Trainer Already Feels Like a Million : Luis Olivares Saves Girl, 6, From Drowning in Hotel Pool

No matter what Flying Pidgeon does in Sunday’s Budweiser-Arlington Million, trainer Luis Olivares has had a good stay in this Chicago suburb.

The 14 jockeys who will ride in the sixth edition of the Million will likely be talking about saving ground with their mounts. Olivares has saved a life.

A few days before Arlington Park opened its two-week season Aug. 19, Olivares jumped into the swimming pool at the hotel near the track, pulled 6-year-old Tiffany Johnson of Chicago out of six feet of water and gave her mouth-to-mouth resuscitation until professional help arrived.

Olivares happened to be at the pool that morning because he had called his wife, Marissa, in Miami, Fla., and told her he was bored.

“Why don’t you go for a swim?” Marissa suggested.

So Olivares bought a bathing suit and headed for the hotel’s indoor pool. He was just removing his jewelry when he heard the shouts of a young boy. It was Tiffany’s older brother, and he was pointing to the water, where his sister had sunk to the bottom.

“She was in the middle of the pool,” Olivares said. “I guess she had started in the shallow water and walked out too far. When I got her out, she wasn’t breathing. She was dead.”

Olivares, 39, learned to swim in the ocean off his native Cuba. His brother, Jose, a jockey, was already in the United States by the time Luis left Cuba 24 years ago--four days before Fidel Castro’s government stopped issuing visas to America.

Olivares carried Tiffany to the side of the pool and gave her mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. Water rushed from the girl’s mouth.

Then Olivares began massaging her chest. At first, there was no response.

“Please--come on,” Olivares said. “Come on!”

Finally, Tiffany began coming around. “She took a deep breath,” Olivares said. “I took one myself.”

By then, Ed Bryant, the manager of the hotel’s sports complex, had reached the scene, and he began giving the girl cardiopulmonary resuscitation. An ambulance arrived, but she didn’t require hospital treatment.

“I wasn’t nervous at the time it all happened, I just did what I thought I had to do,” Olivares said. “I was more excited when I called my wife with the story than when it all happened.”

After Olivares’ heroics, he may find the Million anticlimactic. Flying Pidgeon, a 5-year-old son of Upper Case and Miss Minnesota, won the Hollywood Invitational in May and has earned more than $1 million, but he is given only an outside chance Sunday against Zoffany, Al Mamoon and an English contingent headed by Teleprompter, winner of last year’s Million, and Maysoon, the 3-year-old Shergar filly.

Flying Pidgeon, bred and owned by Constance Daparma, a former professional golfer, and Armand Marcanthony, a South Florida shopping-center builder, was 30-1 in last year’s Million and finished third, 4 lengths behind Teleprompter.

This year, after Flying Pidgeon won stakes at Calder and Hialeah, Olivares was planning to run him in New York when he got a call from Tommy Trotter, the director of racing at Hollywood Park.

“There’s only going to be six horses running in the Invitational, including you,” Trotter said. “I think you ought to consider coming out.”

Flying Pidgeon was hastily flown to Los Angeles, and he won the $300,000 Hollywood race by a neck over Dahar, giving Olivares the biggest win of his career.

Remaining at Hollywood for the Sunset Handicap that was run nine days later, Flying Pidgeon was no match for Zoffany, but he still finished third, 2 1/2 lengths behind the winner. In his last start, Flying Pidgeon ran fourth as the 7-5 favorite in the Canterbury Downs Turf race Aug. 3.

In the Sunset, three horses just in front of Flying Pidgeon ran out of gas at the five-sixteenths pole, forcing Olivares’ horse to the outside. It took Flying Pidgeon a sixteenth of a mile to get clear. Zoffany and Dahar, who ran second, were on the outside all along.

At Canterbury Downs, Flying Pidgeon had a wide trip all the way around, prompting Olivares and the owners to make a jockey change. Jose Santos, the New York rider who is second only to Chris McCarron in purses this season with $5.8 million, has won several stakes on Flying Pidgeon and replaces Santiago Soto for the Million.

Teleprompter, who has not won since he upset the field at 14-1 in last year’s Million, is not getting much support here, but Olivares lists the 6-year-old English-bred gelding as one of three horses to beat Sunday. His others are Al Mamoon and Zoffany, who were 1-2 in the Eddie Read Handicap at Del Mar Aug. 10.

“Teleprompter is a big, good-looking horse,” Olivares said. “He might be tough again. Those two California horses also look tough, but for some reason many of the California horses don’t run well on this course.”

Both of the American winners of the Million--John Henry twice and Perrault--were based in California, but last year, eight West Coast horses, including the favored entry of Greinton and Dahar, couldn’t overtake Teleprompter in his wire-to-wire win.

Greinton might have been best, but he finished three-quarters of a length behind after a crowded trip. Olivares is hoping for a better trip for Flying Pidgeon Sunday than he got in the Sunset.