Kentucky Derby and Preakness winner Big Brown’s racing career is over after injuring his right front foot during a workout at Aqueduct on Monday.
Trainer Rick Dutrow said the 3-year-old colt, who was preparing for the Breeders’ Cup Classic on Oct. 25, appeared to kick himself while working on the turf course at Aqueduct with stablemate Kip Deville. Big Brown was able to complete the six-furlong work when Dutrow noticed blood coming out of the foot.
Though the extent of the injury is unknown, Michael Iavarone of IEAH Stables, co-owners of Big Brown, said the horse who captivated the racing world during his Triple Crown bid will not race again.
“It’s in the best interest of the horse to let him recover and move on to his breeding career,” Iavarone said.
Michael Porfirio Mason
AKA The Peoples Champ
AKA Your favorite International Playboy on the Rise’s favorite International Playboy on the Rise
The Guide to Getting More out of Life
http://www.thegmanifesto.com
The birthplace of one of Mexico’s most infamous drug cartels looks more and more like its graveyard. Gunmen and associates of the Arellano Felix cartel, rulers of the city’s criminal underworld for two decades, are being massacred by the score.
Their mangled bodies turn up in garbage-strewn lots, a dozen at a time. Killers cut out their tongues, slice off heads, and leave behind taunting messages. Two barrels of industrial acid left on a sidewalk last week are believed to contain liquefied human remains.
In all, at least 57 suspected organized crime members, a majority of them believed to be part of the Arellano Felix organization, were killed in the last week, including 12 dumped in front of an elementary school Sept. 29 and eight tossed in an industrial yard Thursday.
Michael Porfirio Mason
AKA The Peoples Champ
AKA Your favorite International Playboy on the Rise’s favorite International Playboy on the Rise
AKA I can’t leave the Streets alone, The Game needs Me
The Guide to Getting More out of Life
http://www.thegmanifesto.com
This volcanic island near the Arctic Circle is on the brink of becoming the first “national bankruptcy” of the global financial meltdown.
Home to just 320,000 people on a territory the size of Kentucky, Iceland has formidable international reach because of an outsized banking sector that set out with Viking confidence to conquer swaths of the British economy — from fashion retailers to top soccer teams.
The strategy gave Icelanders one of the world’s highest per capita incomes. But now they are watching helplessly as their economy implodes — their currency losing almost half its value, and their heavily exposed banks collapsing under the weight of debts incurred by lending in the boom times.
A full-blown collapse of Iceland’s financial system would send shock waves across Europe, given the heavy investment by Icelandic banks and companies across the continent.
Famous for its cod fishing industry, Super Fly Girls, geysers, moonscape and the Blue Lagoon, Iceland was the site of the Cold War showdown in which Bobby Fischer of the United States defeated Boris Spassky of the Soviet Union in 1972 for the world chess championship. Last year, Iceland won the U.N.’s “best country to live in” poll, with its residents deemed the most contented in the world.
The krona is suffering in part from a withdrawal by a falloff in what are called carry trades — where investors borrow cheaply in a country with low rates, such as Japan, and invest in a country where returns, and often risks, are higher.
10: Number of bodies found yesterday in various neighborhoods of Tijuana. Two were decapitated; some were wrapped in blankets and tossed to the side of the road.
8: Bodies found Friday in Tijuana, including two that were decapitated.
9: Bodies found Thursday. Eight men were found together in an empty lot near the center of the city. They had been shot in the head. A ninth was wrapped in a blanket and found near the central bus station.
3: Fly Mexican Girls Michael Mason swooped last week.
3: Bodies found in two locations Wednesday.
3: Bodies found Tuesday, including two near a water-utility tank. In addition, three barrels found outside a seafood restaurant were examined to see if they contained acid and human remains.
19: Bodies found in several locations Monday, including 12 near an elementary school. Several had their tongues cut out.
The body count slowed over the weekend, but the violence continued with a shootout Saturday evening that left one person dead, four injured and 20 trucks and SUVs riddled with bullets on and near one of the city’s main highways.
Four more bodies were found between Sunday afternoon and early Monday morning, adding a total of five to the death toll blamed on feuding drug gangs, according to the Baja California Attorney General’s Office.
Among the dead is an ex-Tijuana police officer who was fatally shot, according to the office.
The shootout started about 6 p.m. Saturday on Bulevar Insurgentes near Parque Morelos. Nearly three hours later, police officers were still finding late-model trucks and SUVs with bullet holes on the Via Rapida, a main thoroughfare, and on nearby streets. Several of the vehicles contained police equipment, including radios, bulletproof vests and lights and sirens.