Alysheba’s Campaign Trail Has Major Stop at Classic

Wearing a presidential campaign button on his red down jacket, trainer Jack Van Berg quite naturally wanted to talk about the election as he stood outside his barn on a 35-degree morning Monday at Churchill Downs.

But it wasn’t the Bush-Dukakis race that concerned him. Van Berg was interested in discussing the horse-of-the-year contest and the future of Alysheba, issues that are likely to be settled Saturday in the Breeders’ Cup.

The consensus seems to be that if Alysheba wins the Classic, the 4-year-old son of Alydar will clinch the national title even if the undefeated filly Personal Ensign wins the Breeders’ Cup Distaff earlier in the day.

Alysheba’s racing future is not so clear-cut, even though trainer Van Berg is emphatic about the way he feels.

“My vote would be to run him next year,” he said. “But of course, my vote doesn’t count. It will be up to the owners (Clarence and Dorothy Scharbauer and their daughter, Pamela). But if the horse went to stud, it would be like losing a hell of a good friend.”

For the $3-million Classic, Alysheba will return to the track where mediocrity left off and celebrity began. Going into the 1987 Kentucky Derby, he had won just once, beating maidens at Turfway Park, and had been disqualified for interference after finishing first in the Blue Grass at Keeneland the week before.

Surviving an attempted mugging by Bet Twice in the stretch, Alysheba won the Derby with an extraordinary bit of nimble footwork in the final yards.

That was millions of dollars ago, and Alysheba can make $1.35 million more Saturday, which would send him over the $6.5-million mark and enable him to displace John Henry as racing’s leading money-winner.

This year, Alysheba has won 6 of 8 starts, including the Strub and the Santa Anita Handicap in California, the Iselin Handicap and the Meadowlands Cup in New Jersey, and the Woodward Handicap in New York. His only losses have been a fourth-place finish in the Pimlico Special and a second in the Hollywood Gold Cup.

Bet Twice, who won the Pimlico but nothing since, is skipping the Classic to run on grass in the Breeders’ Cup Mile, and Cutlass Reality, who beat Alysheba by 6 1/2 lengths at Hollywood Park, is considered suspect outside California and will be either the third or fourth betting choice in the Classic.

Anticipating a victory Saturday, Van Berg said: “I don’t know how the writers will vote (for horse of the year), but if the people of the United States could vote, Alysheba would be a unanimous choice. He would win hands down, because everybody knows him.

“We’ve run this horse from one end of the country to the other, and we haven’t ducked one soul. This is a great horse.”

Maybe it’s wishful thinking, but Van Berg suspects that Alysheba will still be running next year. Thought has been given to 1989, because the colt is one of the early nominees for the Santa Anita Handicap next March.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if the Scharbauers ran him next year,” Van Berg said. “They bought horses to have the enjoyment of seeing them run.”

Alysheba was a $500,000 yearling. His luck in two previous Breeders’ Cups has been like Van Berg’s, all bad. In the 1986 Juvenile at Santa Anita, Alysheba trailed by 11 lengths after a half-mile but rallied and salvaged third. Last year, in the Classic at Hollywood Park, he was a nose short of Ferdinand at the wire, when a victory would have meant a horse-of-the-year title.

Van Berg has failed to win with 10 Breeders’ Cup starters, and in three Classics, his horses have lost twice by a head and once by a nose. Alysheba’s loss to Ferdinand last year was preceded by defeats for Gate Dancer against Wild Again in 1984 and Proud Truth in 1985. Gate Dancer was moved down to third by the Hollywood Park stewards for crowding Slew o’ Gold in the stretch of the 1984 race.

Victories in those three races would have netted Van Berg $405,000--a trainer’s standard 10% of a horse’s purse--and instead, he settled for $287,600 less. The misery apparently is not as acute now as it was then.

“I don’t look back,” Van Berg said. “I guess if I won those three, I would have been a hero. But if I started looking behind at the times I didn’t win and at all the goofy things I’ve done, my life would be in greater turmoil than it already is.”

Van Berg blames himself for Alysheba’s loss in the Pimlico Special.

“The horse wasn’t fit,” he said. “I should have shipped him to Pimlico 30 days before the race to have him ready.”

As for the defeat in the Hollywood Gold Cup, Van Berg said: “I think Chris (McCarron) was watching Ferdinand and not paying too much attention to Cutlass Reality. But Cutlass Reality is a nice horse. He’s run some good races.”

McCarron will be aboard again Saturday.

“People get on me a little about this because of John Henry, but Alysheba is the best I’ve been on,” McCarron said. “And he still thinks he’s a 2-year-old.”

One more victory from Alysheba, and McCarron will have the distinction of having ridden both the horse who held the earnings record and the horse who broke it.

Horse Racing Notes

Laffit Pincay, who was taken off Forty Niner in the Classic because he wouldn’t cross a jockeys’ picket line in New York and ride him there on Sept. 17, will ride Slew City Slew in the race. Slew City Slew is a longshot, but with exceptional early speed, he’s dangerous. . . . Another of Pincay’s mounts is Triptych in the Turf. The European mare will run only if the course is firm.

Alysheba and Cutlass Reality will both run, even if the track is muddy. Cutlass Reality’s owners would lose their $360,000 supplementary fee if they scratched because of a track condition. . . . Alysheba is not insured. His owners can’t justify the premiums, which would run about $1.2 million a year.

After Henry Cecil, the trainer of Indian Skimmer, announced that he would run the filly in the Turf on a painkiller that’s legal in Kentucky but not in England, British racing authorities expressed their regret. They would prefer that international races be run without medication. Cecil then reversed himself and said that he would not medicate Indian Skimmer. . . . Pat Valenzuela will ride Short Sleeves in the Mile.

Exclusive Enough, who probably wouldn’t have qualified for the crowded Sprint because his record wasn’t good enough, is staying in California. There’s a 14-horse limit for all Breeders’ Cup races, with starters determined by points earned for high finishes. . . . Synastry is another Sprint candidate who might not qualify. . . . Claramount is probably out of the Sprint and will run in a stake at Aqueduct instead.

Although Risen Star, the winner of the Preakness and the Belmont, was retired months ago, his owners have rented six billboards in the Churchill Downs area, ostensibly to influence voters in the competition for the year’s best 3-year-old. The billboards read: “The time is right . . . 2:26 2/5 . . . Risen Star.” The time refers to the colt’s winning performance in the Belmont. . . . Media Starguest will not run in the Mile, and instead will be shipped to Santa Anita for the Burke Handicap next Monday.