This week in Diva Dish, horse enthusiast Mickie James comments on the Kentucky Derby tragedy, and Maria and the Raw Divas practice yoga with Trish Stratus.

A Champion's thoughts on a tragedy
When Mickie James isn't defending her Women's Championship in the Raw ring, she's often at home in Virginia with her prized horses. When Diva Dish watched the Eight Belles tragedy unfold at the Kentucky Derby last weekend, we decided to talk to WWE's resident equine expert about the filly's untimely death after her runner-up finish on the track.

"I'm not against competitive racing. I obviously grew up with horses. I've had to put horses down on the farm before and it's very, very sad," James said.

"These racehorses can be worth millions of dollars. … The thing is, they're willing to fork out all this money just to have the horse, but when it comes to fixing the horse, if something happens, they just put her down instead of trying to help or talk to the vet," she expressed.

The Women's Champion told Diva Dish that she's seen injured horses at the veterinary clinic in casts, hoisted up on pulley systems to help them move around without putting weight on their injured limbs.

"It's expensive and a lot of people don't have the funds to care for an injured horse, but someone who has millions of dollars to put into horse racing obviously has the money to fix the horse and let her live a life outside of racing," she said. "These racehorses are only in the circuit at maximum, maybe seven years. After that, they just ship them off and it's really sad. Unless they're grand champions, then they use them as sires and dames in order to produce future lineages. After they've worked so hard and made their owners so much money, why don't they just let them retire?"

A passionate James was quite saddened by the Eight Belles tragedy at the Derby. As a horse owner, she said it must have been a tough call on the owner's part to euthanize the horse on the track. The Raw Diva went on to compare the horse's injury to those sometimes suffered by sports-entertainment's finest.

"It's not like the horse had a heart attack on the field or had something detrimental happen to her. She broke her ankles. So if I went out and broke my ankles, you're going to put a bunch of ambulances around me and just shoot me up with morphine? Because they are athletes just like us!"

Yoga, Stratus-style
This week when the Divas headed north for a short tour of Canada, several Raw beauties visited the yoga studio of Toronto's favorite former Diva, Trish Stratus.

"It was amazing, and it was so sweet of her to allow us to come in and to learn yoga," Maria told Diva Dish. "It was funny because the instructor said, ‘You are all very advanced,' but we work in the ring, we're all athletic and everything."

While yoga isn't a regular part of Maria's workout routine, she's pleased her experience at Trish's Stratusphere yoga studio was a positive one.

"I would definitely like to thank Trish for opening my eyes to different types of yoga. And that's something I'm going to definitely do in the future," Maria said.

For more information on Stratusphere in Vaughan, Ontario, visit its official Web site at stratusphereyoga.com.