Here's a picture of
Two Lea's victory cooler that she won in the 1952 Ramona Handicap.
Two Lea was a Calumet filly who ultimately earned the #77 spot on the list of the top race horses of the 20th century. During her career, she raced hard with short stretches between races, and she competed while struggling with ringbone and soreness. She was sometimes raced 3X in a single month, like the time she raced for a third time in one month against Kentucky Derby winner
Ponder and was beat by him only at the end. This match was in the Santa Maturity. Despite her ringbone, she earned a career record of 26: 15, 6, 3. In her third year, she shared championship honors with
Wistful and later in her career earned Champion older mare as well as was inducted into the National Museum and Racing Hall of Fame in 1982. She once raced in the Santa Anita Handicap
with
Citation and
Ponder, but all three were beaten by
Noor. Later in her career, she was on extended break due to ringbone and when she returned to the track, she showed visible scarring and knots from her firing procedures. In her final season, she raced 11 times and won 6, with 5 of those wins occurring in stakes races. In fact, she won 2 of her last 3 starts. And in one very splashy race, Calumet Farms took 1-2-3 in the Vanity Handicap with
Two Lea, Wistful and
Jennie Lee! When she retired, she proved to be a truly amazing broodmare as well. She produced
Tom Fool, who won the Kentucky Derby, Preakness Stakes, and came in 2nd in the Belmont. She also produced Hall of Fame horse,
Tim Tam, and through a cross with
Nasrullah, produced stakes winners
Pied d'Or and
On-and-On. She died in 1973 at the wise age of 27! My girls are closely related to
Two Lea.. Her father is
Bull Lea and she also has
Sweep, Chicle, Friar Rock, Spearmint, and
Ballot as some of their shared relatives! You can read more about this great champion and fighting mare at the following links:
http://www.racingmuseum.org/hall/horse.asp?ID=157or
http://www.racehorseherbal.com/Memorabilia/Cooler/cooler.html
photo by Bob Coglianese of the lovely Spring Waltz, a 2003 filly just like my lovely Violet. She won the Grade 2 Rampart Stakes by 9 furlongs over the weekend of March 8, 2008. In the Daily Racing Form, her jockey, Javier Castellano, said "There was no question that I was concerned with getting stuck behind horses on the final turn. We had to squeeze through a little bit, but she's got a big heart. As soon as we made it through, she hit another gear and took off."
