Alysheba Wins a Bump-and-Run Derby : McCarron and Mount Almost Take a Spill

Alysheba went from a can’t-win horse to a celebrity Saturday, winning the Kentucky Derby with some nimble footwork in the stretch, and saving Bet Twice from being the first disqualified winner in race’s 113-year history.

Bet Twice, weaving through the stretch as though he was a piece of tissue paper caught in the wind, came into Alysheba’s path after being struck left-handed by Craig Perret’s whip with three-sixteenths of a mile to go.

Alysheba, a son of 1978 Triple Crown runner-up Alydar, clipped Bet Twice’s heels and came as close as a horse can come to going down. Miraculously, jockey Chris McCarron got his mount back in gear, only to have Bet Twice again come out and almost block Alysheba’s path at the eighth pole.

This time, there was no contact, and Alysheba went on to win by three-quarters of a length. But for Bet Twice and his rowdyism, Alysheba was 10 lengths better in this field of 17 3-year-olds, giving Churchill Downs its eighth straight upset winner in the Derby.

Not since Spectacular Bid in 1979 has a public choice prevailed in the Derby.

And this year, the favorite not only didn’t win, he didn’t even complete the 1-mile course, to the awe of 130,532 fans and a national television audience.

Demons Begone, winner of the Arkansas Derby and his two other starts this year, was sent off as the 2-1 favorite. Ahead of only three horses with a half-mile to run, Demons Begone started gushing blood from both nostrils, forcing jockey Pat Day to pull him up.

Avies Copy, a starter in the mutuel field who finished third, 2 lengths behind Bet Twice, would have been a cheese champion had Alysheba gone down. Bet Twice would have been disqualified, and the stewards would have had no choice but to give the victory to the next best horse that finished the race.

Alysheba, who had been the fouler instead of the foulee 10 days ago, losing the Blue Grass Stakes at Keeneland when he bumped Leo Castelli in the stretch, was an 8-1 price and paid $18.80, $8, $6.20. Bet Twice, who was 10-1, paid $10 and $7.20, and Avies Copy, at 24-1, returned $6.80. A $2 exacta on Alysheba and Bet Twice was worth $109.60.

After the first three, the order of finish was Cryptoclearance, Templar Hill, Gulch, Leo Castelli, Candi’s Gold, Conquistarose, On the Line, Shawklit Won, Masterful Advocate, War, Momentus, No More Flowers, Capote and Demons Begone.

Capote, the 1986 2-year-old champion who was attempting to win the Derby off only two starts this year, both in the last month, led for a half-mile and was another horse who didn’t finish, being eased through the final 70 yards by Angel Cordero.

Alysheba’s time of 2:03 2/5 gives further indication that this year’s 3-year-old crop is not likely to be memorable. On a day when 3-year-old maidens were flirting with the track record, Alysheba’s time was the slowest for a winner since 1974, and the third slowest in the last 25 years.

The slow clocking will not stop Alysheba’s mother-daughter owners, Dorothy and Pamela Scharbauer of Midland, Tex., from cashing their horse’s $618,600 reward, a record share of the Derby’s overall record purse of $793,600.

This makes Alysheba a millionaire, and he earned his first $423,026 the hard way, winning only once--more than seven months and six starts ago--while finishing second five times and third twice in 10 races.

Alysheba is a bay colt parented by Alydar, who was second to Affirmed in the Derby as well as the other two Triple Crown races in 1978, and Bel Sheba, who won only five races and $34,031.

Alysheba cost the Scharbauers $500,000 at a Keeneland yearling auction. Dorothy Scharbauer is the daughter of the late Frank Turner, who won the Derby with Tomy Lee 28 years ago Saturday.

Alysheba gave McCarron his first Derby win. McCarron hadn’t won a Triple Crown race until he took last year’s Belmont Stakes on Danzig Connection, and he had been 0 for 6 in the Derby.

It was also the first Derby win for Alysheba’s patient trainer, Jack Van Berg. Van Berg had been winless in four Derbies, including the 1984 race, when Gate Dancer, after finishing fourth, was disqualified to fifth for interference in the stretch.

The 51-year-old Van Berg had Alysheba undergo a 2 1/2-hour operation by California veterinarian Scott Merrill a couple of days after the colt ran second to Chart the Stars in the San Felipe Handicap at Santa Anita on March 22.

The minor surgery, similar to the operation Tank’s Prospect had shortly before he won the Arkansas Derby and the Preakness in 1985, was to relieve an ulcerated epiglottis, a membrane in the throat that swells and impairs breathing.

“When my horse turned for home in the San Felipe,” Van Berg said, “he stuck his head in the air, looking for air to breathe.”

Two weeks later, Alysheba had recovered from the surgery, but he developed a fever and was unable to run in the Santa Anita Derby.

Van Berg had decided on an Arkansas Derby route to Kentucky, but the morning Alysheba was to be flown from California to Oaklawn Park, the trainer discovered some figures on the Blue Grass that made him change his mind. So instead of being taken off the plane in Arkansas, Alysheba continued on to Keeneland in Kentucky.

Wanting a prep race for the Blue Grass, Van Berg was thwarted again when Alysheba’s temperature flared at Keeneland.

“Some members of the press have been down on this colt,” Van Berg said, “but he looked awful good today. Of course, if he had been seventh or eighth, they would have said that I’m as dumb as I look.

“But this colt has never lied to us. We always had a lot of confidence in him. He’s a good legitimate horse, and we’re planning on going to the Preakness (the second leg of the Triple Crown, at Pimlico on May 16) with him.”

The 113th Derby was one of the roughest. Cryptoclearance, breaking from the No. 1 post, was crowded leaving the gate, as was Masterful Advocate. War’s jockey, Herb McCauley, thought his mount was going to be sent over the fence in the rough run to the first turn.

And Alysheba and McCarron had trouble before they were almost decked by Bet Twice. They were squeezed and bumped in the early going, and were just a couple of lengths behind War on the turn.

“I thought that if War goes, I go,” McCarron said.

Down the backstretch, Alysheba was in 13th place when McCarron took him to the outside and he started gobbling up horses. When Capote, one of the three Wayne Lukas-trained entries, began to drop back on the far turn, On the Line, another Lukas horse, moved into the lead briefly. But Bet Twice passed him at the top of the stretch.

By then, Alysheba was on the outside, in third place, and finally it was only going to be him or Bet Twice at the wire.

McCarron and Alysheba found a loophole in the law of gravity on the first contact, then they knew better than to give Bet Twice a good shot at them the second time.

With 70 yards to go, Alysheba passed Bet Twice and McCarron said to himself: “Come on, wire! Quick!”

After Bet Twice’s attempted roadblock, the rest of the run was the easy part.