The First Saturday In May

For those, few, of you who haven't been following events along the Derby Trail this year, a significant - and long-overdue - change has been implemented in determining which thoroughbreds are qualified to be included in the Derby field.  Prior to 2013, entry was based primarily upon graded stakes earnings.  Simply put, the 20 three-year old thoroughbreds which had won the most purse money in Grade 1, Grade 2 and/or Grade 3 races was eligible for entry [provided they also met assorted secondary conditions which won't be addressed here].  

Allow me to now stipulate my yearly rant about 20 horses being too large a field, that they should not use the auxiliary starting gate and that they should limit the size of the field to 14.  

Let us now continue.

Among the shortcomings with the graded stakes earnings qualifier was that often horses would have earned a large sum of purse money by having won - for example - an important sprint race but that the same breeding which made them so adept at winning a sprint race simultaneously made them virtually incapable of winning at the Kentucky Derby's mile-and-one-quarter length.  Yet there they were, occupying a spot in the Derby starting gate which probably should have gone to a horse better able to compete at the Derby's so-called classic distance and also, attributable to their natural style of racing, there they were setting a too-fast - and many would argue "false" - pace in their early going, setting up a race scenario which isn't conducive to creating a satisfying conclusion.  Another shortcoming; Fillies are now effectively barred from the Kentucky Derby (unless they race against colts on the Derby Trail.  This measure is in part to ensure better fields for the Kentucky Oaks).

For 2013, the graded stakes earnings criteria has been abolished and in its place a points system has been devised by which a Win, Place and Show finish in predetermined prep races earns horses point totals which increase based upon, primarily, Grade level.  The highest point totals being awarded to those finishing 1st, 2nd or 3rd in Grade 1 races, a step lower for Grade 2, etc.  Those prep races which were selected for participation in this point system were those which would truly serve to prepare a given horse for the Kentucky Derby such as but not limited to; the Blue Grass Stakes, the Florida Derby, the Wood Memorial, the Arkansas Derby, the Santa Anita Derby, the Louisiana Derby, the Fountain of Youth Stakes, the San Raphael Stakes, the Gotham Stakes, etc.  There have been a few complaints with this new point system.  For example, the Illinois Derby was omitted from participation despite having produced the 2002 Kentucky Derby winner, War Emblem.

Whatever bugs yet need to be worked out of this new system, I think it provides a way to have a more capable field of Kentucky Derby participants than did the previous graded stakes earnings-based criteria.

What the forgoing suggests is that this year's Kentucky Derby field appears to be the best - or strongest - they've had, 1 through 20, in many decades.  Just one part of the lure of the Kentucky Derby for handicappers is the challenge; The Derby is the single most difficult race to handicap.  Bar none.  With a stronger field of 20, that challenge becomes incrementally more difficult.

For those of you interested in the wagering aspects of the Kentucky Derby, be sure to check out the links tab along the upper right side of Heavy Artillery (just below the red banner) for my list of recommended links.  Of particular relevance to this subject are links to The Daily Racing Form and The Blood-Horse.

For those of you who have an interest in the Kentucky Derby that skews more to the pageantry of the event, remember to watch the Kentucky Oaks - or "Ladies Day" - on the NBC Sports Network from 5pm to 6pm on Friday, May 3rd.  That one hour will be jam-packed with hats, dresses, roses, celebrities and... um... oh yeah, the Kentucky Oaks.

Then, clear your schedule for Saturday May 4th:

-- 11am to 4pm broadcast coverage will again be on NBCSN 
-- 4pm to 7pm the broadcast moves to the NBC mothership
-- 7pm to 730pm, post-race coverage reverts to NBCSN

If you simply have an interest for the spectacular thoroughbreds themselves, make a point to read Steve Haskin's "Derby Report: The Players Up Close" at:

steve-haskin/archive/2013/04/26/

And for those of you out there who prefer gray horses (you know who you are!), Santa Anita runner-up Flashback is off the Derby Trail, recovering from minor surgery.  Had Flashback not been injured, he'd easily have wrecked havoc with the Derby odds board as every bettor of the fairer sex would have put $2 on him based solely upon his striking coat (see image below):

Are those sparkles on the coat of Flashback?  What's next?  Glitter?  A pink horse?

Long-range Reconnaissance

The Kentucky Derby has seen some historically big longshot winners in recent years.  In 2005 Giacomo won at odds of 50-1 and in 2009 Mine That Bird won at odds of 51-1.  Those two represent, respectively, the third-longest and second-longest odds-on Kentucky Derby winners.  2013 marks the 100th anniversary of the biggest longshot to ever cross the wire first in "The Run for the Roses" when Donerail won at odds of 91-1.  Your $2-to-Win ticket that day paid $184.90.  Adjusted for inflation, that is approximately $4,417.98 in today's worthless greenbacks.  In 1913, thanks to streamlined production and cheap labor costs in the pre-UAW era, the cost of Henry Ford's Model T dropped to $550 (in 1909 a Model T, in black paint, ran about $850).  Your $4,400 winning ticket on Donerail meant you could have purchased a Model T for every day of the week, if that week included 8 days.  1913 was a long time ago, maybe they had 8-day weeks back then.

