Michael Matz

ELKTON, Md. - Michael Matz entered a horse in the Preakness on Wednesday. It just wasn't the horse he had been thinking for months he would be running in Saturday's race at Pimlico. If you had just dropped by Matz's barn at the Fair Hill Training Center on Wednesday morning with no context, it all looked so routine. Sets of horses came off the track as the next group was readied for the track. Some horses walked the shed row. Others were outside getting cleaned up. After the outside work was done, Matz took to the phone to call racing offices to enter horses for weekend races.

For Michael Matz, any trip from his home in Chester County down here to Churchill Downs calls for a journey down memory lane. This year, Matz is back at Barn 42, two years after Barbaro electrified the grounds on the first Saturday in May. But this year's trip is far more than revisiting past glories. Yesterday, Matz talked about how training another horse into the Kentucky Derby is a great thrill. This time, his horse is a come-from-behind colt named Visionaire, a 20-1 shot. "You know, at least I'm part of it," Matz said yesterday morning outside his barn after Visionaire came back from the track.

After 29 years of riding horses, Michael Matz has learned one thing: Luck plays a big part in making a champion. The two-time Olympian from Collegeville, now competing at the Devon Horse Show, has patiently waited to shake the bad luck that plagued him on the horse show circuit last year. Last night, the standing-room-only crowd at the horse show's biggest event - the $60,000 Budweiser Grandprix of Devon - met him with overwhelming applause. While his horse placed eighth out of 12, the crowd enthusiastically supported him as he manuevered his way over the four- and five-foot high jumps.

British rider Tim Grubb ended a streak of second-place finishes last night by galloping his way to victory in the $60,000 Budweiser Grand Prix of Devon at the Devon Horse Show. Grubb, a frequent representative of the British Equestrian Team, lives in Whitehouse, N.J., and was the winner with a margin of less than one-tenth of a second on Elan Chemical Co.'s Ever Elan, an 11-year-old thoroughbred Grubb characterized as fast and handy. "He turns really well, he's a handy horse, and he's pretty fast.

The race had been over for about an hour. Billy Glass, smoking a cigarette and wearing a Barbaro hat, was talking about how he had known Michael Matz for almost 40 years, since they started out on the equestrian circuit - Matz as a rider, Glass as a groom. "He's not a [con artist], and he's not a conniver, and he's not a cheater," Glass said yesterday about the trainer of Barbaro, who won the 132d Kentucky Derby yesterday. "He's just a hard-working, straight-shooting individual.

Buddy Brown took Aramis cleanly over eight jump-off fences in 46.611 seconds to win the ninth annual Valley Forge Military Academy Grand Prix yesterday on the school's grounds in Wayne. Aramis earned $9,000 from the $30,000 purse for owner Derby Hill Farm. Brown, from Brownsville, R.I., is a former member of the U.S. equestrian team. Second place went to Liran, ridden by Michael Matz of Collegeville. Twelve horses in the starting field of 28 made it to the jump-off by vaulting cleanly over 17 high fences, including a water jump.

Michael Matz and Rhum IV soared fault-free over eight jumpoff fences to beat Anne Kursinski and Top Seed in the $30,000 St. Christopher's Hospital for Children Grand Prix yesterday at the Radnor Hunt Club. Matz, of Collegeville, reined his horse over the fences on a twisting course in light rainfall in 38.038 seconds. Kursinski, a two-time Olympian, raced Top Seed faultlessly home in 38.105 seconds for owner Hilary Boone of Lexington, Ky. Matz earned a $9,000 first prize for Fitz Eugene Dixon Jr. of Lafayette Hill.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Roy Jackson, co-owner of the great and ill-fated racehorse Barbaro with his wife, Gretchen, said their connection with Barbaro's trainer, Michael Matz, will never fade. "We'll be tied until we're off this earth," Jackson said Thursday. "It still keeps going on. " It just won't continue with more horses. This summer, the Jacksons told Matz they were moving the horses they had with him to another trainer. "I don't know what to say," Matz said Thursday outside his barn at Churchill Downs as he prepares two undefeated 2-year-olds for the Breeders' Cup, with Somali Lemonade racing Friday in the Juvenile Fillies Turf and Union Rags racing Saturday in the Juvenile.

Inquirer columnist Bob Ford has won the David F. Woods Memorial Award for the best Preakness story or column for the previous year. The winner is chosen by representatives of Pimlico Race Course, the site of the Preakness Stakes, the second leg of the Triple Crown. Ford examined the relationship between Fair Hill Training Center-based trainers Graham Motion, who won last year's Kentucky Derby with long-shot Animal Kingdom, and Michael Matz, the trainer of 2006 Derby winner Barbaro.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Belmont Stakes winner Union Rags will begin his stallion career at Lane's End Farm in Versailles, Ky. The 2,000-acre farm made the announcement Thursday on its website. Union Rags, owned by Phyllis Wyeth, retired last month because of a tendon injury in his left front leg. He had a record of five wins in eight starts and total earnings of more than $1.7 million. His stud fee was not announced. Trained by Michael Matz, Union Rags finished seventh in the Kentucky Derby after being squeezed at the start of the race.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Belmont Stakes winner Union Rags will begin his stallion career at Lane's End Farm in Versailles, Ky. The 2,000-acre farm made the announcement Thursday on its website. Union Rags, owned by Phyllis Wyeth, retired last month because of a tendon injury in his left front leg. He had a record of five wins in eight starts and total earnings of more than $1.7 million. His stud fee was not announced. Trained by Michael Matz, Union Rags finished seventh in the Kentucky Derby after being squeezed at the start of the race.

