Alysheba and Forty Niner Clash in Woodward : They Are Expected to Be the Class of a Classy Field Today at Belmont Park

Forget for a minute that the eight starters in today’s $750,000 Woodward Handicap at Belmont Park have earned a combined total of more than $12 million.

Five trainers with horses in the 1-mile race--headed by Wayne Lukas, who with Talinum has the remotest chance of winning this one--have combined purse totals of more than $23 million just this year. And the jockeys are even richer. Seven of the eight are in the Daily Racing Form’s top-10 purse list this week, and the eighth--Laffit Pincay--is off only temporarily, having just returned from a six-week layoff after suffering rib and lung injuries in a spill at Del Mar.

Horses ridden by the eight Woodward jockeys have earned $57 million this year, and since riders take home about 10% of what their mounts make, that means that the average Woodward jockey has already banked about $700,000.

The Woodward should more rightly be called the Moneybags Handicap, but lucre is not expected to get in the way when Alysheba and Forty Niner and six possible spoilers meet in what can be called the most promising race since the Triple Crown series.

Forty Niner, who after the retirement of Risen Star has become the most prominent 3-year-old in the country, and Alysheba, winner of the 1987 Kentucky Derby, the 1988 Santa Anita Handicap and the recent Iselin Handicap, are the headliners, but every horse in the field has had moments of brilliance. The others:

--Brian’s Time, winner of the Florida Derby and the Jim Dandy, second to Risen Star in the Preakness and a close third to Forty Niner in the Travers last month at Saratoga.

--Cryptoclearance, more known for his hanging second-place finishes than his victories but a runaway winner over Cutlass Reality in the Budweiser Gold Cup at Hawthorne in his last start.

--Personal Flag, brother of the more famous, and undefeated Personal Ensign, is a sore-footed 5-year-old who is apparently ready to run for the first time since he won the Suburban Handicap at Belmont 10 weeks ago.

--Waquoit, who has won 18 races, more than any other horse in the Woodward. A $15,000 yearling from New England, he occasionally wins in New York, as he did in the Brooklyn Handicap, his last start, in mid-July.

--Roi Normand, winner of the Sunset Handicap on grass at Hollywood Park in July. He raced in Europe until this year and will be making only his third start on dirt.

--Talinum, who won the 1987 Flamingo and would have been one of the favorites in the Kentucky Derby had he not gone lame a week before the race. He has done little since.

Here is the field in post-position order, with jockeys, weights and morning line odds: Personal Flag (Robbie Davis), 119, 5-1; Forty Niner (Laffit Pincay), 119, 3-1; Cryptoclearance (Pat Day), 120, 9-2. Alysheba (Chris McCarron), 126, 9-5; Waquoit (Jose Santos), 122, 6-1; Talinum (Randy Romero), 113, 20-1; Roi Normand (Gary Stevens), 116, 20-1, and Brian’s Time (Angel Cordero), 117, 6-1.

The temperature is expected to be in the 70s, and the track should be fast. These are conditions Alysheba did not have in his last New York start, when he ran sixth, beaten by Java Gold by more than 20 lengths, in the Travers a year ago. Trainer Jack Van Berg said that Alysheba bruised his heels in that race.

Much is being made about Alysheba never having run well in New York, where he is unable to race with an anti-bleeder medication that is permitted elsewhere. Van Berg groans when he recalls the 4-year-old colt’s only other start here, a fourth-place finish in the Belmont Stakes when even a third would have been good enough to take the $1-million bonus for high finishes in the Triple Crown.

But Van Berg can see how it happened. McCarron lost touch with the field early and then Alysheba was bumped hard at the top of the stretch. The medication issue should be moot, because Alysheba won his last race, the Iselin at Monmouth Park in New Jersey, without it.

If Alysheba is to win today, however, it’s necessary for him to be closer than usual. Because there is a lack of raw speed in the race, Forty Niner can be in or close to the lead without being expended.

Although some observers believe that Forty Niner has moved ahead of Risen Star in the battle for the Eclipse Award for best 3-year-old colt, scrutiny of Forty Niner’s record shows that it has more holes than Alysheba’s.

Forty Niner has won 10 of 16 races, but this year he is only 5 for 10 and he has usually done his winning when the best horses weren’t in the race. He also has lost some tight races--to Brian’s Time in the Florida Derby, to Risen Star in the Lexington Stakes and to Winning Colors in the Kentucky Derby.

In a lively rivalry with Seeking the Gold this summer, Forty Niner turned the photo finishes around, first in the Haskell Handicap, then in the Travers. The Travers is being used as an example that Forty Niner is a 1-mile horse, not normally the case among progeny of the speedy Mr. Prospector. But the horse Forty Niner out-gamed in the Travers, Seeking the Gold, is also by Mr. Prospector.

Two former winners of the Belmont Stakes, Creme Fraiche and Bet Twice, ran unsuccessfully at the Meadowlands Friday night. Creme Fraiche, who hasn’t won a race since March, was far back early and rallied to finish second behind Forest Fair in the Richard Stockton Stakes. In the New Jersey Turf Classic, Bet Twice took the lead in the stretch but wound up third, with Milesius winning the race and Circus Prince, a California invader, running second.

Bet Twice has won only two of eight starts this year, with two seconds and four thirds. Milesius’ winning margin was three-quarters of a length, and Circus Prince finished a half-length ahead of Bet Twice.

Gary Stevens, who is battling New York-based Jose Santos for the national riding title, has left California to ride at Belmont Park for the next two weeks. Stevens leads Santos by $11,000.