Horse Racing / Grahame L. Jones : Committed Faces Surgery Today; Career Over

There are, it seems, only two types of racing luck--good and bad. Indifferent doesn’t enter the picture.

This week at Santa Anita, it was trainer Ron McAnally’s misfortune to suffer the bad.

McAnally was to have saddled Committed in Wednesday’s feature race, the $60,000-added Monrovia Handicap. The 6-year-old mare had been assigned the high weight of 125 pounds and, with jockey Bill Shoemaker aboard, very likely would have been sent off as the favorite, especially since she had proven almost unbeatable on the turf.

Instead, Committed, winner of several Grade I stakes in England, Ireland and France before returning to the United States to compete in the Breeders’ Cup Sprint at Aqueduct Nov. 2, spent Wednesday awaiting an operation this morning that will determine her future. Whatever its outcome, her racing career is over.

Committed’s luck--and McAnally’s--turned Tuesday morning during a gallop on the main track. She broke down and had to be taken from the course by van. McAnally was at the Galway Downs training facility in Rancho California at the time, and assistant trainer Eduardo Inda was hesitant to evaluate the mare’s condition, other than to say X-rays would be taken.

On Wednesday morning, McAnally delivered the verdict.

“The X-rays showed that she has a split (left, front) pastern bone, the bone that goes from the ankle down to the foot,” he said. “Fortunately, she was only galloping at the time. Had she been working or racing, it would have probably been a disaster.

“This way, we’re going to operate on it tomorrow (Thursday) and put a couple of screws in it, and then I think she’ll be all right for breeding. This was to have been her last race. She’ll be bred in Kentucky to Seattle Slew.”

McAnally said he could find no cause for Tuesday’s mishap.

“The filly was completely sound,” he said. “She was galloping strong and changed leads and it snapped.”

And, just like that, a career had ended.

Bred at Hickory Tree Farm in Middleburg, Va., and owned by Allen Paulson, Committed had done most of her racing in Europe. By Hagley out of Mistinguette, she won 17 of 30 lifetime starts and finished second four times and third three times.

Because she competed mostly overseas, where purses are smaller, her lifetime earnings were a comparatively modest $337,972. Still, she was considered an excellent grass horse, all 26 of her in-the-money finishes coming on turf.

While McAnally was contemplating his bad luck, jockey Rafael Meza was being thankful for his own good fortune.

Meza, injured in a four-horse spill at Santa Anita Jan. 20, returned for the first time Wednesday aboard Genuine John in the sixth race and rode him to a second-place finish.

“After being off for three or four weeks, you always come back looking a little rusty,” Meza said. “I felt good. I’ve been exercising, jogging three or four miles a day. I feel like it’s coming along OK.

“I came out of it (the spill) good. I thought it was going to be a lot more (time) time than what it was. I’m just going to take it easy for this week, take about three or four calls a day, and see how I feel.

“I suffered seven broken teeth, and pulled muscles in my ribs and in my right knee. My whole face was swollen, my eyes were black and blue.

“I was really very lucky. I was more worried that I had internal injuries because of the excruciating pain I had for the first three days. But all the tests came out great. I recovered very well overnight in the hospital.

“I came back good.”

England’s top trainer, Clive Brittain, who was in Florida last week to attend the Eclipse Award ceremonies, took the opportunity to add Santa Anita to his tour itinerary.

“I hadn’t been here for eight years,” Brittain said during an interview Wednesday afternoon. “And since I intend bringing Jupiter Island over for the San Juan Capistrano Handicap (April 20) and Pebbles for the Breeders’ Cup (Nov 1), I just wanted to walk the track.”

Brittain’s impression?

“I thought it was pretty good. I’ve heard varying reports about it being very firm, but then she (Pebbles) goes on fast ground so it certainly won’t affect her.”

Pebbles won the Breeders’ Cup Turf Stakes at Aqueduct last Nov. 2, and Brittain hopes to have similar success with Jupiter Island in the San Juan Capistrano.

“He’s a 7-year-old now,” Brittain said. “We couldn’t find a place for him in stud last year so we kept him in training, and the same applies this year. He’s a really tough, hard horse to beat. He’ll come from behind. He likes to come off the pace.”

The $400,000 San Juan Capistrano, an invitational for 4-year-olds and up, is run over a 1 3/4 miles on turf, meaning Jupiter Island should have plenty of time to make a late run.

Brittain also may try to add a Kentucky Derby victory to his laurels. He has nominated Bold Arrangement for this year’s race, and the three-year-old also could run in the Bluegrass.

Trainer Ross Fenstermaker has yet to make up his mind whether to run Eclipse Award winner Precisionist in Sunday’s $200,000-added San Antonio Handicap.

Precisionist, who worked a mile in 1:37 4/5 Wednesday morning, was assigned a high weight of 127 pounds for the 1 1/8-mile stake, and that has Fenstermaker concerned. He feels that if Precisionist beats Greinton while giving him five pounds (Greinton was assigned 122 pounds Wednesday, five less than Precisionist and two less than Gate Dancer), he will be at an even greater disadvantage in the Santa Anita Handicap March 2.

“I’m concerned about giving five pounds to Greinton and what that would mean to the Big ‘Cap weights,” Fenstermaker said, adding that he will not make a final decision until today.

Proud Truth and Vanlandingham, which finished second and third, respectively, behind Spend a Buck in Horse of the Year voting, were both back in the news this week.

Proud Truth, whose recent West Coast trip proved a disaster when he finished out of the money in both the San Fernando Stakes and the Strub Stakes, is reported training well at Hallandale, Fla. The Darby Dan Farm colt is preparing for the $300,000 Gulfstream Park Handicap Feb. 22.

Meanwhile, also at Gulfstream Park, Vanlandingham is in the process of being syndicated for a reported $15.3 million, or $425,000 per share, according to the Daily Racing Form.

The Eclipse Award winner as best older male horse of 1985 makes his 1986 debut on Saturday in the $150,000 Canadian Turf Handicap at Gulfstream. He will stand at stud at Claiborne Farm beginning in 1987.