Belmont Stakes winner Union Rags has been retired because of a tendon injury in his left front leg. The announcement on Saturday came a week after the colt's veterinarian had said he would be out with the injury but that his prognosis was "excellent" for a return to the races next year. Russell Jones , adviser to the colt's owner, Phyllis Wyeth of Chadds Ford, says Union Rags is "a pretty attractive stallion prospect" and that there has been a high level of interest.

THE THOROUGHBRED may very well be the most fragile animal on Earth. One look at the legs in relation to the body tells the story. Union Rags had no issues from the time trainer Michael Matz got him in the spring of 2011 until Tuesday. Then, it became clear there was an issue with a tendon. It is not career-ending, but it is year-ending. The Belmont Stakes winner will not run again in 2012. Whether he runs in 2013 will be up to owner Phyllis Wyeth.   "I have just received notification from Michael Matz that Union Rags has sustained a minor tendon injury, which will mean that he will miss the balance of the 2012 season," Russell Jones, Wyeth's adviser, said in a statement.

Belmont Stakes winner Union Rags is out for the remainder of the year with a tendon injury, said Russell Jones, bloodstock adviser to the colt's owner, Phyllis Wyeth of Chadds Ford. The injury was discovered Tuesday morning by trainer Michael Matz. More information will be released Wednesday by veterinarian Kathy Anderson, Jones said. "At this point, a lot is up in the air," Jones said. "Even though he's done minor damage to the leg, there's no chance he will run again this year.

ELMONT, N.Y. - Would I'll Have Another have won the Belmont Stakes and the Triple Crown had he not gotten injured? Would Union Rags have won the Kentucky Derby had he not been eliminated at the break? The fascinating 2012 Triple Crown season did not play out the way it had been envisioned when the prep races began, and it ended without any answer to the two most pressing questions. What we did get was great stretch runs in Kentucky, Maryland, and New York, one crushing disappointment within hours of a potential coronation, and one setback seconds into the race that may be the start of the Triple Crown but always will be the most important in American racing.

ELKTON, Md. — Sometime around 10 a.m. Sunday, a horse van carrying Kentucky Derby and Preakness winner I'll Have Another north on I-95 to Belmont Park, passed about 10 miles east of the Fair Hill (Md.) Training Center. The horse that will be going for the Triple Crown on June 9 in the Belmont Stakes was on his way to get familiar with the surface they call "Big Sandy. " Meanwhile, the horse whose trainer thought might be going for the Triple Crown was hanging in his Fair Hill stall.

ELKTON, Md. - About 10 a.m. Sunday, a horse van carrying Kentucky Derby and Preakness winner I'll Have Another north on I-95 to Belmont Park passed about 10 miles east of the Fair Hill (Md.) Training Center. The horse that will be going for the Triple Crown on June 9 in the Belmont Stakes was on his way to get familiar with the surface they call "Big Sandy. " Meanwhile, the horse whose trainer thought he might be going for the Triple Crown was in his Fair Hill stall. Union Rags is quietly getting ready, away from the madness that is sure to envelop I'll Have Another and his connections in the coming days.

BALTIMORE - Chester County trainer Michael Matz, whose Teeth of the Dog finished fourth in the Preakness, learned a thing or two about expectations while guiding Barbaro. With Bodemeister, the Kentucky Derby and Preakness favorite who finished a close second in both races, headed to the sideline for the Belmont, Matz's bay colt, Union Rags, might provide the toughest competition for I'll Have Another. Union Rags will also be fresh, having skipped the Preakness after a rough trip in the Derby resulted in a seventh-place finish.

] ELKTON, Md. - Michael Matz entered a horse in the Preakness Wednesday. It just wasn't the horse he had been thinking for months he would be running in Saturday's race at Pimlico. If you had just dropped by Matz' barn at the Fair Hill Training Center Wednesday morning with no context, it all looked so routine. Sets of horses came off the track as the next group was readied for the track. Some horses walked the shed row. Others were outside getting cleaned up. After the outside work was done, Matz took to the phone to call racing offices to enter horses for weekend races.

ELKTON, Md. - Michael Matz entered a horse in the Preakness on Wednesday. It just wasn't the horse he had been thinking for months he would be running in Saturday's race at Pimlico. If you had just dropped by Matz's barn at the Fair Hill Training Center on Wednesday morning with no context, it all looked so routine. Sets of horses came off the track as the next group was readied for the track. Some horses walked the shed row. Others were outside getting cleaned up. After the outside work was done, Matz took to the phone to call racing offices to enter horses for weekend races.