When Bobby’s Kitten hit the far turn in the $500,000 Penn Mile last Saturday night, it was clear that the colt was going to win, and probably win big. Javier Castellano was just waiting for the right moment.
When that moment came, Bobby’s Kitten took off like the race had just started, running the final quarter-mile in 23.58 seconds and the final eighth in 11.88. If you were at Penn National, you did not need a clock to tell you how fast the horse was running. It was obvious.
The wondering will continue right up to the moment the gates pop open for the 146th running of the Belmont Stakes late Saturday afternoon.
Why is California Chrome this good? How does he defy the basic principles of trying to breed the best to the best and hope for the best? Where does it say in his trainer’s resume that he’s ever handled anything anywhere near the ability of this particular colt? And where is Los Alamitos, anyway?
The Belmont Stakes has historically been billed as “the Test of the Champion,” and it may live up to that description when California Chrome bids to sweep the Triple Crown. But in the last decade or so the 147-year-old event has been marked by freakish results and diminished prestige. Its 1 ½-mile distance has made it an anachronism in American racing. Its recent history sheds light on the special challenges that California Chrome will face on Saturday.
Before the Kentucky Derby, the owners of California Chrome turned down an offer to sell 51 percent of their colt for $6 million. The offer pegged his value at about $12 million. After California Chrome proceeded to win the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness, trainer Art Sherman declared: “Now the horse is worth $30 million.” The owners surely expect that his value as a prospective stallion will soar further if he wins the Belmont Stakes and completes a sweep of the Triple Crown.
Mickey Taylor knows just how Steve Coburn and Perry Martin feel, coming from a place in the Thoroughbred world so far removed from the bluegrass of Kentucky and the ivied walls of Belmont Park to try and win the Triple Crown.
“After Triple Crown winners from Meadow Stable, and Calumet, and King Ranch, there we were with a horse bought at public auction,” Taylor said, harking back to the spring of 1977. “We weren’t just from the far side of the moon. We were from somewhere out past Mars.”
As usual, a Belmont Stakes with a Triple Crown on the line is sucking all the oxygen from the room. Life goes on elsewhere, although you’d hardly know it.
Between May 17, when California Chrome added the Preakness to his Kentucky Derby, and June 7, when he will dance with the devil one more time at Belmont Park, there were two other stakes rated Grade 1 on the North American schedule.
Dial the number of the guy who just five weeks earlier had his bell run big time after being thrown by a goofy 2-year-old colt and you’re not sure what to expect. Head injuries are the deep, dark waters of physical trauma. No one can predict how the victim will emerge.
It was a relief, therefore, to hear Larry Jones yammering away on the other end of the line like the same drawling cowboy he’s always been. Or at least since the racing world started noticing him because of horses like Hard Spun, Eight Belles, Proud Spell, Believe You Can, and Havre de Grace.
We have known since that final night at Hollywood Park that California Chrome had the instant acceleration that has been winning major races forever. We knew California Chrome was fast enough to win classic races when he got Beyers of 108 and 107 in the San Felipe and Santa Anita Derby. We found out in the Preakness that California Chrome is tough, with multiple gears, first fighting off that early turn move by Social Inclusion and then holding firm against a serious stretch charge by Ride On Curlin. We shall find out on June 7 if California Chrome is legendary.
Penn National set records in total handle, ontrack handle, and single-race handle in 2013 on the first Penn Mile Day. Given the horses likely to run in the five stakes worth a total of $1 million in purses this Saturday, there is no reason to think it won’t be a big day again.
During the Civil War, the infield of Washington Race Course in Charleston, S.C., was used as an outdoor prison camp for captured Union soldiers. Upon the camp’s liberation at the war’s end, a mass grave with the bodies of at least 257 soldiers was discovered behind the grandstand. The bodies were reburied in individual graves, and on May 1, 1865, a celebration in their memory was held, featuring bands, picnics, and marching maneuvers by Union brigades, both black and white.
It was the first Memorial Day.
