|
I have always had a fondness for the Santa Anita Derbies; I witnessed Affirmed winning this race as a young lad. At the time, I wasn't aware that I would be witnessing a Triple Crown winner.
I thought with so much certainty that Ferdinand was going to beat Snow Chief in the Santa Anita Derby as well as in the Kentucky Derby.; but Ferdinand finished third to Snow Chief and Icy Groom. I was so perplexed.....
It would be years later that I would learn that the great Charlie Whittingham used the Santa Anita Derby as a prep race for the Kentucky Derby and Whittingham sacrificed his great 3 year old filly Hidden Light as a workout companion for Ferdinand during the week of the Derby. Both horses were owned by Howard Keck. The last workout before the Kentucky Derby, I recalled that Ferdinand had worked a smashing 5 furlongs in 58 flat or so.
Whittingham was the master in getting his horses ready run their best for certain major races and he was also a master in getting his horses ready to run off long layoffs through workouts in the morning.
Since then, I always try to approach certain races with precaution as it might be a prep race for a major objective race further down the road. If a horse ranked on top of my readouts and it did not fired in the race, I do not second guess my workup of the race or the pacelines that I had chosen. I just move on and stick to my analysis.
It could have bounced off the major effort or it wasn't fully recovered to duplicate the last paceline, it might need some time. It could have been an unfavorable match up in the race at hand. Anyways, thanks for reading.
Back to the Santa Anita Derby....
|