Off To The Races

Back in TigerBlog's newspaper days, there was always this friendly discussion in the sports department about horse racing coverage.

Specifically, there was a small faction, including a much younger TigerBlog, who felt that instead of using head shots of jockeys, the paper should print head shots of the horses themselves. The overwhelming majority thought this was ridiculous.

With the start of the Triple Crown season, Sovereignty ran through the mud Saturday to win the Kentucky Derby. Again, there was no post-race interview with the horse, only the jockey and trainer. 

And here's a fun fact: Even 52 years later, Secretariat still holds the record for the fastest Derby, Preakness and Belmont Stakes. 

And here's an even more fun fact: Every horse who raced at Churchill Downs Saturday in the Derby is a direct descendant of the great horse himself. Every horse in the race was between a fourth and seventh generation descendant of Secretariat, who sired 660 foals in his lifetime.

Hey, there's a good theme for today. Off to the races. 

What? You were expecting lacrosse today? There will be plenty of time for that later in the week. 

First, there was the Ivy League softball race. 

Princeton went up to Providence this weekend hoping not to have go back next weekend. To make sure this happened, Princeton needed to win one of three games at Brown.

If the Tigers could do so, that would mean the Ivy League tournament would be coming to Princeton this week (and would also mean an outright Ivy League title). Should Brown could get a sweep, then the league tournament would be back on that same Rhode Island field.

Princeton took care of things pretty quickly, with a two-hit, no-walk shutout courtesy of Brielle Wright in a 5-0 Game 1 win Friday in the first of the series. Princeton got all five of its runs in the third, with three of them courtesy of a three-run home run by Sonia Zhang.

The teams then split Saturday's doubleheader, with a 4-3 Brown win in the first game and a 7-5 Princeton win the second in a game the Tigers trailed 5-1 at one point. 

Brown still qualifies for the Ivy postseason for the first time ever, either in the old Ieague championship series format that started in 2007 or the Ivy tournament. It'll be Princeton and Brown at noon on Thursday in Game 1 of the tournament, followed by Harvard and Columbia in the second game. 

The double-elimination event ends Saturday.

Then there was racing on the water. 

The Princeton women's lightweight rowing team did what it has come to do this time of year, and that's run row away from the field at Eastern Sprints. This time the Tigers won the varsity 8 and varsity 4 races and took second in the varsity 2. 

Added all together, it came to another team points trophy. The win in the varsity 8 was the fifth straight and 11th overall for the Tigers, who go for another IRA national championship at the end of the month. The win in the 4s was Princeton's ninth all-time and second in three years.

There aren't too many celebration shots (jubo, as it's known) that are better than smiling rowers on a dock. See?

Finally, in the racing that happens on a track, the Larry Ellis Invitational was held at Princeton this past weekend.

Among the top performances was the the men's 4x400 relay of Karl Dietz, Kavon Miller, Joey Gant and Xavier Donaldson, who bettered the 14-year-old program by one full second with a 3:04.85.

 On the women's side, Mena Scatchard won the 1500 and 800, just missing her own record in the 1500 by a half second. 

The racing continues this coming weekend when the Ivy League Heptagonal championships will be held at Yale. 

And, to wrap this theme up nicely and connect it all back to the beginning, both Princeton teams will be looking to complete their Triple Crowns.