Charlie and Willie Tie a Yellow Ribbon at the Old Oak Tree

Sentiment sometimes is in short supply at the race track.

Take Sunday at Santa Anita, for instance. A filly named Estrapade won Oak Tree’s Yellow Ribbon Stakes, good for a $240,000 payday. Afterward, Estrapade’s owners were talking about how the horse would be sold on Tuesday. Some kind of corporate tax deal. Could bring in $4 million or more.

At least they didn’t auction off the old girl in the Santa Anita winner’s circle. You know how sensitive women can be.

Estrapade’s owners weren’t the only owners in the Yellow Ribbon Stakes that the fans might have trouble relating to financially. This race in particular was a who’s who of mega-rich people.

You had Nelson Bunker Hunt, of the We-Own-Texas-and-Its-Suburban-States Hunts. You had Allen E. Paulsen, who recently sold his share of an aircraft corporation to Chrysler for $636 million. You had an English soccer-pool tycoon, Robert Sangster.

You had titles coming out of the woodwork--Marquise de Moratalla (Tamarinda), Sir Alan Clore (Alydar’s Best) and one of those loveable Arabian sheiks, Sheikh Maktoum Al Maktoum (Capo di Monte). Al has so many relatives in the thoroughbred game now that traffic around any big race track isn’t bumper-to-bumper, it’s sheik-to-sheik.

With all the lofty rollers and titled tycoons, you didn’t know if this was a horse race or the filming of a TV special, “Dynasty meets Dallas in Arcadia.”

So you start looking for a little sentiment buried under all this money Sunday, sentiment other than that in the teary eyes of those holding winning tickets.

Sure enough, there it is, a genuine human interest story. Right there in the winner’s circle. The jockey and the trainer. Willie Shoemaker and Charlie Wittingham.

Somebody digs up the stat that this is the 100th Santa Anita stakes winner that Shoe has ridden for Wittingham.

It’s not 800 career home runs, or 3,000 yards rushing, but it’s a nice, round number, impressive, and representative, maybe, of a classic working relationship.

Wittingham was at Santa Anita the day the track opened in ‘34, as a jockey agent and trainer, and he is the all-time leading trainer of stakes winners, having topped the 430 mark this year. Charlie is 72 years old, and still out-training most of the young bucks.

Shoe is also a veteran. Closing in on 8,500 career wins, and 1,000 stakes wins. He’s 54 years old, and still among the world’s top jocks.

Whatta team! Charlie and Willie. Truly two of horse racing’s most beloved and idolized folk. Two authentic legends.

Did they share a moment in the winner’s circle Sunday? A warm handshake, an exchange of winks, or thumbs up, in honor of No. 100?

“I didn’t get a chance to talk to him,” Shoemaker said.

What about history, though? What about that magic moment when Charlie and Willie first teamed their respective God-given horse racing talents into this winning combo? Does Shoemaker remember that first winner?

“No,” Shoemaker said.

“The first one?” Wittingham said. “I’ll be lucky to remember this one.”

For the record, and for the movie script of this saga, the first Charlie-Willie stakes win at Santa Anita was the Palos Verde Handicap, Dec. 26, 1957. The horse was Nashville.

Now, nearly 29 years later, they have No. 100. What does the 100 mean to Shoe?

“It’s just another stakes race,” Shoemaker said.

He added, “It’s nice to win with Charlie, he’s a great trainer, no question.”

You have to understand that Shoe, while a cooperative athlete with the media, saves his best conversation for occasions other than press conferences. Also that he was working Sunday with a big cold and a fever of 101 degrees.

Well, then, what about Wittingham? What does he remember of the young Shoe, circa ‘57?

“The first time I saw him, he was a little bitty guy with his teeth stuck out, and I didn’t pay much attention to him,” Wittingham said.

Shoemaker is still a little bitty guy (size 1 1/2 racing boots), but his teeth have long since been straightened and Wittingham has long since learned that this is a guy who can ride your horses.

Really, you have to take my word for it because these guys certainly aren’t going to get all mushy talking about one another, but this is a wonderful team, Charlie and Willie.

These two classics are too old to do what they do, but they do it anyway. They both bring a level of enthusiasm and skill and energy to their jobs that puts to shame most of the younger trainers and jocks. Pete Rose would be impressed.

They are both multi-zillionaires, but they’re usually out at the track before sunrise because there’s no place they’d rather be. They are the golden guys.

On Sunday, Charlie and Willie stole the show from the Sheiks and the Marquises and the Counts. It was heartwarming. Believe me.