Forzando II Shows Talent on Any Course

There are horses for courses and then there is Forzando II, who seems to be a horse for all courses.

When the 4-year-old English-bred colt won Belmont Park’s Metropolitan Handicap Monday, he found just one more different kind of track that he could handle.

Forzando won races on both firm and soft grass courses in England, France and Italy. Since arriving at trainer John Sullivan’s barn at Santa Anita last fall, the horse has made the transition to dirt, winning on the hard surface in Arcadia as well as in the cuppy going at Belmont.

Sherwood Chillingworth, the manager of an eight-member syndicate that owns Forzando, had the idea to try the horse on dirt after Forzando had won 8 of 20 starts on grass. “There are tons of good grass horses around,” said Chillingworth, a Los Angeles real-estate developer. “It’s much easier to market a stallion when he shows that he’s a versatile horse on the track.”

The first time on dirt, Forzando ran a mile in 1:35 1/5, the second-fastest time of the season for that distance at Santa Anita. That showed Sullivan that Forzando was ready to go against the best handicap horses in the East, where Chillingworth had a hankering to run, anyway.

“A stallion just isn’t accepted in Kentucky unless he wins a race in New York,” Chillingworth said.

Forzando not only won the Metropolitan mile, he devastated a field that included the class of the East--Track Barron, Dr. Carter and Imp Society, who went into the race with a six-stake winning streak. Forzando won by 5 lengths and paid $49.20 to win.

Chillingworth won’t say what his group paid for Forzando last October, except that the price was in six figures. The horse came recommended by Alton Tabor, a bloodstock agent who told Chillingworth: “I have a horse who’s got a great temperament. People over here (England) don’t think he can run a distance, but I think he can be stretched out.”

Forzando, who earned $207,600 in the Metropolitan, has won at distances from six furlongs to 1 1/16 miles. He carried 118 pounds, including jockey Don MacBeth, Monday and will be asked to handle several pounds more in Belmont’s 1-mile Suburban Handicap July 4.

Meantime, he’ll be flown today to Los Angeles, where he will rejoin Sullivan’s stable at Hollywood Park. Sullivan doesn’t have any other stock in New York and prefers to be close to his horses.

“Going back and forth across the country can sometimes be hard on a horse, but not this one,” Chillingworth said. “Alton was right about his temperament. An hour or so after the Metropolitan, he was surrounded by about 25 people. Even some of the losing jockeys, Jorge Velasquez (Dr. Carter) and Angel Cordero (Track Barron), came by. But they didn’t bother the horse. He just stood there, chewing on the grass, as calm as could be.”

Hajji’s Treasure is insured for $400,000, but that’s one check that owner Stan Hodge of Pleasanton hopes he never has to collect.

“I just want to bring him home,” Hodge said. “I hope that someday he’s well enough to sire some babies and I can take one of ‘em back to Baltimore and win that vase.”

Hodge was talking about the Woodlawn Vase, a replica of which goes to the winner of the Preakness Stakes at Pimlico. Hajji’s Treasure, after winning this year’s California Derby at Golden Gate Fields, was supplemented to the May 18 Preakness for $20,000, but broke both right front sesamoids (ankle bones) and later underwent surgery at the University of Pennsylvania’s New Bolton Center near Philadelphia.

Originally, Hajji’s Treasure’s survival chances were listed as 10% to 20%. “His chances are even now,” said Hodge, who wept openly after the Preakness. “It was a sad day. He was in a great position at the time, but we’ll never know, of course. I think he was a horse that still hadn’t peaked with his win in the California Derby.”

Trying to find the bright side, Hodge said: “If it happened anywhere, it’s good that it happened where it did. If it happened at Golden Gate, he would have been dead 10 minutes later, because there’s no hospital nearby with facilities comparable to New Bolton. They gave us a police escort leaving the track and got him there (about 100 miles away) in time to quickly perform the surgery.”

Spend a Buck, becoming the first Kentucky Derby winner to skip both the Preakness and Belmont Stakes since Tomy Lee in 1959, is still being managed well by Dennis and Linda Diaz, who have seen a $12,500 yearling win more than $3.9 million.

At 1 1/2 miles, the Belmont is too far for Spend a Buck. The 1 1/8-mile Haskell Invitational Handicap at Monmouth Park July 27 is a perfect distance for the Buckpasser colt, and so are the fringe benefits. Spend a Buck earned a $2 million bonus for sweeping three races at Garden State Park and winning the Kentucky Derby, and by winning Monday’s Jersey Derby, he became eligible for another bonus, this one $1 million. The other races in this series are the Haskell and the Pegasus Handicap, also 1 1/8 miles, at the Meadowlands Sept. 26.

The Travers at Saratoga Aug. 17 is still on Spend a Buck’s schedule. “Our ultimate goal is the Breeders’ Cup (at Aqueduct Nov. 2),” Dennis Diaz said. “And we want to make sure that we don’t have a horse who’s run too many races by the time that day rolls around.”

Spend a Buck, probably running with an injured leg, finished third in last year’s Breeders’ Cup, which was as good an indicator as you could expect for this season’s crop of 3-year-olds. Chief’s Crown and Tank’s Prospect finished ahead of Spend a Buck, and those are the top 3-year-old colts this year, although not in the same order.

Racing Notes There’s nothing like a good horse to ruin a friendship. The love affair between the Spend a Buck people and Angel Cordero is over. Cordero privately believes that he deserved part of Laffit Pincay’s $260,000 haul from the Jersey Derby. Cordero honored a promise to ride Track Barron, who finished third the same day at Belmont Park. Pincay got the entire 10% of Spend a Buck’s $2.6 million payoff, even though Cordero rode the colt in the first three races that made him eligible for the $2 million bonus. Cordero believes that Dennis Diaz, one of Spend a Buck’s owners, could have pressured Garden State Park into running the Jersey Derby later in the day, which would have enabled the jockey to ride both places. . . . Because Pincay gets credit for all of Spend a Buck’s money on his lifetime purse record, his career total exceeds $98.5 million. Bill Shoemaker heads the list with about $100.1 million. . . . Operators at Belmont Park now answer the phone by saying, “Belmont Park, home of the Belmont Stakes.” That’s an improvement over the long-standing “New York racing,” but it still won’t get this year’s Kentucky Derby winner into the Belmont. By the time the Derby, the Preakness and the Belmont get around to offering a bonus for the horse that sweeps the Triple Crown, two bonuses worth $3 million in New Jersey may have been paid out, and the tracks will be hard-pressed to find an insurance company that wants to take the risk.