Rick Reily finds another asinine story to wax poetic about

If you love to see a strong female take on the boys, if you think fillies should be given every chance to compete with studs, if you despise sleazy efforts by rich men to keep girls off the field, we have a heroine for you.

Her name is Rachel Alexandra and she's beautiful, fast and young.

Surely there must be some catch. No woman I know is beautiful, young, AND fast.

Oh, and she's a racehorse.

Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiit.

/slowly conceals erection

In fact, she's one of the fastest racehorses in the world. You can see her run in Saturday's Preakness, but only thanks to a last-second triumph of brains over bullies.

None of these triumphs being carried out by Rachel Alexandra herself because in fact, she belongs to a species of animals that are so dumb, they'll run back into a burning stable unless you tie them up.

So how come Alexandra the Great didn't win the Kentucky Derby? Because she wasn't entered.

Not run Rachel Alexandra? That'd be like leaving your Lamborghini Diablo in the garage! Making Emeril order Domino's! Sticking Halle Berry in a nunnery!

Oooh, double topical reference.

"Colts should run against colts and fillies should run against fillies," explained Rachel's then-owner, Dolphus Morrison, a man whose thinking is so caveman he could star in a Geico ad.

These references are so fresh, that if they were made into a movie, it'd be about a guy who moved from West Philadelphia to Bel Air, and would star Will Smith!

He believes the Derby is a "showcase" for future stallions. He means, of course, stallion owners, who can show their horse's speed in the Derby and then get much more in stud fees when they retire them way too early at the end of the season. Money over history, in other words. So the Derby was won by Mine That Bird, a gelding. So how'd that work out for the breeders, Mr. Morrison?

I'm sure that none one of the other horses in that field will get lucrative stud fees. Not a single one.

But pessimism ruled at Pimlico and we were looking at a Masters without Tiger Woods—until last week.

Tiger Woods: A player who's been dominate in his skill sport for over a decade :: Rachel Alexandra: A racehorse who had only beaten other 3 year old fillies before Preakness.

That's when Jess Jackson, owner of Curlin, bought Rachel and immediately entered her in the Preakness.

The multi-millionaire buys a sure-fire lock and enters it into the Preakness. I can't wait for the heart warming Disney movie.

Until things got ugly, which they usually do in this game. Because Rachel wasn't originally a Triple Crown nominee, she could only run in the 14-horse Preakness if 13 or fewer nominated horses entered, which looked like it would be the case. But then Mark Allen, the owner of Mine That Bird, announced he was thinking of entering his other horse —Indy Express—just to bump Rachel, thereby getting back his star jockey. (Hey, Mark, I don't like your chances for Sportsman of the Year.)

Wait--you mean in a sport where the specific function is for gambling, someone tried to do something to increase their chances of winning? I'm shocked. Shocked and appalled.

It got worse. Adding his name to the list of co-conspirators was Ahmed Zayat, owner of Pioneerof the Nile, who said he'd also like to block Rachel with an extra horse. Sure! If you can't beat her on the track, beat her in the registering office.

Yeah, and fuck the NCAA for enforcing academic standards on athletes. Stop beating college teams at the registrar's office.

The whole thing made you want to roll around in stable manure just for the comparative cleanliness of it.

Which is still cleaner than being involved in a "sport" that derives most of its revenue from the gambling losses of the lower-class. Oh wait...

In the end, the female was saved by … a female. Marylou Whitney, a great lady of horse racing, said she'd pull Luv Gov in the Preakness if Rachel wasn't allowed to race. "We think Rachel Alexandra is wonderful," Whitney's husband, John Hendrickson, told the New York Times. "It is ladies first for us."

A nice gesture and all, but if Marylou Whitney weren't a millionaire, I doubt she'd be so eager to forfeit the roughly $100,000 in fees it took to enter Luv Gov in the Preakness.

Imagine that.

That caused the two conniving owners to drop their scheme in shame and give Rachel her spot in Baltimore.

They didn't abort their plan because of shame. They aborted because they understood the decrease in expected utility from entering multiple horses.

To repeat: In the face of fear and chauvinism and collusion, the very best athlete will get her chance. And isn't that when sport is at its best?

At no point did Rachel Alexandra realize she was looking "fear and chauvinism" in the face. She's a fucking horse used in a large gambling enterprise run by multi-millionaires. Get over it.