 'til post time. Have a great day!

I admit this is going to sound sexist, but when I learned what was planned for Rachel Alexander’s future, my first thought was, “That slut!”

I don’t know why I’m surprised. It’s the way of the world. Already, the girl really gets around. She got around Pimlico on Saturday in 1:55:08. She’s the first filly to win the second leg of the Triple Crown in 85 years and only the fifth in the 134-year history of the Preakness Stakes.

Those are the kinds of numbers that get pulses racing. Jess Jackson is the filly’s owner. One report described him as the Kendall-Jackson “wine magnate,” a term they left undefined. I like to think it's a typo that means whenever he strolls down the aisles of a liquor store bottles of Cabernet and Merlot fly off the shelves and bond to the 79-year-old entrepreneur.

Despite his advanced age, he spends a great deal of time thinking of horse sex and this in no way means he’s deviant. The fourth most famous race in the sport is tastelessly called The Breeder’s Cup.

How the refined men and women who dabble in what is renown as The Sport of Kings aren’t lumped in with common pimps must be just another exception of privilege.

That’s what struck me when I read that Jackson is eyeing a breeding jackpot with the filly. He also owns the stallion Curlin, winner of the 2007 Preakness, and insiders say it’s a sure thing he’s going to usher the pair off to the breeding barn.

As a romantic who’s always eager for new techniques to please the missus, I decided to research what goes on behind the big doors of the breeding barn.

You can check it out at this highly entertaining segment from Mike Rowe’s Dirty Jobs show on the Discovery Channel.

There are no roses. No sonnets. No sweet nothings. It’s all very clinical. The stud comes in, does his business and, I guess, leaves behind an insincere note with a made-up phone number for the spent mare.

Then there was this disturbing passage that could have easily applied to me and any unfortunate date from back when I was about 24. Try this: whenever the paragraph mentions the “stallion” or its male pronoun, just substitute “Chris” and read on:

“Make sure the stallion mounts the mare in a controlled and reasonable fashion. Too many overenthusiastic or fresh, young stallions will be so anxious to start copulating that they will try to mount from the side and/or thrust with no rhyme or reason. This can frustrate both the stallion and the mare, and neither option is particularly desirable. A frustrated mare can start lashing out at the stallion, and a frustrated stallion will only perform worse as he allows his frustration to cloud his mind.”

Boy, does that take me back. It might have risked ruining the mood, but I’ll bet my dates would have been thrilled I’d have brought along a squad of white smocked veterinarians to show me what goes where.

Not all the research was so grim and sterile and, yes, I realize that’s a poor word choice when dealing with story about horse fertility. I found there’s a sporty-looking human supermodel named Rachel Alexander and she’s often topless.

I’m going to start trying this research thing more often!

I’m unable to reconcile why I feel the equine Rachel Alexander is such a cheap slut for her role in the breeding process when I always feel I should congratulate the male counterparts with cigars and bourbon toasts.

I guess it’s just the primal differences between men and women, stallions and fillies. I’ve been a bystander to enough Lifetime movies to know that women who wind up like Rachel Alexander always come to a moment when they realize what they’ve become. It destroys their self-esteem.

They say they feel used.

And I know what most men will do if we ever find ourselves in the stud role and in a moment of clarity realize we’ve been used for the most base reasons.

We’ll say, "Thanks!"