 I’ve been a horse-racing aficionado since 1966, when I started watching the Triple Crown races on TV. My pick was Amberoid, who finished eleventh in the Derby, moved on up to third in the Preakness, then blasted home first by 2 1/2 lengths in the Belmont Stakes. Sorry Kaui King on crimping your Triple Crown bid. So it’s been lots of fun for me to bring my favorite sport into play in Always Play the Dark Horse. For verisimilitude, I drew on some real race horses’ interesting quirks when creating the equine players of my story.
Another champion handicap horse, equally determined but far less free with his chompers, was Devil His Due was a racer of the 1990s who looked as if he could have played the title role in Walter Farley’s Black Stallion series. Unusual for a champion stallion, he was not retired early but ran into his sixth year. Also unusual, he was sound enough to never have run on Lasix. I was even lucky Our black stallion was also famous for a little escapade with the IRS, a version of which makes it into
Sources for information and Images on each of the thoroughbreds. If you believe the posting of an image here violates your copyright, please contact me and I will remove it. No violation of copyright intended. Amberoid photo: Turf and Sport Digest Cover, September 1966 Equipoise Kelso Devil His Due |
Tag Archives: horse racing
Sharon and Yang Improve the Breed
Suffolk Downs was one of the premier race tracks of New England for the twentieth century. For something like sixty or seventy years, some of the finest thoroughbreds competed there: War Admiral, Seabiscuit, Stymie, Top Row, Menow, War Relic, Crimson Satan, Riva Ridge, Lost Code, Mom’s Command, Waquiot, and Cigar. Sadly, it was the last of the New England tracks to close, in 2014. Happily, though, the track has been re-opened this fall for three racing dates. My husband and I had the pleasure of going to the track on the second date, October 3.Here you see me checking out the odds
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Jewels of the Triple Crown Part 3
Blog #8War Admiral: The Mighty AtomMan O’ War was considered the yardstick for greatness in racing for most of the twentieth century––and still is by some. The original “Big Red” was a tall, rangy powerful chestnut with a star and stripe on his face and the look of eagles in his eyes. A fast horse out of the gate, he was almost impossible to pass, except for that one really bad start that cost him his only loss, to a horse aptly named Upset. War Admiral was his best son, amongst some fine stakes horses. Two horses couldn’t have looked more different: Big Red tall, some claim 16.3 hands, and lean; War Admiral muscular and compact, only standing 15.3. Man O’ War a gleaming red chestnut, the Admiral a solid dark brown, almost black. Nevertheless, the two shared a blinding speed and feisty spirit that brought them home first over some very good competition. War Admiral, nicked named the “mighty Atom” for compressing such a concentration of speed and power in such a small package, was foaled at Riddle Faraway Farm, the home of his magnificent Dad and owned by Samuel D. Riddle (who raced both horses). As a two year old, the colt’s record was respectable, though not spectacular: three wins in six starts, including one stakes race (Drager 62, Robertson 318). Still, he showed both promise and spirit, which he fulfilled by going unbeaten at three. In the Chesapeake Stakes, he trounced the winners of the Flamingo and the Santa Anita Derby, leading Samuel Riddle to break his rule of not running in the Derby for the first and only time (Riddle felt that early in May was too soon to ask a three year old to go 1 1/4 miles). After War Admiral caused an eight-minute delay at the starting gate (the spirited colt loathed the confinement), he shot to the lead and stayed there to romp home by 1 3/4 lengths over the good Pompoon (Drager 62, Robertson 318). The Preakness proved an even more thrilling race, with Pompoon’s jockey sending the colt to challenge War Admiral early and the two staging a furious battle on the lead. War Admiral prevailed by just a head (Drager 63-65, Robertson 318). Interestingly, Robertson claims that the victory was more authoritative than it looked, with the Admiral decisively turning back every attempt Pompoon made to move ahead (318). The Belmont Stakes was a particularly impressive victory, and not just because War Admiral led from start War Admiral was out of action for four and a half months, but when he was back in action, he racked up wins in the Washington Cap and the Pimlico Special (under 128 lbs!), to take Horse of the Year Honors for 1937 (Robertson 318). That year, another horse was making headlines, the