I woke up about 10 minutes before my alarm as usual this morning. It was a crisp, cold Vermont day, just beginning to hatch. After pouring a fresh cup of Green Mountain coffee to get my brain going I remembered–it’s Equinics Day. Time to get to the barns and check out the horses-especially the 5 entered in the big races today. As I was drinking my coffee I paused to think about the past Equinics- of all the residencies, trainers and horses that have competed over the last 10 years. Yes, it’s been 10 years since Ldyssecret had an idea that has since become a part of sim legend-a series of races to be run every other year the same time as the real life Olympics. In the first Equinics the res teams were: California, Delaware, Iowa, Nebraska, Nevada, New York, North Carolina, Turfstar (Longchamps), Vermont, Minnesota, Vikings (Sweden) and Ireland. Most of these res’s and the trainers and horses that proudly represented them are long gone from the memories of todays simsters. The horse that won the first Equinics race was a 2yo colt named Baby Prospector, from the Minnesota res. I tried to look up Baby Prospector but he isn’t even in the retired horses list anymore, a fate suffered by many male horses that were owned by a trainer no longer in the game. Too bad all of that history is lost. Over the years many memorable (and not so) trainers and horses have made their marks on the Equinics. Today’s races will add more to that list. To add an Equinics Medal to a horse’s resume is something very special, giving them a permanent place in the the game’s history, for as long as the sim exists. But a large part of the races is that there are many horses that have no chance of winning and won’t. As they return to their connections after the race, exhausted, having given all they had they are all winners. To quote a part of the Equinics oath “….in the true spirit of sportsmanship, for the glory of sport and the honor of our teams”.<\/p>\n
As I am walking to the barns I see other trainers and backstretch people, many that I do not know, walking with that same spring in their steps that I have. It’s the same walk seen at any racetrack the morning of any race. I’m not sure why but I still feel as if there is something missing. Than I notice people stopping and looking to the skies, pointing. I look up and smile immediately. High in the sky is a beautiful winged white horse descending in a series of long circles toward the Pastures of Green. It is Pegasus the flying horse of Greek mythology, the symbol of the Equinics. He makes a couple of slow circles over the track and barn areas than disappears over the Green Mountains to the east. After a moment of silence in awe of the great horse …….Wow!! So now the Equinics are really here. Pegasus has made his presence known and has approved the games.<\/p>\n
Let the games begin!!! May the horse be with us all…………..<\/p>\n
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Posted early A.M. Saturday<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":272,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7784","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7784","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/272"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7784"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7784\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7784"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7784"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7784"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}