Spiritual conversion helps assistant starter display tremendous courage

It is impossible to know how any of us would react in a crisis. Clinton Beck, an assistant starter at Pimlico Race Course, did not know how he would react until it happened.

On his way home from the track after a day's work, Beck came upon an accident. A car was on fire, and two children were trapped in the back seat.

As the flames spread with frightening speed, people who had gathered began to run away, but Beck ran into the flames. He broke the car window with his elbow, literally cut an infant boy out of his car seat restraints, got the boy's four-year-old sister out of her seat belt, and ran to safety.

"The little girl said, 'Mister, mister, I don't want to burn up like this,' " Beck said. "It was awful. There were flames everywhere, and smoke, and people screaming. I knew that if something happened to me, they would remember me for doing the right thing."

A scant few seconds later, the vehicle exploded, knocking Beck and the two children to the ground, but they were safe.

For his heroic deeds, Beck received the 2006 White Horse Award from the Race Track Chaplaincy of America at its annual luncheon on November 2 at Churchill Downs during Breeders' Cup World Championships week.

Beck credits a spiritual conversion just days earlier for the courage to act. "How can you take Jesus in your heart, in one breath, and in your first test, turn your back on it," Beck said.

Also honored at the luncheon were four other White Horse Award nominees.

Bob Young, an outrider at Horsemen's Park in Omaha, Nebraska, rode toward a field of horses in mid-race, wheeled, and led them through a narrow opening between the outside fence and a starting gate that a stalled tractor could not pull off the track.

Outrider Brian Gaylord, nominated for two heroic efforts, captured a loose filly in the Hollywood Park paddock, and later comforted a thrashing racehorse caught in some fencing until help could arrive to cut her loose.

Tammy Burlin and Michael Rea were honored together for saving four horses from a burning barn at Fair Hill Training Center in Elkton, Maryland. Twenty-four other horses perished in the November 1, 2005, fire.

The RTCA also awarded the White Horse Community Service award to three police officers who responded to the crash of Comair Flight 5191 on August 27 near Lexington's Blue Grass Airport.

Lexington police officer Bryan Jared and Blue Grass Airport officers Jon Sallee and James "Pete" Maupin were first to get to the disaster, and they were able to pull co-pilot James Polehinke from the wreckage. He was the lone survivor.

Beck received a $5,000 prize, and the others received a $1,000 prize.--Steve Myrick