#mubtaahij

  Bob Baffert’s Mubtaahij worked 6 furlongs in 1:12:00 Friday morning.

Mubtaahij worked 4 furlongs in :48:80 for trainer Bob Baffert.

Midnight Storm just nosed out Win the Space for second with Cupid back in 4th. 

I never thought I would ever have this thought again after I, more or less, was turning my back to American racing. But after the Pacific Classic... I just had to.

California Chrome is a special horse to me. Not because he has won the Kentucky Derby, for which he was my favourite. Not because he has won the Dubai World Cup - I was all for Mubtaahij. Not because he is the richest ever horse from America. Not because he (mostly) always wins.

No. Chrome is special to me because I have followed him since I saw him win at Hollywood Park in December 2013. The day before Hollywood Park closed I stayed up until very very very late to watch the course's final days and races on the official live stream (I live in Denmark). There, in a race, I watched a flashy two-year-old chestnut colt with purple blinkers and a green donkey on the jockey's silks win EASILY. I thought by myself 'oh, what a great horse' (by watching one race, hah), but his looks also attracted me to be honest - i like horses with white faces. It was not the colt's first race nor was it his first victory. In fact, it was his seventh race and his third victory. It was the King Glorious Stakes on the 22 December 2013. And it was the first time, but not the last, I heard about him.

I am sure most people know what then happened, so I won't say more than that he just went on to win race after race after race and started as the favourite for the 2014 Kentucky Derby - winning that one easily, too. After a runner-up effort in the 2015 Dubai World Cup, he was shipped to England for Royal Ascot but and injury kept him from running and he was shipped back to the USA.

Well... In his native California he was back to winning ways in the 2016 San Pasqual Stakes. And he has been winning since! He made a trip to Dubai where he won a handicap before going on to win the Dubai World Cup - again, I was rooting for Mubtaahij and was sad he did not win, but he did a great job anyway, not to forget that Chrome did a good job, too. Four months after the World Cup, California Chrome, again in California, won the San Diego Handicap.

Just four days ago he ran in the Pacific Classic along the likes of triple champion mare Beholder and Dortmund. AND WHAT DID WE JUST SEE??? Ohhh, California Chrome surely is something special.

Imagine, December 2013, when I first saw him, is almost three years ago! He is now five years old. He has won the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness Stakes. He has won the Dubai World Cup. He has, as far as of 24 August 2016, won six Group/Grade 1 races - not bad for a horse who finished sixth in his first Grade 1 (2013 Del Mar Futurity). He has finished second in races such as the 2015 Dubai World Cup and a close third in the 2014 Breeders' Cup Classic.

I probably do not need to say what Chrome has on his resume and what he has accomplished. I know many hate him because of what his old owners said after the Belmont Stakes - but, let's be honest, the horse has nothing to do with it.

California Chrome is a special, wonderful and great horse. A Derby winner still in training and not at a stud like most of the others at his age. Once he retires, and I hope stays in training at least one season more, he will retire to stud at Taylor Made. Side note: From huble beginnings to one of the greatest in the world, he proves that a champion horse not needs a million dollar pedigree.

I just felt a need to post this, because... Who would have been able to imagine what would go on to happen after the 2013 King Glorious Stakes? Definitely not me. And no, I have not been rooting for California Chrome in every race (there are Mubtaahij and Toast Of New York among other Europeans, for instance, and I like Dortmund a lot, too), but I am more than happy to witness a horse like that and to be alive at the same time.

I was not able to write this in a shorter version.

Happy 4th birthday, Mubtaahij. <3 28 April 2016