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Derby 128 Has Something For Everyone
By William F. Reed
May 4, 2002
"Now then, you may say a horse race is a mighty little thing to
produce
all this fuss. If you say that, you do not understand, and, not
understanding, it is useless to argue with you."
-- Damon Runyon, 1926
LOUISVILLE, Ky. (May 4, 2002) - This afternoon, at the old sporting shrine known
as
Churchill Downs, the gods of Thoroughbred racing will study the 20
horses who
will run in the 128th Kentucky Derby (GI) and pick one to smile upon. The
lives of
everyone connected with "The Annointed One" will never be quite the same.
In
only two minutes or so, they will be magically transported from mundane
reality into golden immortality.
Exactly a century after the black jockey Jimmy Winkfield won his
second
consecutive Derby with Alan-a-Dale, the Derby is an American
institution, a
prize avidly sought by horsemen around the world. This afternoon's field
includes entrants with roots in Japan, Ireland, Dubai, the U.S., and
maybe
even Never-Never Land.
One of the horses is a gelding, two others were bred in states that
are
more or less ghettos in the breeding world (Ohio and New York), and
three are
sons of the sire Gone West. The jockeys range from grizzled veterans
such as
Laffit Pincay, Jr. and Eddie Delahoussaye, both on the wrong side of 50, to
relative youngsters who will be making their Deby debuts.
And nobody is sure what to make of the trainer Bob Baffert's
decision to
enter Danthebluegrassman at the last minute, what impact yesterday's
withdrawal of Buddha (minor foot bruise) will have on
the
race, and what an unknown cowboy trainer named Wilson Brown and the colt
It'sallinthechase are doing in the same race with training icons D. Wayne
Lukas,
Bill Mott, and Shug McGaughey.
All will be hoping to feel what Charlie Whittingham, who had skipped
the
Derby for 28 years, felt after he won the 1986 Derby with Ferdinand.
"I never had the response I received from winning that one race,"
Whittingham said. "I could win a stakes in California, and a few people
might
extend congratulations on a casual basis. But everywhere I went after
Ferdinand's victory, people wanted to talk about it. I've been in racing
all
my life, yet I found the reaction amazing."
And so did Whittingham come to understand the meaning of Derby
immortality.
"The Kentucky Derby, regardless of costume changes, of cast changes,
of
makeup and hairdos, somehow retains the fresh charm of a dewey rose at
dawn."
-- Blackie Sherrod, 1991
This Derby should have something fresh for just about everyone in
the
anticipated crowd of 130,000, and the millions more who will watch the
NBC
worldwide telecast anchored by Lexington, Ky.'s Tom Hammond. Something old?
Jockey
Laffit Pincay, 55, would become the oldest Derby-winning rider if he
boots
home Medaglia d'Oro. Something new? The Lusty Latin team of trainer Jeff
Mullins and jockey Glenn Corbett are Derby rookies.
Something borrowed? Jockey Gary Stevens, who jumped to Johannesburg
when
his preferred Derby mount, Sunday Break (Jpn), didn't make the field because
of
insufficient earnings in graded stakes races. And something blue? Blue
Burner
will try to give owner George Steinbrenner and trainer Mott their first Derby win.
The winner could have to overcome a lot of history.
Perfect Drift will attempt to become the first gelding to win the
roses
since Clyde Van Dusen in 1929.
Harlan's Holiday will try to become the first Ohio-bred to win the
Derby since Wintergreen in 1909, and Private Emblem will be try to
overcome
the fact that no New York-bred horse has ever captured the roses.
And as if overcoming an unprecedented route for the Derby isn't
challenge enough, Johannesburg will try to become the first winner of
the
Breeders' Cup Juvenile (GI) to also capture the next year's Derby.
But the hoary past isn't as important as the precious present. If
Halle
Berry and Denzell Washington can become the first African-Americans to
win
both the top acting Oscars, if the Indiana basketball team can reach the
NCAA
title game without Bob Knight, then maybe a Derby myth or two also will
be
shattered.
"What is the Kentucky Derby? It is nobility fighting vulgarity,
glory
against greed. I said the Derby is mostly heart. Not all heart, for
Churchill
Downs is a business. But you don't love someone because they are
perfect. You
love them because they are what they are."
-- Edwin Pope, 1990
The homecoming king of this year's Derby will be trainer D. Wayne
Lukas,
who skipped last year's event after entering at least one horse in every
Derby from 1981 through 2000. Now he's back with the late-blooming Proud
Citizen, who has a shot to give Lukas his fifth Derby victory.
"The Derby is a war, not the Junior Prom," says Lukas.
