Weekend Racing at Santa Anita : Broad Brush’s Performances Have Not Been Artistic, Just Rewarding

If Broad Brush were a football running back, he’d be an All-American. If he were a basketball guard, he’d score 30 points a game.

But Broad Brush is a racehorse, and there’s no room in his sport for a broken-field, hard-to-cover thoroughbred. Broad Brush’s bullish style makes him a menace, not a champion.

How good would Broad Brush be if he ever started running straight? The 4-year-old colt, with 10 wins in 18 starts, has earned $1.4 million, and in some of his richest victories--the Jim Beam Stakes, the Wood Memorial and the Pennsylvania Derby--he has won in spite of himself.

After finishing third in the Eclipse Awards voting for last year’s 3-year-old colts, Broad Brush will make his first start of 1987 in the $150,000 San Fernando Stakes Sunday at Santa Anita. Ferdinand and Snow Chief, who ran 1-2 in the Malibu at Santa Anita Dec. 26, are also entered, which makes the 1 1/8-mile race a Triple Crown reunion of sorts.

Snow Chief, Ferdinand and Broad Brush ran 1-2-3 in the Preakness at Pimlico.

Two weeks before that, Ferdinand won the Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs, while Snow Chief, the favorite, finished a dismal 11th, and Broad Brush ran third. Ferdinand was the only horse among the trio to run in the final Triple Crown race, finishing third in the Belmont Stakes. Snow Chief was voted the divisional title, ahead of the grass specialist Manila, and Ferdinand, who took a six-month vacation after the Belmont, was forgotten by the voters.

Dick Small, the former Green Beret who trains Broad Brush, has come to California from his Maryland headquarters with both the colt and confidence. The plan after the San Fernando is for Broad Brush to run in the $500,000 Charles H. Strub Stakes Feb. 8. He may also stay for the $1-million Santa Anita Handicap March 8.

“There are lots of $150,000 races back East,” said Small, referring to the San Fernando purse size. “My owner (Maryland real estate developer Robert Meyerhoff) is already a wealthy man. We’re here because we think we’ve got the best horse.”

After Broad Brush’s win in the Wood, two weeks before the Kentucky Derby, Small also thought he had the best horse at Churchill Downs.

“What happened is that Snow Chief got a bad trip, we got just an average trip and Ferdinand got a great trip,” he said. “That was the difference.”

Because they are Marylanders, Small and Meyerhoff wanted to win the Preakness badly. But Broad Brush stumbled leaving the gate, costing him early position, and then there was a bumping incident with Clear Choice on the first turn. Although Broad Brush finished third, he ran 10 1/2 lengths behind Snow Chief.

“Before the race, Bill Hartack (the former jockey working the ABC telecast) diagrammed what would happen all the way around the track,” Small said. “He had my horse and Clear Choice in the exact spot they were on that turn. It was uncanny.”

Small never considered running Broad Brush in the Belmont, three weeks later. “I thought Ferdinand was a living cinch in the Belmont, so there was no sense going to New York to get beat,” Small said. “We started looking around for a race that we could win.”

Small found the race--the Ohio Derby. After that victory, Broad Brush also won the Pennsylvania Derby and the Meadowlands Cup, against older horses.

He ran second in the St. Paul Derby, the Travers and the Pegasus Handicap. For interference in the stretch, he was moved back by the stewards from second to fourth in the Travers--a decision Small questions--and he finished fifth in the Haskell Handicap, the worst finish for the son of Ack Ack since his first start in 1985.

Small said there were two reasons Broad Brush didn’t run in the Breeders’ Cup Classic at Santa Anita Nov. 1. “It would have cost $360,000 to supplement him, but more than that the race was only two weeks after the Meadowlands Cup, which wasn’t enough time to fly him all the way to California and have him ready.”

Instead, Broad Brush was to make his first grass start, in the Washington D.C. International at Laurel Nov. 15, but heavy rains forced Small to scratch him, ending the colt’s 3-year-old campaign. Broad Brush revels in running on muddy dirt tracks, but Small didn’t want to take the chance on a soft grass surface.

Broad Brush suffered his worst case of the zig-zags in the Pennsylvania Derby at Philadelphia Park in September. At the top of the stretch, he bolted for the outside fence.

“He was leading by a sixteenth of a mile at the time,” Small said. “I had told Mr. Meyerhoff that we had his problems straightened out, and when I saw that, I thought I was going to get sacked. But then he started running again and he took off like a rocket to win by more than a length.”

Asked why Broad Brush runs so erratically, Small said: “You can only guess, but I think that when he passes other horses and makes the lead, he thinks the race is over.”

The last time Broad Brush started, about three weeks after the Pennsylvania Derby, his 3 1/2-length win at the Meadowlands was a straight-arrow performance.

“I think he’s finally matured,” Small said. “But no matter what he does in the mornings, you can never be sure of the afternoons. Traveling seems to help. It seems to make him more mentally alert. If he can just run his races, we’re in for an exciting year.”

Horse Racing Notes This is the field for the eight-horse San Fernando, in post-position order: Ferdinand, with Bill Shoemaker riding; Young Blade, Jack Kaenel; Late Request, Fernando Toro; Don B. Blue, Rafael Meza; Snow Chief, Pat Valenzuela; Mustin Lake, Gary Stevens; Broad Brush, Angel Cordero, and Variety Road, Laffit Pincay. . . . The weights, based on purses won, give Snow Chief and Broad Brush the top imposts, 126 pounds apiece. Three horses--Ferdinand, Don B. Blue and Variety Road--are at 123. . . . Cordero got the mount on Broad Brush for the Travers while Stevens was serving a suspension at Del Mar, and has been on him ever since. Stevens rode Broad Brush to victory in the Ohio Derby. . . . Snow Chief worked a half-mile Friday in a blazing :45 4/5. . . . Santa Anita will be open on Monday, usually a dark day, with Auspiciante expected to carry high weight of 122 pounds in the $100,000 San Gorgonio Handicap. . . . Jockey Eddie Delahoussaye will start a five-day suspension Sunday.