Triple Crown Is a Realistic Goal for Whittingham

Just as trainer Charlie Whittingham disdained the Kentucky Derby for 26 years, he is also not that excited about the Preakness, the second jewel in racing’s Triple Crown.

“But you win the Derby and you have to go to the Preakness,” Whittingham said Sunday at Churchill Downs. “The Triple Crown does so much to increase a horse’s value that you have to try for it when you get the chance.”

At 73, Whittingham is the only trainer with the chance this year, following Ferdinand’s 2-length win Saturday at 17-1 odds in the 112th Derby. Elizabeth and Howard Keck’s 3-year-old colt will be flown to Baltimore today to prepare for the Preakness at Pimlico on May 17.

Ferdinand’s forte is distance, which may make the Triple Crown windup, the 1 1/2-mile Belmont Stakes on June 7, an easier assignment than the 1 3/16-mile Preakness. The Derby distance is 1 miles.

Whittingham’s long-range aspirations for Ferdinand are on grass. A chestnut son of Nijinsky II and Banja Luka, Ferdinand is by a sire whose entire career was on grass in Europe, where a record of 11 wins in 13 starts included several major victories. Nijinsky was sired by Northern Dancer, winner of the Derby and Preakness in 1964, and his family tree also includes Dark Star, winner of the 1953 Derby.

“The Triple Crown races are too close together,” Whittingham said Sunday morning while Ferdinand grazed on a field not far from his barn. “This horse could actually use a month off after running in the Derby, but what are you going to do? You’ve got to take a shot at the Preakness.”

Ferdinand, whose last pre-Derby race was a third in the Santa Anita Derby, became the first horse since Needles in 1956 to win the Kentucky Derby after coming into the race with a month’s layoff.

Whittingham’s only two Derby appearances before Saturday were an eighth with Gone Fishin’ in 1958 and a ninth with Divine Comedy in 1960. Both colts did better in the Preakness, Gone Fishin’ running third and Divine Comedy finishing fourth in the Preakness.

Larry Gilligan, who rode Divine Comedy in the Preakness, was Ferdinand’s exercise rider for a couple of key workouts at Churchill Downs before the Derby.

“I had never been on the colt in California,” Gilligan said. “Charlie left the angels at home and brought the devil for the Derby.”

Bill Shoemaker, 54, who on Saturday became the oldest jockey ever to win the Derby, rode Hidden Light, Whittingham’s filly, in the mornings here. Hidden Light finished a disappointing seventh the day before the Derby in the Kentucky Oaks.

Gilligan, who is semi-retired as a jockey, weighs 118 pounds, and Shoemaker goes about 93.

“There’s around a 25-pound difference,” Whittingham said. “Ferdinand had to carry 126 pounds in the Derby (with lead weights added to Shoemaker’s tack to make up the difference), so I wanted a rider closer to that weight to ride him in the mornings. You can tell more if the weight’s similar.

“Ferdinand’s works were sensational here. He blew the filly out of the park. Back home, he hadn’t been able to do that.”

Broad Brush, who finished third in the Derby, and Badger Land, who was fifth, are expected to challenge Ferdinand in the Preakness. So is Snow Chief, the Derby favorite who finished 11th in the worst race of his career.

“Maybe the mile and a quarter was too much for him,” said Carl Grinstead, co-owner of Snow Chief. “The shorter distance at Pimlico with the track’s sharp turns might be more to his liking.”

Another horse who might wind up in the Preakness is Tasso, last year’s champion 2-year-old colt who missed the Derby because of self-inflicted cuts on his legs in the Wood Memorial.

Tasso has resumed training at Aqueduct. Speaking from there Sunday, trainer Neil Drysdale said Tasso would run in the Withers Stakes Wednesday at Aqueduct, and after that a decision would be made whether to run in the Preakness or the Jersey Derby at Garden State Park on May 26.

Bold Arrangement, the English colt who was second in the Derby, is going home, to run in the Epsom Derby in early June. Rampage, fourth in the Derby and one of several horses who were knocked around in a roughly contested race, is not definite for the Preakness, and a decision will be made in the next couple of days.

Although Rampage finished three lengths and a neck behind Ferdinand, his trainer, Gary Thomas, thought the Arkansas Derby winner would have won Saturday with better racing luck. Rampage ran into a wall of horses in the stretch, and then Pat Day couldn’t find the hole that Shoemaker was able to locate with Ferdinand.

“My horse was pounds the best,” Thomas said. “I have a sick feeling about not being able to win.”

There were 16 horses in the Derby, and Thomas believes that is too many. The limit for the Derby is 20 starters.

“I’d hate to change tradition,” Thomas said, “but a limit of 12 or 14 is enough. With 14, you’d only have to use one starting gate, and that would be fair. Horses that have to start from the auxiliary gate take the worst of it.”

When jockey Pat Day got off Rampage after the Derby, he said to Thomas: “This horse will win the Belmont.”

Later, Day added: “I really believe I was on the best horse.”

Whittingham appeared to have the best jockey. Shoemaker, winning his fourth Derby, came from the outside to the rail in the stretch, squeezing Ferdinand through a tight hole with about three-sixteenths of a mile left to run.

“Shoe rode the right race on the right day,” Whittingham said.

Although Whittingham has won most of California’s and many of America’s major stakes, he appreciates the importance of a trainer having a Derby win on his record.

“If you were in Alaska fishing,” Whittingham said, “and told somebody that you trained horses, right away they’d ask you, ‘Have you ever won the Derby?’ If you said no, they’d say, ‘See you later.’ ”