But Baffert, who emerged in the late 1990s as Lukas' No. 1 rival,
had to
settle for a couple of painfully plain Derby dates that don't exactly go
with
his Hollywood image. After War Emblem rolled to victory in the Illinois
Derby (GII), Prince Ahmed Salman of Saudia Arabia bought him for around $1
million
and turned him over to Baffert with instructions to run him in the
Derby.
There's also Danthebluegrassman, who belongs in the Derby like your
family
car belongs in the Daytona 500.
The anti-Baffert is Shug McGaughey, who trains Saarland for the
Phipps
family. He'll be making his first Derby appearance in 13 years because
he
refuses to enter a horse in the Derby unless he has a serious chance to
win.
This is a prom where everyone keeps changing their dance card. The
refreshments should include doughnuts, because every competitor has a
hole in
it. And so it goes, all the way through the deep, evenly matched, and
curiously flawed field.
So on the backstretch it has been possible to hear someboy say that
the
California horses don't have a chance, then walk 10 steps to where another
pundit is explaining why Came Home, winner of the Santa Anita Derby (GI),
can't
lose. Some give Medaglia d'Oro a huge chance, and others say that not
even
Wild Horses, a longshot, could keep them from betting that Request for
Parole
will do a jailhouse-rock number on the field.
No wonder track oddsmaker Mike Battaglia listed Harlan's Holiday at
9-2, making him the highest morning-line favorite ever.
"This Kentucky Derby, whatever it is - a race, an emotion, a
turbulence,
an explosion - is one of the most beautiful and violent and satisfying
things I've ever experienced."
-- John Steinbeck, 1956
The Derby is a garland of red roses draped across the winner's
withers
and victorious jockey Don Brumfield saying in 1966, "I'm the happinest
hillbilly hardboot in the world." It's mint juleps and trainer Carl
Nafzger
calling the stretch run for Mrs. Frances Genter, 90, as her Unbridled
galloped to victory in 1990.
The Derby is big hats for women and female jockey Julie Krone
imagining
herself becoming the first of her gender to be blessed with the Derby's
immortality. It's vibrant neckties for men and noted race-caller Clem
McCarthy saying in 1961, "Carry Back too far back...can't make it unless
he
hurries."
And it's that haunting song that wettens eyes and makes everyone a
resident of My Old Kentucky Home, at least for awhile, on the first
Saturday
in May.
"I can't help it," said jockey Jacinto Vasquez, who won the Derby
aboard
Foolish Pleasure in 1975 and the filly Genuine Risk in '80. "When they
play
that song, your heart feels though it will beat right through your
chest."
Jim McKay, who anchored ABC's Derby telecasts for years said the
song
"rises like a hymn in the springtime air." And Miami Herald columnist
Edwin
Pope once said the Derby is "a blur that blinds the eye while binding
the
soul."
The best horse doesn't always win the Derby. For reference, see
Native
Dancer in 1953, Damascus in 1967, and Holy Bull in 1994. It's whomever
the
racing gods choose to bless. Or, as trainer Jack Van Berg once put it,
"It's
all a matter of who that star is going to shine on."
The feeling here is that Harlan's Holiday will be The Chosen One,
followed in order by Perfect Drift, Saarland, and Private Emblem. Then
again,
maybe it's time for Johannesburg, Castle Gondolfo, and Essence of Dubai
to
win one for the foreign horses. And don't overlook the longshot Lusty
Latin,
who's surely named for Senor Horatio Luro, who won the Derby with
Decidedly
in 1962 and Northern Dancer in '64.
The dapper Luro once won a swordfight against a French nobleman who
had
done something to offend him. He also had the looks, charm, and means to
escort such Hollywood beauties as Ava Gardner, Loretta Young, and Lana
Turner.
"Very attractive, Lana was," Luro once said. "I took her to South
America
with me. Hard to control. You could not hold on to her for long. Too
much,
too much for me."
In other words, Lana was unlike Kentucky Derby immorality, something
that
will belong to you as long as starry-eyed horsemen want to run for the
roses
on the first Saturday in May.
Native Kentuckian William F. "Billy" Reed has been a sports writer in various capacities for 42 years and has missed covering the Kentucky Derby a mere two times since 1966. He has been a high-profile sports writer in Kentucky for the Commonwealth's two largest daily newspapers, the Louisville Courier-Journal and the Lexington Herald-Leader and was a national columnist for Sports Illustrated, covering among other sports, Thoroughbred horse racing and college basketball. Reed currently pens a column for the Louisville Sports Report , contrbiutes features to the Keeneland program and will be, among varied other assignments, filing Kentucky Derby installments on www.kentuckyderby.com.
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