Trainer Has Recovering on His Mind : Horse racing: Robbins, who had knee surgery, says Flying Continental is ready for the Big ‘Cap despite suffering gash.

A week ago, neither Flying Continental nor his trainer, Jay Robbins, appeared to have much chance of being involved with today’s $1-million Santa Anita Handicap.

While Robbins was hospitalized for knee surgery, Flying Continental was banging up his left hind leg in a fluke barn accident.

When Robbins called his father, Jack, the next day to tell him that the four-hour surgery had gone well, the trainer learned of Flying Continental’s injury. Jack Robbins, a veterinarian, manages the West Coast horses for Jack Kent Cooke, the owner of Flying Continental.

Forty stitches later--for the horse, not the trainer--Flying Continental will try to accomplish what he couldn’t do a year ago, spring a surprise in the Big ‘Cap. Last year, at 8-1, the 5-year-old California-bred son of Flying Paster ran a good third behind Ruhlmann and Criminal Type. Today, Flying Continental is the same 8-1 on the morning line, with Farma Way the 2-1 favorite, in the 54th running of the race.

Jack Robbins, who in recent years has unsuccessfully denied that he had anything to do with keeping two-time horse-of-the-year John Henry together, once said of Flying Continental: “This horse is not a top horse, but he’s a tough horse.”

Never has Flying Continental been tougher than during last week’s ordeal, which started when the horse, in making a turn at the end of the shedrow, kicked his back leg and struck another trainer’s ultrasound machine.

“Somebody said that the machine doesn’t even work, that it had been broke for seven months,” Jay Robbins said.

The next day, Robbins quickly declared Flying Continental out of the Big ‘Cap. There was never any swelling around the gash, however, and last Sunday the horse jogged two miles around Santa Anita’s training track without any difficulty. Robbins decided that today’s race was still possible.

Idle for two days while the stitches healed, Flying Continental was back on the track Wednesday with his regular jockey, Corey Black, and they worked half a mile in 47 seconds. Robbins timed him going two-fifths of a second faster.

“The horse worked so good that if somebody hadn’t told me about the stitches, I wouldn’t have known they were there,” Black said.

When Flying Continental was patched up, no painkiller was used, because that could have resulted in the horse testing positive for a prohibited medication today.

“The gash started low on the leg up to and above the inside of his hock,” Robbins said. “It’s not on the outside, where it might be exposed, and it doesn’t hinder his movement.”

Flying Continental, whose sire ran second to Spectacular Bid in the 1980 Big ‘Cap, has earned $1.5 million with seven victories, seven seconds and six thirds in 25 races. The totals for the nine other entrants are still in six figures.

Cooke, the former owner of the Lakers and current owner of the Washington Redskins, pushed Flying Continental into the 1989 Kentucky Derby, and although he finished 12th at 84-1, he is one of the few horses from that 15-horse field still running.

In one of only three starts outside California, Flying Continental won the Jockey Club Gold Cup at Belmont Park in October. It’s at Santa Anita, though, where the horse thrives, with five firsts, four seconds and two thirds in 12 outings. The only time he finished out of the top three was his fifth-place finish in the San Antonio Handicap three weeks ago. Farma Way beat him by nine lengths.

“I’d think more of our chances if we had an off track,” Robbins said. Two of Flying Continental’s five Santa Anita victories have been on off tracks, in the San Fernando and the Strub last year.

Robbins, 45, has run only one other horse in the Big ‘Cap, finishing fourth with Nostalgia’s Star in 1987. Besides both being winners of the Strub, Nostalgia’s Star and Flying Continental had something else in common, chronically sore knees. And although Nostalgia’s Star earned $2.1 million, Robbins says that Flying Continental, who has more quickness and agility, is the better horse.

The horse is ready for today, and so is the trainer.

“I only used the crutches for one day,” Robbins said. “They were harder to get used to than just using the sore leg.”

Horse Racing Notes

Trainer Gary Jones has scratched Quiet American from the Santa Anita Handicap because of an allergy that has been bothering the horse most of the week. Quiet American, who would have run as an entry with Anshan, was the 3-1 second choice.

On Friday, the Breeders’ Cup announced some changes in qualifying criteria that may come to be known as the Quiet American rules. Effective this year, more points will be given to horses who win graded races, which sometimes determine which horses get to run when fields are over-subscribed. Also, the point system will determine the first eight starters, instead of nine, and the remaining six will be in the hands of an international selection committee. Quiet American couldn’t get in the Breeders’ Cup Classic.

With Quiet American out, Chris McCarron is deprived of what would have been his 11th mount in the Big ‘Cap. McCarron, who won in 1988 with Alysheba, also could have ridden Anshan, but trainer Charlie Whittingham has given that assignment to Angel Cordero Jr. . . . Another jockey caught in a switch is Kent Desormeaux. He might have ridden Pleasant Tap, but opted for Avenue Of Flags, a top Kentucky Derby prospect, in today’s Sausalito Stakes at Golden Gate Fields. But Avenue Of Flags was injured, and now Desormeaux also is without a Big ‘Cap mount.

Media Plan, one of the favorites in the Sausalito, has been sold by Leonard Lavin for $450,000 to M.C. Hammer and the trainer switch moves him from Tom Proctor to Wayne Lukas. Another Sausalito starter is Olympio, who was scratched from last Sunday’s San Rafael at Santa Anita. . . . Apollo, who lost the San Rafael by a head to Dinard after leading most of the way, is headed for the 1 1/8-mile Jim Beam at Turfway Park March 30 and might be joined there by Whadjathink, another California-based 3-year-old. . . . Woodsy, unable to beat the best 3-year-olds in Florida, will run today in the Swift at Aqueduct.

Buzz Tenney, trainer Shug McGaughey’s assistant, will saddle Defensive Play in the Big ‘Cap. McGaughey’s father was killed last Sunday in a traffic accident in Florida.

Joe Burnham, Sierra Madre motion-picture photographer, has won the Joe Palmer Award, one of the annual honors sponsored by the National Turf Writers Assn. Other winners are Frances Genter, the owner of Unbridled, and Bob Harding, formerly of the Newark Star-Ledger. . . . Taffeta and Tulle, winner of the Buena Vista Handicap, will carry high weight of 121 pounds Sunday in the $150,000 Santa Ana Handicap for fillies and mares on grass at 1 1/8 miles.