rag-to-riches handicap star you may have seen a movie about: Seabiscuit. The Biscuit and War Admiral missed meeting in 1937 when the former was pulled out of the Washington Cap, and 1938 proved to be a year of exciting rivalry for handicap and horse-of-the-year honors between the two. Both horses won big and racked up high earnings; both horses carried high weights to victory over the top stakes stars of the year. After several near misses, the two finally met in a winner-take-all match race for $15,000 (not chump change in 1938). Anyone who’s been to the movies in the past few years knows how that turned out. Tom Smith used shrewd training techniques to get the Biscuit to break fast and put on an early burst of speed. For the first time in a long time, War Admiral was headed, almost literally, out of the gate. The Admiral made several runs at the Biscuit, but it was the older horse who finally prevailed (Drager 73-82, Robertson 325-26). Still, War Admiral hardly suffered a broken heart, turning around shortly afterward to trounce his rivals soundly in Rhode Island Cap under 127 lbs. at the old ’Gansett in Rhode Island. War Admiral came back to racing at five; owners weren’t afraid to ask their horses to prove themselves (without necessarily over racing them) in those days. He took a prep for the Widener, then was se Sources: The Kentucky Derby: The First Hundred Years (Peter Chew); The Most Glorious Crown (Marvin Drager); The History of Thoroughbred Racing in America (Willaim H. P. Roberston). |
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Jewels of the Triple Crown, Part 2
Blog #6 Father/Son Act: Gallant Fox and OmahaAlthough there have been many parent/offspring winners of individual triple crown races, there only one such duo has taken the entire triple crown: Gallant Fox and his son Omaha. Both horses were owned and bred by William Woodward’s Belair Stud and both carried his white with red dots silks. Gallant Fox was foaled in 1927, a trim bay with a crooked blaze, son of import Sir Gallahad III. As a juvenile (two-year-old) he was not stellar, but not bad, winning two of six starts, including stakes. His problem was not lack of speed or stamina but a plethora of curiosity (Drager 36). William Robertson described him as “lively as a puppy and just as inquisitive” (276). At the start of the Tremont Stakes, he was left at the barrier because he was too fascinated with watching the other horses. Things got much better at three.
Gallant Fox developed a cough and fever at the end of the season, so Woodward, feeling his colt had more than proved himself, retired him. Initially, the colt did well at stud, siring Omaha, Granville, and Flares––then, not so much. He died on 11/13/54, an hour before the runnings of the Gallant Fox Handicap and the Marguerite Stakes (named for his dam) (Drager 49). Omaha was a stunning beauty: “Bright gold chestnut, [with] a slash of a blaze” (Drager 51). His two-year-old season wasn’t exactly stellar, either, although he won or finished second in several stakes. He was just too big and awkward. However, at three he was no longer gangling but imposing, standing 16.2 hands tall (a hand equals four inches) (51-52). He took two races before the Derby, including the Wood Memorial (like his Dad), then took the Derby in muddy going by 1 1/2 lengths with a strong finish; the third time a father/son duo had done so. In the Preakness, Omaha earned the name “the Belair Bullet” when he “smothered Sources: The Most Glorious Crown (Marvin Drager); The History of Thoroughbred Racing in America (William H. P. Roberston). Gallant Fox photo from The Most Glorious Crown (Marvin Drager).
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Jewels of the Triple Crown
With all the well-merited excitement over American Pharoah’s [sic] being the first horse to cop a Triple Crown in 37 years, I thought people might like to know a little about the eleven colts who preceded him in attaining this difficult feat. First, you might like to know that the Derby, Preakness, and Belmont Stakes were not officially dubbed the Triple Crown by the Thoroughbred Racing Association until 1950, after Citation (Big Cy) swept them in 1948. In the first quarter of the twentieth-century, they came to be considered the most important races for three-year-olds (the only age allowed to run in them). Then, in the mid-1930s, Charles Hatton of the Morning Telegraph and Daily Racing Form referred to them, unofficially, as the Triple Crown of stakes for three-year-olds when Omaha swept them (Chew 74, Drager 3). So let’s take a look at the first triple crown champ, Sir Barton.Sir Barton
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Sharon Healy-Yang 