Snapshot of the winner’s circle photo. (Double J Photos)
By Maribeth Kalinich
A few years back (2005 to be exact) I purchased racing photos from an eBayer with the username PickUpTheTempo. I was intrigued by the name and asked if it was a racehorse but the seller did not respond. So, I googled it.
A story about Olympic swim coach Bob Bowman popped up.
The story featured Bowman at his office at University of Michigan and commented that he “didn’t have a photo in his office of his star Michael Phelps however he did have a photo of his prized 2-year-old filly on his credenza.” The filly’s name—Pick Up The Tempo.
She was the daughter of City Zip out of Fast Femme (Jovial Turn). But her pedigree didn’t matter. One look and I was hooked. I followed that filly through her entire career. She ran with such heart through 35 starts winning eight with five seconds including in the Kattegat’s Pride at Pimlico on Preakness weekend for Susan Cooney. That day she did indeed wear the number 4.
I also learned in the google search that Pick Up The Tempo was a Willie Nelson song. Seems the Ebay seller was a big Nelson fan.
The seller ended up being Frank Morgan, an attorney from Baltimore who was a part owner of Pick Up The Tempo.
When I didn’t see Tempo entered in any races for a while, I contacted Morgan to inquire.
He said she had been retired. I asked if they had any plans to breed her and with a chuckle Frank said no.
However, a few months later Frank called me because they changed their minds and wanted to breed Tempo but they didn’t know where she was.
Frank offered to hire me to find the now 5-year-old mare. He said, “you found me, I think you could find her.”
Turning down his offer of pay I said I would try but couldn’t guarantee how long it might take.
Every day I got on my computer and tried different key words and different browsers.
About five weeks into my search there she was ….
Tempo had been retrained as a hunter/jumper and was now in Georgia. And she had a new name … Fiona.
I called Frank and gave him the news. He was quite amazed that I found her and proceeded to contact the new owner.
Seems Tempo had been retrained in Maryland and Frank said he wished they had known. But her new owner had no interest in either selling the mare back to Morgan and Bowman nor leasing her to breed.
But Tempo’s story still had a happy ending.
Epilogue:
Just by chance, I wrote to Maryland track photographer Jim McCue to see if he had any winner’s circle photos of Tempo. What I received was a treasure. I noticed the name of the jockey, who in the photo was wearing a winter ski mask partially covering her face. It was apprentice A.R. Napravnik aka Rosie! I cherish the photo even more!
