Dancing Emerald "The Queen of Greenwood"

It it time to talk about pure royalty. Her title was; "The Queen of Greenwood". Her racing name was "Dancing Emerald" This talented performer was the best speed female from the Sheldon Wolfe Racing Stable. Dancing Emerald stood about 15.1 hands high. She was dark bay in color, and had a beautiful star between those piercing eyes of hers. Dancing Emerald was the epitome of a highly talented female. Dancing Emerald nickname became "Emmy". Dancing Emerald knew she was from royalty and was talented. She was very sure of herself, she was very confident, very demanding, and had a extremely bad temper. Emmy would quickly let you know if you did something that displeased your heinous. Then you would have to try and cope with her wrath! It was difficult for Emmy to show affection or to show her approval. I knew her well, because I was her groom for most of her exciting career.

My father purchased a yearling for the Les Lee family at the Keeneland Sales in the fall of 1981. He purchased a filly by Cutlass, out of the mare Jestaemerald for $17,000. The Lee's choose the name "Dancing Emerald". Emmy would be the second prolific Lee runner in there horse history, in the Sheldon Wolfe Racing Stable. Dancing Emerald would go on to win 10 races including winning the Whimsical Stakes race twice. Also she would put together a 6 race win streak in her brilliant racing career. Eight of her wins would take place at Greenwood. Sadly Greenwood is just a memory now. There is nothing left of Toronto's historic racetrack. All that stands now, is rows of houses, where the thoroughbreds use to entertain loyal horse racing fans for generations.

Dancing Emerald showed tremendous talent very early in career. However she never made it to the races during her two year old campaign. This was due to being plagued with shore shins. My father reassured Les Lee that he should not worry. That he owned a very talented race filly. Giving her the time would pay off in the future. Les agreed to my father's advise. We were all rewarded by the correct decision that was made. Dancing Emerald enjoyed a very good winter, and started to train great as a 3 year old. However there was still some soreness in her front shins. We kept working on them. Finally we resolved her shin problems. It was now time to see how good this talented filly was. Emmy kept telling us that she was good. Emmy showed great speed in the morning trials. She was breed for speed. That would become her style and her trademark. Even with the amazing talent that she had. It took the Queen a while to perfect her success in the racing business.

Dancing Emerald broke her maiden (won her first race) on July 2, 1983. She was confidently ridden by ridden by Jack Lauzon in this race. It would be the only race that she would win running from behind, in her career. Emmy broke well in this race. She stalked from fourth position on the outside, and was never far behind. Running past the quarter mile pole, Emmy laid a menacing second on the outside. The front runner "Plum Fun" was no match for Dancing Emerald in the final eight of a mile to the finish line. Dancing Emerald pulled away to win one lenght. Emmy was on her way!