Horse Racing : Trainer Has the Good--and Bad

Want a horse that wins a stakes race once in a while? Trainer Irv Guiney’s got one.

Want a horse that almost always runs second? Guiney’s got one of those, too.

Want a horse that never wins? See Guiney at Barn 117 at Santa Anita.

Fifty Six Ina Row, the stakes winner; Volanda, the filly who can’t do hardly anything but finish second, and Winners Town, an unwanted gelding, have given Guiney the highs, the in-betweens and the lows of the horse business.

The highs for Guiney have been well-spaced. Fifty Six Ina Row won a division of the National Sprint Championship last December at Hollywood Park, but when the 4-year-old colt took the Potrero Grande Handicap on March 9, it was the trainer’s first stakes win at Santa Anita in 18 years.

His previous Santa Anita stakes winner was Mira Femme, one of the nation’s best 2-year-old fillies in 1966. Mira Femme, who was owned by Verne Winchell Jr., beat colts in California and shipped to Chicago as a supplementary entry to win the Arlington-Washington Lassie Stakes. Guiney thought she deserved the divisional championship, but the honor went to Regal Gleam, an Eastern filly.

Precisionist, who had swept the three-race Strub series, was one of the horses Fifty Six Ina Row beat in the Potrero Grande. Fifty Six Ina Row is a son of Dimaggio, who was bred and raced by John Valpredo. Valpredo’s daughter, Carolyn, named Fifty Six Ina Row after Joe DiMaggio’s record 56-game hitting streak in 1941.

Valpredo also owns Volanda. He says the name means “she is flying,” but for seven straight races, “she is hanging” would have been a better translation. After a third and a sixth in her first two lifetime starts last year, Volanda ran off a string of seven straight seconds.

The streak ended Wednesday. Second for a while, Volanda took the lead on the turn and held it to beat six other maidens in the 6 1/2-furlong sixth race.

“She’s not a second-running filly,” Guiney said, meaning Volanda isn’t one of those horses who won’t pass the horse on the lead. “In her race earlier this month she had a clear lead in the stretch and then finished second again. She got tired, and that might have been my fault--I didn’t have her tight enough for the race.”

Winners Town’s frustrations are not as easily explained. After 16 losing performances, he broke his maiden at Fresno last May, then lost at least 22 more races.

Turned down by Santa Anita for a stall, Winners Town has been exiled to Caliente. “Somebody said that the trouble with Winners Town is that he’s always running in the wrong town,” Guiney said. “Fresno is his town.”

Imp Society’s win in the John B. Campbell Handicap at Pimlico last Saturday was his fourth straight stakes victory this year after a second in his first start.

“They keep putting more weight on him and he keeps running farther and still wins,” trainer Wayne Lukas said. Imp Society is part of Lukas’ New York division, which is being run in residence by Kevin Rodine and by the trainer’s son, Jeff, on a shuttle basis from California.

Imp Society carried 125 pounds in the Campbell, which was the first time in the streak that the 4-year-old colt’s won at 1 miles.

Imp Society is a son of Barrera, whose best distance was six furlongs. “He had a respiratory problem, that’s what kept him from running any farther,” said trainer Laz Barrera, the horse’s namesake.

When Peter Perkins gave Bill Shoemaker a lifetime breeding right to Lord at War, it was the first time the jockey had received such a bonus. The day before Shoemaker rode Lord at War to victory in the Santa Anita Handicap, Perkins promised him that he would be able to breed a mare to the horse every year he’s at stud.

“Ralph Lowe was going to let me breed to Gallant Man after he retired, but in those days I didn’t have any mares,” Shoemaker said.

Lowe was a generous man. Shoemaker cost him the Kentucky Derby in 1957, misjudging the finish line and standing up on Gallant Man, who then lost by a nose to Iron Liege. When Shoemaker drew a suspension that kept him from riding Gallant Man in the Preakness Stakes, Lowe not only forgave the jockey but gave him an automobile.

Shoemaker says that he owns a couple of mares in Kentucky and plans to buy a few more, with an eye toward Lord at War when he goes to stud.

Horse Racing Notes

Billy Barty, the entertainer who stands 3-9, owns six harness horses in a partnership that is giving some of its winnings to the foundation that Barty runs for undersized people. The foundation counsels short people and hopes to build a hospital and retirement center. Barty will be at Los Alamitos tonight, when fans under five feet will be admitted free. . . . Dario Lozoya, who suffered kidney and neck injuries in a spill at Santa Anita March 8, won’t return to action until next month. Lozoya, whose 24 winners had him among the Santa Anita leaders this season, will receive a 22-day extension on his apprentice period because of the accident. . . . For unknown reasons, 8 of the 28 racing secretaries eligible to vote in the Eclipse Awards didn’t cast ballots. The secretaries voted 10-10 on the Horse-of-the-Year ballot between John Henry and Slew o’ Gold, so just one of the eight nonvoters could have turned the election in Slew o’ Gold’s favor. John Henry and Slew o’ Gold tied for the title, but John Henry got the award when total votes cast by the secretaries, the Daily Racing Form and the turf writers were counted. . . . Ralph Siraco, a graduate of Gardenia High School, is the track announcer at Garden State Park. The Cherry Hill, N.J., track, destroyed by fire in 1977, has been rebuilt and opens April 1. . . . Hail Bold King, unable to win in three starts at Santa Anita, is leaving Charlie Whittingham’s barn to run at Garden State. . . . Vincent Timphony, trainer of Wild Again, says the sore-footed winner of the $3-million Breeders’ Cup Classic will leave Santa Anita soon for Oaklawn Park. Wild Again hasn’t started since the Nov. 10 Breeders’ Cup. “We’re eventually shooting for the Breeders’ Cup at Aqueduct next November,” Timphony said. Timphony drew a suspension recently at Oaklawn when one of his horses tested positive after a race. Arkansas doesn’t allow horses to run on medication. “I’m appealing the suspension,” Timphony said. “The horse came from another state, where bute (phenylbutazone, a painkiller) is legal, and there was still some in his system.” . . . The couple from Torrance that hit the $352,000 Pick Six last Sunday at Santa Anita went to the window thinking that they only had five winners of their ticket. Five winners paid only $5,100.