Race fitness and the Triple Crown
Fit horses win the Kentucky Derby, Preakness, and Belmont, not necessarily the most talented horse(Editor's Note: The following is a commentary on preparing horses for the Triple Crown that includes the author's analysis of form, class, and fitness.)
WHO was the last horse to come into the Kentucky Derby (G1) off ridden-out victories and flop? Holy Bull.
Holy Bull had some minor traffic problems at the start of the Derby, never made the lead, and finished 12th. Maybe he did not like the surface. Or maybe he just was not fit enough. He was not the first to crack under the crushing fitness/class pressure of the Kentucky Derby. And he will not be the last.
In 1993, Prairie Bayou won the Blue Grass Stakes (G2) ridden out. It did not prove to be much of a tightener. The Derby was better-it won him the Preakness Stakes (G1). Sea Hero, fourth in the 1993 Blue Grass, got a little more out of his prep and won the Derby. Colonial Affair tired in the Peter Pan Stakes (G2), but got a good stiff work in the race and won the Belmont Stakes (G1) in his next start.
In 1992, Arazi came off an easy victory over a lackluster field in France and got blown off the track as the heavy Derby favorite. Lil E. Tee, fit from a tough race in the Arkansas Derby (G2), won the Kentucky Derby. Pine Bluff, who should have been a factor off his hard-fought win in the Arkansas Derby, rebounded dead fit to win the Preakness, but found a well-prepared and more talented A.P. Indy, who prepped in the Peter Pan, too much in the Belmont.
Best example of what easy prep races can do to a horse who is only marginally better than his Derby rivals came in 1991. Hansel came off easy victories in the Lexington (G2) and Jim Beam (G2) Stakes only to get soundly drilled in the Kentucky Derby, finishing tenth. He looked like a tired horse after that race and nobody seemed to know what happened. Once fit, he took the Preakness and the Belmont. Strike the Gold, who hung third in the Florida Derby (G1) but got fit doing so, tightened up with a ridden-out win in the Blue Grass and peaked with his Kentucky Derby victory.
In 1990, Unbridled got himself fit for the Derby by running hard and tiring to lose the Blue Grass, finishing third. A decent second-place finish in the Preakness had him as fit as possible for the Belmont, but in the race he ran into the Dermot Weld-trained, and guaranteed-fit-to-go-the-distance, Go and Go (Ire). Go and Go was coming off a fourth-place tightener in a 1 1/4-mile grass race in Ireland. The favorite for the 1990 Derby, Mr. Frisky, came into the Derby with four ridden-out scores, including the Santa Anita Derby (G1) and San Rafael Stakes (G2). He finished eighth. Some said he had problems. Others questioned his fitness coming out of races in which he did not have to exert himself.
In 1989, Easy Goer ran into the Whittingham wall that came in the form of a dead-fit Sunday Silence. Easy Goer, a big horse coming off easy victories, ran a hanging second in the Derby. He rebounded after that tightener to finish a game and much closer second in the Preakness, and finally galloped home in the Belmont over a past-his-peak Sunday Silence.
Winning Colors found herself alone on the lead in the 1988 Derby and held on to win by a neck over Forty Niner as Risen Star's 1 1/16-mile prep in the Lexington could only get him third money. Once fit, Risen Star proved he was clearly the best of the crop in the Preakness and Belmont.
Demons Begone was another heavy favorite coming off easy victories that found the pressure of the 1987 Derby too much to handle. He bled during the running of the Derby.
In 1986, there were two masterful conditioning jobs by the best in the West and the best in the East. Whittingham had Ferdinand ready to wear down the Derby field while Woody Stephens had Danzig Connection as fit as he could get him off a driving win in the Peter Pan to take his record fifth straight Belmont Stakes.
Spend a Buck, who did not contest the Preakness or Belmont, galloped home the winner as the lone speed in the 1985 Derby, while Woody Stephens ended up with a tightener for his second-place finisher Stephan's Odyssey, who was coming off a ridden-out victory in the Lexington. Favored Chief's Crown, coming off an easy victory in the Blue Grass, could do no better than third in the Derby. Woody Stephens wound up Creme Fraiche to win the Belmont off of hard races in the Derby Trial Stakes (G3) and Jersey Derby (G3), the latter a second-place finish to Spend a Buck. A fit Stephan's Odyssey ran a lackluster fourth in the Peter Pan, but came back to run a good second in the Belmont. Chief's Crown, who danced every dance in the '85 Triple Crown, could do no better than second in any of the races.
