Hat’s Off to Snow Chief, This Time : Those in Ferdinand Camp Give Preakness Winner Credit

Elizabeth Keck wore the same hat to the Preakness that she had on the day her Ferdinand won the Kentucky Derby.

Now, it was two hours after Saturday’s Preakness, and Keck had taken off her not-so-lucky hat, sitting next to her husband Howard on a bench opposite Ferdinand’s stall in the Pimlico stable area.

Several yards away, the Kecks’ trainer, Charlie Whittingham, was explaining why Ferdinand didn’t successfully continue his Triple Crown search by winning the Preakness. The son of Nijinsky II ran second Saturday, four lengths behind Snow Chief. Ferdinand won the Kentucky Derby, but on other occasions he couldn’t beat Snow Chief, running second in last year’s Hollywood Futurity and finishing third in this year’s Santa Anita Derby.

Both Whittingham and his jockey, Bill Shoemaker, were more complimentary of Snow Chief than they were critical of Ferdinand after the Preakness.

“Don’t forget,” Shoemaker had said in the jockeys’ room, “Snow Chief ran his race today.”

To which Whittingham added: “On certain tracks, Snow Chief can be a tough horse, and this was one of those days. I kind of figured that he’d be hard to beat in a shorter-distance race than the Kentucky Derby.”

Whittingham agreed with Shoemaker, who had been frustrated by being unable to move Ferdinand closer to the slow early pace Saturday.

“Bill didn’t take back with the horse,” Whittingham said. “He just couldn’t move any faster because the horse wasn’t taking hold of the track.”

Ferdinand is expected to run next in the Belmont Stakes in New York on June 7, where the 1 1/2-mile distance should be more to his liking than the 1 3/16-mile Preakness.

Down the asphalt path from Whittingham was trainer Wayne Lukas, who had two horses to explain--the favored entry of Badger Land and Clear Choice. Lukas, shooting for his third Preakness win in the last seven years, had to settle for a fourth with Badger Land and a last-place finish with Clear Choice. The trainer’s only solace for the weekend was Family Style’s win in the Black-Eyed Susan Stakes at Pimlico Friday and Lady’s Secret’s victory Saturday at Belmont Park in the Shuvee Handicap.

“The slow early fractions were not legit for a race like the Preakness,” Lukas said. “I’m sure all of the other jockeys in the race would like to have said, ‘We’ll run with you,’ but for some reason they couldn’t. I know Jacinto (Vasquez) was hitting Clear Choice going down the backside, trying to get him to move up.”

Badger Land, fifth in the Derby after being clobbered leaving the gate, had an untoward start in the Preakness, this time of his own doing. Breaking from the outside post position, Badger Land ducked out badly when the stall doors opened.

“He probably wasn’t standing right when the door opened,” said Jorge Velasquez, Badger Land’s jockey. “He’s such a long-legged horse that it created a problem.”

But neither Velasquez nor Lukas was using the poor start as an excuse for losing.

“He broke in a tangle,” Lukas said. “Because of his size, he’s not nifty (handy) on his feet, anyway.”

The plan is to take both Badger Land and Clear Choice to New York, where the California-based Lukas has a division of horses, and evaluate whether to run in the Belmont Stakes.

“That’s the nature of this game,” Lukas said. “If you don’t win, you just pack up and go on.”