Catching Up With Action This Day

Action This Day winning the 2003 Breeders' Cup Juvenile. (Photos by HorsePhotos)
Starting his racing career with a loss at Del Mar in early September of 2003, Action This Day made sure that wouldn’t happen again during his 2-year-old season.
He came back at the end of September to break his maiden at Santa Anita, closing a 2 ¼ length gap in the final furlong to win by a nose. The win convinced his connections to aim for the stars with him in his next start over the track in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile.
Action This Day was so far behind the leaders that he drifted in and out of the camera’s frame during the early part of the race, sitting as far back as 13 ¾ lengths for the first half mile. The leaders were flying and setting fast fractions, setting the race up perfectly for Action This Day.
As the field turned into the stretch, Action This Day appeared on the camera while passing half the field. The colt had no problem going between horses for David Flores in the stretch and took the lead in the final 1/16 to pull away by 2 ¼ lengths over Minister Eric with the rest of the field five lengths behind him.
2003 BREEDERS’ CUP JUVENILE

Video courtesy of Breeders’ Cup World Championships
The win was the first Breeders’ Cup victory for owner B. Wayne Hughes and was a clean sweep of the Breeders’ Cup juvenile races for trainer Richard Mandella, who also won the Juvenile Fillies with Halfbridled, in addition to the Breeders’ Cup Turf and Classic.
ACTION THIS DAY ENTERING THE WINNER'S CIRCLE

The Juvenile win put Action This Day on the Kentucky Derby trail but he ran into a speed bump in his three-year-old debut.  Running in the Sham Stakes, Action This Day again started off in the back but while he was only a little over a length behind the winner, he finished off the board for the first time in his career when finishing fourth.
From there, Action This Day never seemed to find his two-year-old groove again and was no closer than 7 ¼ lengths behind the winner at the finish in his next five starts. His best finish as a three- and four-year-old may have been in the Kentucky Derby where he finished sixth.  While he was 13 ¾ lengths behind the winner, he navigated traffic to close from last to beat horses such as Birdstone and Tapit in that Derby.
After suffering an injury in the Derby, Action This Day wasn’t seen at the races until the day after Christmas that year when he ran in a turf race for the first time, finishing ninth. After finishing eighth in a Grade 2 in January of 2005, Action This Day was retired to Castleton-Lyons.
Named the Champion 2-year-old colt of 2003, Action This Day retired with two wins in nine starts for $822,484 in earnings.
Action This Day’s first crop arrived in 2006 and produced some of his best horses, including champion Cracovia and stakes winner Night Action. In 2010, Action This Day moved to Dana Point Farm in Pennsylvania before relocating to Indian Stallion Station the following year.
As of July 22, Action This Day has had 139 winners from 217 starts and four stakes winners from eight crops three and older.
Today Action This Day stands in Peru, where Cracovia was named champion in 2011, at Haras Los Azahares.