Stephens prepped Swale to win the 1984 Derby with tough races in the Fountain of Youth Stakes (G2), Florida Derby, and Lexington, but admitted he worked his horse too fast for the Preakness en route to a seventh-place finish in that race. No matter, a more casual work schedule got an already fit Swale home in the Belmont.
Sunny's Halo was the beneficiary of one of the best Derby-winning conditioning jobs ever when trainer David Cross swam his horse into shape before winning his prep in the 1983 Arkansas Derby. Woody Stephens ended up using the Derby as a tightener for eventual Belmont winner Caveat. Coming off a driving victory in the Derby Trial, Caveat was a stretch-wide third in the Derby. Stephens honed Caveat's fitness and confidence with a handy score in a 1 1/16-mile allowance race before sending him over to win the rail-smashing Belmont that ended the horse's career. Slew o' Gold, a romping winner of the 1983 Peter Pan after finishing fourth in the Derby, was favored for the Belmont, but could not match the magic of Woody Stephens in the stretch.
1994 typical year
In the last ten years, almost every Derby or Belmont has been won by the fittest horse, whereas horses that galloped around and won easily before the big races found themselves lacking when the running started. This year proved no different.
Holy Bull never was hard tried in seven of his eight previous races. His loss in the Fountain of Youth, despite an excuse that's been heard one too many times, was an indicator that something was amiss. And he isn't the kind of horse that is going to get a lot out of gallop-around victories. Seattle Slew got a lot out of just going to the paddock. He got "himself" fit after Billy Turner put the bottom into him. Holy Bull got nothing out of his races before the Derby.
Good horses that come off easy victories do not get fit by doing so. Holy Bull's very average six-furlongs work for the Derby certainly didn't do anything to expand his lungs. The only way a good horse can get fit is by being forced to work faster, preferably longer, and under pressure to do something he has not done before.
Strodes Creek was the bet in the Derby at almost 8-to-1. Charlie Whittingham does not send over short horses in Grade 1 races going 1 1/4 miles or more. Ferdinand (17-to-1 odds)
and Sunday Silence (3-to-1 odds) are proof of that. Strodes Creek was also the pick in the Belmont for that reason alone and if his lack of experience hadn't shown up on the far turn, he might have won the race.
This takes nothing away from trainer D. Wayne Lukas, of course, who went into hiding and concentrated solely on having Tabasco Cat physically and mentally prepared for the Belmont. Lukas finally proved he could get a horse ready to go 1 1/2 miles. Tabasco Cat had a bad start in the Derby, but appeared to have had a tough enough race in the Santa Anita Derby to be fit for the Kentucky Derby. Was he or wasn't he?
Go for Gin came out of a tough race in the Wood Memorial Invitational Stakes (G1) in which he had to work his heart out in a losing cause. But he got the fitness edge he needed in doing it. His lungs were forced to expand beyond their previous limits. Despite his front-running trip in the Derby, he was fit enough to win anyway. But that was as fit as he got. He reached his highest fitness level at the right time, which is a tribute to trainer Nick Zito.
Charlie Whittingham once commented that he thought he won more big races than the other trainers because he handled the pressure better. By that he meant not just pressure from owners, but pressure of getting a horse as fit as possible for a big race, a tough Grade 1 affair. There is an art to getting a horse as fit as possible without breaking him down.
Trainers who lack the knowledge, skill, and experience required to accomplish the fitness task, crack under the pressure, become fearful and back off, or are fooled by their horses. Grade 1 races are rarely won by accident. Whittingham and Stephens proved a long time ago that you do not have to break horses down to win the big ones.
The horse that wins the three-year-old classics may not have the most talent. He may not have the most class. But if he's healthy, peaking, fitter than his rivals mentally and physically, and preferably coming out of a tough race, he will win.
Of course, he has to be able to handle the pressure.
Likewise for the trainer.
George Williams, the Daily Racing Form's Trackman and a weekly feature writer at Woodbine, won the 1992 Sovereign Award for outstanding newspaper article in Canada. A former trainer, he also spent time as a groom in the barns of Charlie Whittingham, Woody Stephens, and H. Allen Jerkens.