Horse Racing / Bill Christine : Trainers Taking Slow Roads to Kentucky

Trainers of last year’s top 2-year-olds seem to be thinking alike in their preparations for this year’s Kentucky Derby, which will be run 10 weeks from today at Churchill Downs.

The operative word is patience.

Of the nine 2-year-old colts rated the highest in the 1988 Experimental Handicap, only one--Mercedes Won, the runner-up in last Saturday’s Fountain of Youth at Gulfstream Park--has run a race as a 3-year-old. The Experimental is an annual listing of the leading Kentucky Derby candidates, based on their performances as 2-year-olds.

Easy Goer, who was assigned the high weight of 126 pounds in the Experimental, is scheduled to start for the first time this year in a minor stake at Gulfstream a week from today.

Undefeated King Glorious, who was rated a pound under Easy Goer, has been restricted to light training because of a strained knee and his future is uncertain.

Of the two colts rated at 124 pounds, only Is It True has a chance to make the Derby. Fast Play had knee surgery and probably will not run in any of the Triple Crown races.

Bio and Trapp Mountain, who were ranked next in the Experimental at 122 pounds, are both in Florida. Trapp Mountain is expected to make his 3-year-old debut in a couple of weeks. Bio ran six times in four months last summer and fall and won a couple of stakes, but he was unable to beat the better horses and has not been heard from since October.

Mercedes Won received 121 pounds in the Experimental, and after him at 120 pounds came Tagel and Music Merci, who will be favored Sunday in the San Rafael at Santa Anita. Tagel is in France and may run only once there before being shipped to Louisville for the Derby.

Four of the last six winners of the Derby did not start their 3-year-old campaigns until March, with Sunny’s Halo, the 1983 winner, and Spend a Buck, who was first in 1985, not getting under way until about six weeks before their successful runs at Churchill Downs. The exceptions were Ferdinand in 1986 and Alysheba in 1987. They both began their 3-year-old campaigns in January.

With no powerhouse 3-year-olds having surfaced in California, it seems unusual that the stakes-winning Double Quick and Hawkster would leave town for their next Kentucky Derby preps. Double Quick will run March 18 in the Remington Derby at Remington Park in Oklahoma, and Hawkster is headed for the Florida Derby at Gulfstream Park a week from today.

Hawkster ran third in the 1 1/16-mile El Camino Real Derby at Bay Meadows in his last start, which in trainer Ron McAnally’s opinion made the 1 1/8-mile Florida Derby a more logical spot than Sunday’s San Rafael at a mile. The next stake at Santa Anita for 3-year-olds is the San Felipe on March 19, and McAnally believes that under the handicap conditions of that race, Hawkster might be forced to spot the opposition too much weight.

It has been difficult to make an assessment of Hawkster since he won the Norfolk by seven lengths last October at Santa Anita, because all three of his subsequent starts have been on off tracks. He was fifth in the Hoist the Flag at Hollywood Park, third in the Hollywood Futurity and then third, beaten by less than a length, by Double Quick in the El Camino Real.

“I thought he was the best horse in that last race,” McAnally said. “He was caught on the inside most of the way and then closed well once he got clear.”

There will be only five major preps for the Kentucky Derby this year--the Florida Derby on March 4, the Santa Anita Derby and the Flamingo at Hialeah on April 8, the Blue Grass at Keeneland on April 15 and the Wood Memorial at Aqueduct on April 22. In recent years, the number was seven, but the committee that rates stakes races has downgraded the San Felipe Handicap at Santa Anita and the Arkansas Derby at Oaklawn Park.

The quality of the fields in a race over a five-year period and the stability of purse money are the main criteria that the stakes committee uses. Oaklawn, suffering from competition and a sagging economy, has cut the purse of the Arkansas Derby in half, to $250,000. Alysheba was second in the San Felipe before winning the Derby in 1987, but the Santa Anita stake is really only a prep for a major race, the Santa Anita Derby.

“Considering the kind of horses we’re running in some of these races around the country, five major races before the Derby sounds about right,” said Santa Anita’s Frank (Jimmy) Kilroe, who serves on the stakes-grading committee.

Keeneland officials, concerned that the Blue Grass was in danger of being downgraded, changed the date of their race from nine to 21 days before the Derby, hoping that the switch will bring a better group of horses.

Louis Wolfson has sold all of his stock in financially troubled Hollywood Park.

Wolfson and his family once owned about 5% of the track, which made them the second-largest shareholders. Marje Everett, the track’s chief operating officer, owns just under 10%.

Wolfson said that his family still owns a small amount of Hollywood Park stock. He said that he sold his interest long before Cypress voters handed Hollywood a crushing defeat last week, voting down an issue that would have enabled Hollywood to sell its sister track, Los Alamitos, to a firm that wanted to commercially develop much of the property.

“Hollywood Park has real problems with its balance sheet,” Wolfson said. “I don’t see how the bank can go along with them much longer.”

Mainly because of the purchase of Los Alamitos in 1984, Hollywood Park has a debt of about $100 million which has accounted for annual interest as high as $18 million. Last year, the bank extended payment on the track’s biggest note until this June.

In an apparent attempt to turn things around, Hollywood Park has hired G. Michael Finnigan as executive vice president and chief financial officer. He will begin work March 15.

Finnigan, 40, served most recently as senior vice president in charge of finance and administration for the Gannett Outdoor Group.

Said Everett: “Mr. Finnigan will bring a tremendous strength and professional style to our financial and administrative activities.”

Don Galloway, who was named general manager of Los Alamitos earlier this week, headed the Citizens for Sensible Growth, a group in Cypress that unsuccessfully worked to pass the track rezoning proposal.

Galloway, 56, replaces Biff Lowry, who resigned in December. Galloway, who has owned quarter horses, has no experience in race-track management, having worked in county government and on the staff of the Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles.

Horse Racing Notes

Music Merci, with Gary Stevens riding, will be on the rail with high weight of 121 pounds in the five-horse San Rafael at Santa Anita Sunday. Outside the 3-year-old gelding, in order, are Gum, with Pat Valenzuela, 115 pounds; Past Ages, Eddie Delahoussaye, 118; Manastash Ridge, Laffit Pincay, 118; and Yes I’m Blue, Chris McCarron, 118. . . . Cutlass Reality, who was supposed to be retired, will be flown to New York for treatment on his ankle and an attempt will be made to race him again. . . . Trokhos, who ran last in Monday’s San Luis Obispo Handicap, wrenched his back and is sidelined indefinitely.

After Crown Collection and Reaffirming disappointed in last Saturday’s Fountain of Youth, trainer Wayne Lukas said that it is possible he will not have a horse running in the Florida Derby. . . . The winner of the Fountain of Youth, Dixieland Brass, gets extra credit, because he was struck in the face by the whip of Marco Castaneda, the rider of Reaffirming, the ninth-place finisher, and still ran courageously through the stretch.