When one thinks of Churchill Downs today, often the first image that springs to mind is of the iconic twin spires that sit atop the grandstand.  In the photo below, from Derby Day 1901, there wasn't a whole lot else:

How about that massive awning hanging off the side of the grandstand?

The tradition of the Kentucky Derby being run on The First Saturday In May had not yet been established by 1901.  That year, the Derby was held on April 29th.  The winner of the 1901 Kentucky Derby was His Eminence.  His Eminence was a multiple-stakes winner and was sold at auction a handful of times following his Derby score.  In 1910 His Eminence met a tragic demise when his sixth owner was training the Derby champion to be a steeplechaser and His Eminence failed to successfully clear a hurdle.  In the days long before this modern era of spiraling stud fees, Derby winners often faced uncertain and odd futures.  Typhoon II won the Kentucky Derby in 1897.  By 1904, he was pulling a milk cart in Indianapolis, Indiana.

The photo above dates from 1907 but was not of the Kentucky Derby.  The 1907 Derby was run over a track mired in deep mud.  In the photo above of Churchill Downs you can see dust being kicked up at the start on a dry, "fast" track.  Pink Star, a horse of nasty temperament, wore the roses in 1907.  He was gelded the following year and lived out the rest of his life as a farm horse.  One might imagine Pink Star pulling a hay wagon.  And being of even worse temperament.

Notable by its absence in the photo above is the now-familiar starting gate.  The starting gate didn't become widely adopted until the 1940s.

Another strong-willed Kentucky Derby winner was War Admiral.  This son of Man o' War won the Derby in 1937, seen in the panoramic photo below:

The Lexington-born Man o' War did not win the 1920 Triple Crown only because he was not entered to run the Kentucky Derby that year.  His owner would only race his horses on tracks in the eastern United States, tracks such Saratoga, Belmont and Pimlico.  He refused to send his horse to race in Kentucky.  Just one year earlier, in 1919, Sir Barton won the first-ever Triple Crown and so the concept of competing for the Triple Crown wasn't yet firmly established in the minds of horsemen in 1920.  Man o' War was victorious in both the Preakness and Belmont Stakes in '20.  Man o' War was the champion 2-year old in 1919 and was named Horse of the Year for 1920.  Widely regarded as the greatest racehorse of the 20th century, Man o' War retired with a record of 20 wins and 1 second in 21 lifetime starts (his one defeat coming in a half-length loss to a horse named Upset in a race which began - in that era before starting gates - with Man o' War facing the wrong direction, his jockey turning him around just as the starter gave his signal).  Nicknamed "Big Red" long before Secretariat was given the same nickname, Man o' War was a large horse and had a 28-foot stride.  His size and talent meant that he was assigned the high weight in handicap races, giving away as much as 35 pounds to his competitors.  And they still couldn't beat him.  Unlike some of his Derby-winning predecessors, Man o' War enjoyed a long and satisfying life at stud.  His bloodlines can still be found in the winners circle today, notably from horses sired by Tiznow and Honor And Glory.  Today you can visit the final resting place of Man o' War at the Kentucky Horse Park in Lexington and marvel at the life-size statue of him they have on display.

But that is Man o' War and the photo above is of his son War Admiral winning the 1937 Kentucky Derby.

War Admiral was also born in Lexington, Kentucky but did not possess his sire's size.  In 26 lifetime starts War Admiral compiled a record of 21-3-1, one of his five defeats famously coming at the hands (hooves?) of Seabiscuit - himself a grandson of Man o' War - in a match race held at Pimlico in 1938 and as portrayed in the film Seabiscuit.  In 1937 War Admiral became just the fourth horse to win the Triple Crown.

A mere four years later, in 1941, The Sport of Kings saw its fifth Triple Crown winner; Whirlaway, bred and owned by Calumet Farm.  The panoramic photo below captures the field for the 1941 Kentucky Derby participating in the post parade.  I am unable to discern which of the horses, below, is Whirlaway.

