all in Legends

The best way to describe the late Bill Nack’s passion for horse racing and his beloved Secretariat is to allow the master storyteller to do it himself.

“Horses have a way of getting inside of you, and so it was that Secretariat became like a fifth child in our house, the older boy who was off at school and never around but who was as loved and true a part of the family as Muffin, our shaggy, epileptic dog,” he wrote.

The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines courage as “the mental or moral strength to venture, persevere, and withstand danger, fear, or difficulty.” We see human examples of this each time jockeys guide thousand-pound Thoroughbred dynamos from the explosion of the starting gate to the rush for the finish line.

New York’s road to the 2026 Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve concludes this Saturday. Aqueduct will host the $750,000, Grade 2 Wood Memorial Stakes Presented by Resorts World Casino at 1 ⅛ miles on the dirt.

Throughout the years, most top contenders in prep races for the Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve have been colts or geldings. Although fillies are eligible for all Derby preps and can earn points toward securing a spot in the starting gate for the first jewel of the Triple Crown, not many of them take on males along the Derby trail or in the classic.

There are a few female jockeys who will always be associated with their historic “firsts.” Diane Crump was the first female jockey to ride in a sanctioned race and the first woman to ride in the Kentucky Derby. Julie Krone became the first female rider to win a Triple Crown race when she guided Colonial Affair to victory in the 1993 Belmont Stakes. Jockey

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