Roger Attfield

Tenacity. The trait seems to be woven into the very fabric of every jockey. After all, they put their lives on the line every time they break out of a gate perched atop 1,000 pounds of heaving horseflesh. It is also the very thing that propels them to the finish line, driving them to win. Emma-Jayne Wilson is the embodiment of tenacity, the thing that has driven her to the pinnacle of racing and in more challenging times, has helped her overcome adversity. Wilson, who returned to the saddle this...

Charles Fipke's Ready for Shirl (More Than Ready) hadn't visited the winner's circle since January, however, she found the right time to mark her return, collecting her first taste of black-type in the process, in Sunday's GII Canadian Stakes at Woodbine. Favored Gimme a Nother (SAf) (Gimmethegreenlight {Aus}) soon went to the front, slowing the pace to a modest :24.60 and :49.37 as Ready for Shirl set up shop about three lengths behind in the early stages of the nine-furlong test. Continuing to dawdle along through three quarters in 1:14.24,...

Canada's Sovereign Award finalists were announced by The Jockey Club of Canada Wednesday, in addition to dual Hall of Fame trainer Roger Attfield who will receive the E.P. Taylor Award of Merit at the 50th Annual Sovereign Awards ceremony which will be held Apr. 24 at the Paramount Eventspace in Woodbridge, Ontario. Additionally, Emma-Jayne Wilson and Moira (Ghostzapper), winner of the GI Breeders' Cup Filly & Mare Turf before selling for $4.3 million at Fasig-Tipton in November, will both receive Special Sovereign Awards. Wilson surpassed Julie Krone's purse earnings record...

Shirl's Speight, a Grade I winner by Speightstown out of GI Breeders' Cup Filly and Mare Turf winner Perfect Shirl (Perfect Soul {Ire}), will stand the upcoming breeding season at Darby Dan Farm, the farm announced Wednesday. He will stand his first season at stud for $5,000 S&N. A homebred for Charles Fipke trained by Roger Attfield, the globetrotting Shirl's Speight scored the biggest win of his career in the 2022 GI Maker's Mark Mile at Keeneland, and he was among the top milers that year when also second by...

With a victory aboard the debuting Perfect Lady Bee (Bee Jersey) in Thursday's fourth race at Woodbine for trainer Roger Attfield and owner/breeder Charles Fipke, jockey Emma-Jayne Wilson became the highest-earning female jockey in history, surpassing the record of $90,126,584 previously held by Hall of Fame rider Julie Krone. Wilson began the day just over $11,000 shy of the record and began chipping away with a runner-up effort in the afternoon's opening event, a $25,000 claimer going seven furlongs on the synthetic track. Wilson had no mounts in the next...

5th-KEE, $100K, Msw, 3yo, f, 1 1/16mT, 3:08 p.m. ET. SCARLET POPPY (IRE) (Night of Thunder {Ire}) makes the races after she was purchased by Stonestreet Stable and M.V. Magnier for 800,000gns at the Tattersalls October Yearling Sale. The Wesley Ward trainee has a trio of gelding half-brothers who have won stakes in Europe, including Ross Castle (Ire) (Bushranger {Ire}), Snazzy Jazzy (Ire) (Red Jazz) and Ten Year Ticket (Ire) (Rock of Gibraltar (Ire). Also drawn is Ready for Shirl (More Than Ready), who is out of GI Breeders' Cup...

Keeneland kicks off the second weekend of the Spring Meet with the much-heralded return Friday of last year's GI Breeders' Cup Mile winner in the 36th running of the $600,000 GI Maker's Mark Mile S. Master of The Seas (Ire) (Dubawi {Ire}), unseen in the starting gate since his nose win over Mawj (Ire) (Exceed And Excel {Aus}) in the Mile last November, was most recently spotted with trainer Charlie Appleby's string in Dubai before shipping stateside to Keeneland. Now six, the Godolphin homebred has been here before, notching a...

5th-Woodbine, $111K, Msw, 3yo/up, 7fT, post time: 6:52 p.m. ET    Ready Shakespeare (More Than Ready), a half-brother to three-time Canadian champion and GI Natalma S. heroine Lady Speightspeare (Speightstown), gets his career started for trainer Roger Attfield. The Charles Fipke homebred, listed as the 5-2 morning-line favorite, was produced by two-time graded winner Lady Shakespeare (Theatrical {Ire}). This is also the loaded female family of GI Breeders' Cup Filly & Mare Turf heroine Perfect Shirl (Perfect Soul {Ire}), MGISW Shakespeare (Theatrical {Ire}), et al. TJCIS PPs

Moira (Ghostzapper), dominant winner against males in last year's Queen's Plate S., took home both Horse of the Year and Champion 3-Year-Old honors at the 48th Annual Sovereign Awards ceremony hosted by the Jockey Club of Canada on Thursday. The evening began with a commemoration of the club's 50th anniversary and recognition of the founding members from 1973. The top three finalists in each category are determined by the online ballots of the Jockey Club of Canada's voters. The media category award finalists were determined by professionals within the industry...

Charles Fipke's Grade I winner and 'TDN Rising Star' Shirl's Speight (Speightstown) will become the first foreign horse to ever run in Japan's G1 February S., Fipke's advisor Sid Fernando confirmed to the TDN Thursday afternoon. Set for Feb. 19, the race is over a mile on the dirt, and trainer Roger Attfield and Fipke are both set to travel to the Tokyo showpiece. "He's going," Fernando said of the 2022 GI Maker's Mark Mile hero. "He's doing well with Roger Attfield down in Florida." The February S. is one...

In an era where robust stables seem to dominate the upper echelon of racing, dual Hall of Famer Roger Attfield has proven that while numbers matter, how you handle the ones you've got is often of greater consequence. And although one operation might attain a certain number of wins at half the speed of another, in part buoyed by its sheer loft, crossing the wire first remains the great equalizer. Illustrating that importance of reaching the milestone following a lifetime of churning out the highest quality runners, Attfield remains only...

Shirl's Speight (Speightstown) is the 3-1 morning-line favorite in the GI Old Forester Bourbon Turf Classic S. at Churchill Downs Saturday. The Charles Fipke homebred, saddled by Roger Attfield, gets an extra furlong to work with after a dramatic late-running victory in the GI Maker's Mark Mile at Keeneland last time out Apr. 15. The lightly raced 'TDN Rising Star', who will be making his first start at Churchill Downs, won the 2020 GIII Marine S. over the all-weather at Woodbine and captured the GIII Tampa Bay S. over the...