BENSALEM, Pa. - Rarely have so many turned out to watch so few do so little - and appreciated it so much.

For the second and last time between Triple Crown races, thousands of Smarty Jones enthusiasts converged Saturday on Philadelphia Park to watch the undefeated colt go through a mundane training regimen - but the scene the fans created was anything but ordinary.

Kentucky is his adopted home state, but Nick Zito is still New York through and through. He was born there, raised there, and is based there for most of the year. His success in the Kentucky Derby sated one long-held desire, but Zito still longs to win the biggest race in New York, the Belmont Stakes.

His quest has been a particularly trying one. Zito has finished second in the Belmont five times. "Honest, that is frustration," Zito said.

ELMONT, N.Y. - For some trainers, Saturday's $200,000 is a way to get their horses to a meeting with Smarty Jones two weeks from now in the $1 million Belmont Stakes. For others, the Grade 2 Peter Pan is a chance to get away from the undefeated Smarty Jones, who will seek to become the sport's 12th Triple Crown winner in the Belmont.

BENSALEM, Pa. - Three days away from the racetrack did little to rejuvenate trainer John Servis, but it certainly had the batteries of his dual-classic winner Smarty Jones fully recharged.

So energetic was Smarty Jones on Wednesday morning that Servis called an audible in his training routine and had Smarty Jones jog one-half mile and then gallop one-half mile at Philadelphia Park. It was the first day on the track for Smarty Jones since his record-setting 11 1/2-length Preakness victory last Saturday.

BALTIMORE - The record crowd of 112,668 people at the Preakness watched Smarty Jones and Stewart Elliott from everywhere - clubhouse boxes, grandstand seats, infield beach chairs, tippy-toes on the apron.

And then there were the few who saw it from the front row. Jockeys Gary Stevens, Kent Desormeaux, and Mike Smith enjoyed the best seats in the house. Yes, enjoyed. That's how good Smarty Jones was on May 15. Rival jockeys, in the midst of getting hot and dirty, enjoyed the show.

BENSALEM, Pa. - Smarty Jones, who will try to become Thoroughbred racing's 12th Triple Crown winner in the June 5 Belmont Stakes, returned to the track Wednesday morning for the first time since his record-setting victory in last Saturday's Preakness Stakes as he jogged one-half mile and galloped one-half mile at Philadelphia Park.

Smarty Jones, with exercise rider Pete Van Trump up, came on the track just before 6 a.m. with a light drizzle falling. Trainer John Servis, astride his pony, accompanied Smarty Jones throughout the whole exercise.

In last year's Triple Crown, a horse who became wildly popular won the Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes, but was then defeated in the Belmont Stakes by a colt who had disappointed in the Derby and skipped the Preakness. The connections of Tapit are hoping they can follow in the footsteps of Empire Maker and play the role of spoiler against Smarty Jones in the 136th Belmont on June 5 at Belmont Park.

BALTIMORE - Eight is not enough. Smarty Jones has now won eight straight races without a defeat, but his growing popularity has fans clamoring for more. After adding Saturday's Preakness Stakes at Pimlico to his victory two weeks earlier in the Kentucky Derby, Smarty Jones will now attempt to become racing's 12th Triple Crown winner, and first since Affirmed in 1978, in the 136th Belmont Stakes on June 5 at Belmont Park.

ELMONT, N.Y. - Bobby Frankel awoke Sunday morning to find the New York tabloids describing Funny Cide's loss in the Belmont Stakes as part of a sports "Triple Frown," and Frankel's colt, Empire Maker, as "Evil Empire."

As far as Frankel is concerned, it should have been "Empire Strikes Back."

"They had theirs," Frankel said, referring to the Funny Cide team. "It was time for someone else."

ELMONT, N.Y. - The feelings of disappointment the connections of Funny Cide naturally felt early Saturday evening had by Sunday morning evaporated into a sense of accomplishment for what their chestnut gelding had done the last five weeks.

Funny Cide's name will not be written next to those of Citation, Secretariat, Seattle Slew, Affirmed, and Thoroughbred racing's seven other Triple Crown winners. But, Funny Cide's five-length loss to Empire Maker in Saturday's Belmont Stakes does not take away the fact the New York-bred won the Kentucky Derby and Preakness beforehand.