Calumet Farm neighbors Keeneland on Versailles Road in Lexington, Kentucky.  You might recall what Max Watman wrote about Calumet in his book Race Day:


William Wright founded the farm in 1924 after he made a lot of money hustling Calumet baking powder.  He sent salesmen into the field to conduct in-home demonstrations, all of them claiming the egg whites in the powder made the stuff more effective.  The sales tactic worked, and William Wright moved his farm from Illinois to Kentucky, just outside Lexington.
    When William’s son Warren Wright, Sr., took it over, he kicked things into gear.  He sold the baking powder company to General Foods for forty million dollars and got down to seriously breeding and racing thoroughbreds.
    Calumet Farm’s first big horse was Nellie Flag, in 1934, a granddaughter of Man o’ War and the best two-year-old running.  She was the favorite in the 1935 Kentucky Derby, where she was the first Derby mount for the young Eddie Arcaro.  (He would go onto win five Derbies, but not that one – that race belonged to Omaha.)
    In 1936, Wright joined A.B. Hancock, Sr., in a syndicate to import a stallion named Blenheim II, and bought a yearling named Bull Lea.  These two horses would establish a bloodline for Calumet that may very well be unmatched.  Each of the two foundation stallions gave Calumet a Triple Crown winner.  Whirlaway was a son of Blenheim II, and Citation was the son of Bull Lea.
    Winning 18 percent of all Triple Crowns ever won is pretty good shakes already, but Calumet’s accomplishments don’t stop there.  Twelve times Calumet has been the winningest owner when the yearly money count is figured.  Eleven years in a row they were the leading American breeder.  Nineteen horses owned by Calumet have won thirty-eight divisional or Horse of the Year championships.  Calumet-bred horses have won the Kentucky Derby nine times; eight of them were owned by the farm.  They have bred and owned seven winners of the Preakness Stakes.  The Calumet silks, Devil Red with blue hoops, have become famous. The farm itself, with its miles of white fences and all its barns painted red and white, has become the geographical manifestation of horse racing.
    The forties belonged to Calumet.  I can’t imagine anyone has seen anything like the concentrated, brilliant domination that began in 1940, when Whirlaway drifted out coming around his first stretch turn – a crazy habit that would be fixed with intensive training and a custom-made one-eyed blinker – and won his race anyway.  Calumet ran so many good horses these years that huge stakes winners would basically be the stablemate, second-stringers behind Calumet champions.
    Calumet closed out the forties with Citation.  It was the first horse to give Man o’ War’s reputation a run for its money, certainly one of the top three racehorses of all time, called by Eddie Arcaro “The runningest son of a bitch I ever been on.”
    When Warren Wright, Sr., died in 1950, he was survived by his wife Lucille.  His obituary in the Thoroughbred Record read:  “He played the game the way all games should be played, with fierce devotion to the main objective, content with nothing but paramount achievement… The devil red, not merely the symbol of the ultimate aristocracy of the Turf, became also the proud banner of the $2 bettor.  They believed in it, and they worshipped the horses that bore it.” 

Much like baseball players from earlier eras, the racing record of Whirlaway similarly suggests a level of durability that does not exist among the sport's modern participants; Whirlaway would race 60 times, winning 32 races and finishing in the money 56 times in total.  Calumet Farm's other Triple Crown winner, Citation, compiled a record of 32-10-2 in 45 lifetime starts.

Calumet Farm's list of Kentucky Derby winners is as follows:

Whirlaway (1941)
Pensive (1944)
Citation (1948)
Ponder (1949)
Hill Gail (1952)
Iron Liege (1957)
Tim Tam (1958)
Forward Pass (1968)

A ninth horse bred at Calumet (but sold by the farm) that won the Kentucky Derby was Strike The Gold in 1991.  

Max Watman makes reference to great stakes-winning horses being mere stablemates, "second-stringers," behind Calumet's champions.  One example of this was Coaltown.  In 1948 Coaltown won 8 of his 13 starts, including having won that year's Blue Grass Stakes in record time yet it was Calumet Farm stablemate Citation which won the Triple Crown - and most of the laurels - in 1948.

Unsurprisingly, Calumet has had more winners of the Blue Grass Stakes - run next door at Keeneland - than any other owner;  Bull Lea (1938), Ocean Wave (1943), Faultless (1947), Coaltown (1948), Forward Pass (1968), Alydar (1978).

In 2012, Calumet Farm was sold for a reported $40 million and is operated now by a native of Kentucky and former board member of Churchill Downs named Brad Kelley.  Mr Kelley owns two other Lexington-area farms.  He previously operated a racing stable called Bluegrass Hall and has continued using his own Bluegrass Hall colors (or "jockey's cap and silks"; black and gold) for racing under the Calumet banner.  As one condition of the sale, Calumet Farm retains the rights to its historic racing colors.  Here's to hoping that we once again, someday soon, see the old Calumet devil red and blue silks on Calumet thoroughbreds.

Calumet Farm will have one entrant in this year's Kentucky Derby, irrespective of colors, named Oxbow and conditioned by Hall of Famer trainer D. Wayne Lukas.