what we can learn from Big Brown

As you surely know, Big Brown came in last at yesterday's Belmont Stakes race. The thoroughbred had won the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness, so everyone was talking about how there may finally be a Triple Crown winner again. Alas, it wasn't to be. Da'Tara, a 38-1 longshot, won the race.

Trainer Rick Dutrow Jr., who earlier in the week called Big Brown’s victory in the Belmont Stakes a “forgone conclusion,” rushed back to the barn to tend to the Kentucky Derby and Preakness winner, the lowest price Belmont Stakes favorite since Secretariat in 1973. He later told reporters that he couldn’t find anything physically wrong with the colt and was next planning to “scope” him to see if bleeding from his nostrils or throat could have interfered with his breathing.

I think there are several lessons to be learned from this:

• There is very little in life that is a "foregone conclusion," much less a horse race. Like Patrick Henry supposedly said, the only certain things are death and taxes.
• It's never wise to boast, because if you don't follow through, you look like an idiot.
• If you're going to race, you have to prepare, no matter how you've done in the past.
• There's a new new sensation every year.