THORPEDO Anna rips through another gallop in the dark, her 74-year-old exercise rider Danny Ramsey holding and hoping, fighting physics. Big Evs barrels down the horse path, head up, eyes wide, a ball of speed, back for another crack.

Emily Upjohn measures each step like she’s trying on a new pair of Pradas. Rebel’s Romance floats along the turf course, a $9.1 million hovercraft. War Like Goddess, a seven-year-old mare still going strong, straddles the line of boil and boil over, as her trainer Bill Mott tries to cajole her through another day. East Avenue, well, East Avenue stops you in your tracks; the days, the hours, the minutes can’t come quick enough for his trainer, Brendan Walsh.