VIRGINIA HORSEMAN PUBLISHES BOOK
Submitted by: Virginia Thoroughbred Association
Phone: (540) 347-4313
Email Address: vta(at)vabred.org
Date Added: 9/23/2005
Virginian George Rowand's memoir - Diary of a Dream - My Journey in Thoroughbred Racing - describes his seventeen years as a Thouroughbred owner and breeder. A testament to the power of optimism over adversity, the memoir recounts Rowand's inspired but sometimes misguided quest to own the next Secretariat.
Rowand and partners endured many lean years before their second yearling purchase began to produce graded stakes winners. Highland Mills, a filly by Pia Star, was purchased by a Rowand managed partnership at the 1980 Keeneland Fall Yearling Sale. Renown Virginia bloodstock agent signed the ticket for $27,000. Although a failure at the racetrack earning but $450 from five starts, Rowand and partners decided to keep the mare and breed here. That fateful decision propels Rowands story as Highland Mill's foals hit the ground literally running.
Her first foal, Highland Springs, a graded stakes winner of $403,579, reversed Rowand and Bonner Farm's sagging racing luck and catapulted the group on the road to success which included five stakes horses from the mare's first six foals. Rowand candidly recounts the feats of the homebreds $758,202 Grade I winner Miss Josh and $433,194 Grade I winner Royal Mountain Inn and others, all of which were trained by Maryland-based Barclay Tagg more recently of Funny Cide fame.
Rowand currently is an editor the Fauquier Times Democrat and he and his wife Rita, and son Michael live in Orlean. The book, published by the Eclipse Press, a division of Blood-Horse Publications, is available at local bookstores or from Exclusively Equine 1-800-582-5604 or www.ExclusivelyEquine.com.
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