Forget the Triple Crown, Year’s Top 3-Year-Old May Be Ogygian

Since the Triple Crown series has been won by three different horses--Ferdinand in the Kentucky Derby, Snow Chief in the Preakness and Danzig Connection in the Belmont Stakes--this year’s 3-year-old championship is still far from settled. It’s such an anemic division, in fact, that the best 3-year-old on the track here Saturday might not have been Danzig Connection, but a colt who ran about an hour before the Belmont.

That colt is Ogygian, who won the $75,000 Riva Ridge Stakes by 3 1/2 lengths for his fifth win in six career starts. The only time Ogygian hasn’t won for the Tartan Stable was on April 30, when he finished second, beaten a half-length by King’s Swan in a small handicap against older horses.

But, even in defeat, Ogygian was impressive that day, since the race was the Damascus colt’s first start in more than seven months. With that race as a freshener, Ogygian returned three weeks later to win an allowance by almost 10 lengths at Belmont Park and that was followed by his win Saturday.

Although Ogygian won all three of his starts as a 2-year-old, including the Belmont Futurity by 9 1/2 lengths in September, it was a difficult year for both the horse and his trainer, Jan Nerud. Twice Ogygian suffered shin injuries and, in December, while recovering at Tartan Farm in Ocala, Fla., he was spooked by something, kicked a railing and sustained a bone chip in his right rear leg. Surgery removed the chip.

Ogygian’s three races as a 2-year-old impressed the three handicappers who write the Experimental Handicap, a theoretical listing of the top younger horses, more than they did the Eclipse Awards voters. In the Eclipse voting, Tasso was selected as the champion 2-year-old colt, while Lenny Hale, Frank (Jimmy) Kilroe and Tommy Trotter rated him at the top, but even with Ogygian, in their Experimental.

Nerud, who scratched Ogygian from the Nassau County Handicap on Friday at Belmont to run him in the Riva Ridge against strictly 3-year-olds, was pleased with the win.

“I thought he ran a hell of a race,” Nerud said Sunday. “I’m anxious to take on the horses that ran in the Triple Crown races.”

Nerud will get his wish in less than a month. Ogygian’s next start will probably be in the $150,000 Dwyer Stakes, a 1 1/8-mile test at Belmont on July 5, and a race that also is likely to draw Danzig Connection in his first appearance since he gave trainer Woody Stephens that incredible fifth straight win in the Belmont.

“My horse came out of the Belmont in fine shape,” Stephens said Sunday. “That was his fourth race in a month, and he was still bouncing around the barn this morning.”

While Danzig Connection, Ogygian and some others are on a collision course, Snow Chief will not face them right away, being scheduled to run next in the $300,000 St. Paul Derby at Canterbury Downs outside Minneapolis on June 29. If a weak field develops for that race, Snow Chief may be running solely for his already-bulging bankroll, not to swell his reputation. Snow Chief’s post-Preakness win in the Jersey Derby at Garden State Park increased his career earnings to $2.7 million.

As for Ferdinand, he is scheduled to get a rest and then be tested on grass for the first time. Ferdinand, first in the Derby, second in the Preakness and third in the Belmont as the only horse to run in all three Triple Crown races, is scheduled to be returned to trainer Charlie Whittingham’s barn at Hollywood Park on Tuesday.

“He came out of the Belmont without a scratch or a bump,” said Bill Albritton, Ferdinand’s groom. “He’s an amazing horse. Despite the long campaign he’s had, nothing seems to upset him.”

Because of his breeding--he’s a son of Nijinsky II and a grandson of Northern Dancer--Whittingham feels that Ferdinand will run even better on grass. There’s a likelihood that Ferdinand might not even face his Triple Crown rivals and horses like Ogygian and Meadowlake the rest of the year, since most of them are based in the East and will probably stick to dirt surfaces the rest of the year.

Meadowlake was part of a big week for Chris McCarron, who rolled up about 12,000 air miles while riding in significant races in California, New York and England. McCarron started the week with a win aboard Precisionst in the Californian at Hollywood Park; after his win here Monday with Meadowlake, he went to England for an up-the-track finish on Bold Arrangement in the English Derby; then McCarron won the Belmont on Danzig Connection before hurrying back to Hollywood to ride in Sunday’s Gamely Handicap, where he finished third aboard Tax Dodge.

Since Meadowlake and Danzig Connection are likely to face each other at some point later in the year, McCarron will have to make a choice. It’s a cushy situation for a jockey who was 0 for 11 in Triple Crown races before Saturday and seemed to have the misfortune of riding one good young horse after another who suffered serious injuries and even died.

McCarron said he was “just a passenger” on Danzig Connection in the Belmont, but other jockeys who rode in the race knew better, and so did Stephens.

Pat Day, Danzig Connection’s jockey in his race before the Belmont, rode Rampage, the Belmont favorite who finished seventh.

“Chris rode a great race,” Day said. “Just like he always does.”