We went to great lengths to see the 1975 Travers

Oh, the memories of youth. Twenty-five years ago, I was jumping the outside rail at Saratoga Race Course to get a chance to see the Travers Stakes (G1). This came as a result of a too-long stay in Saratoga Springs and not enough winners.

I was reminded of this while reading Hoofprints of the Century (page 74). The Thoroughbred Record of August 23, 1975, included a report on the 106th running of the Travers. It was a race my three friends and I had gone to see and were intent on seeing firsthand even if we did not have enough money between us to pay our way in.

The Travers of 1975 had been shaping up into a great event. Foolish Pleasure, who had not run since his heartbreaking match with Ruffian, was pointing for the midsummer classic, as was the magnificent $600,000 former record yearling, Wajima, one of the last Bold Rulers. The supporting cast included Prince Thou Art (whom we called Prince Thou Aren't) and Valid Appeal.

We had driven to Saratoga Springs from Chicago in a rented Winnebago, which at least ensured that we always had a roof over our heads, and arrived ten days before the Travers, in time for the Jim Dandy Stakes (G3). One of my first Saratoga bets was on Forceten, a West Coast shipper trained by a young Neil Drysdale. Forceten came from off the pace to win the Jim Dandy by a head over Prince Thou Art, returning $3.80 to win. Little did I know it would be one of the last tickets I would cash.

While waiting for the Travers, we picked a whole lot of the right horses that unfortunately always seemed to be on the wrong end of the outcome of a race. By Travers day, we could no longer afford the overnight charge to keep the Winnebago in a local trailer park and were forced to park on a street behind the National Museum of Racing. It may have been illegal-actually, camping on the street was illegal-but that is another matter.

On Travers day, we went to the track and stood dejectedly on the outside looking in. At that time, inside the main grandstand entrance television monitors were visible just beyond the chain-link fence that kept out the riffraff. I remember watching Dance Spell in an allowance race, the fourth on the card, winning from gate to wire, after having come from off the pace to break his maiden in his previous start. Only good horses do that, and he turned out to be a good one.

At that point, the four of us started considering our options. We walked around the grandstand to the top of the stretch. With a stand of trees on our left and the grandstand some 100 yards down the stretch on our right, we took a place along the outside rail to watch the races. Yes, we were pretty far from the action, but at least we had eliminated the chain-link fence from our sight lines.

From this area we could view the races turning into the stretch; we could hear track announcer Chick Anderson call a few names; and then we lost all sounds in a sea of cheers as the horses slowly became specks in the distance. Just one race from this vantage point was enough. We decided to make our move during the next race.

Luckily, it was a grass race, where the horses are even farther into the infield. As the good filly Bubbling led into the stretch, with all eyes on the turf course, we jumped the outside rail onto the main track, ran down the stretch with as much stealth as we could muster in full view of thousands, clambered back over the outside rail, and then scaled a four-foot-high fence that put us into a grassy picnic area beyond the grandstand.

This actually proved relatively easy. We'd had to jump much taller, larger fences to get into the tracks in Chicago.

We ran into the grandstand before being caught, and two races later we saw the Travers. Though Foolish Pleasure was not entered for the race, it was a memorable running anyway. We watched Wajima run like a champion, winning the Travers by ten lengths.

We did not make a bet on the race, but we did cash a lot of memories. We wouldn't have missed it for anything.