THOROUGHBRED RACING : In Excess Gives Rivals a Final Shot

Horseplayers who watched In Excess run third, behind Defensive Play and My Boy Adam, and fourth, after Farma Way, Festin and Pleasant Tap, last winter at Santa Anita still have trouble fathoming what this 4-year-old colt has done since he made New York his summer place.

The horse, who was third at 4-5 in the Strub Stakes and fourth, beaten by nine lengths, in the Santa Anita Handicap, traveled East and swept four major handicaps--the Metropolitan, the Suburban, the Whitney and the Woodward. With the Breeders’ Cup Classic at Churchill Downs on Nov. 2 still ahead, In Excess is the heavy favorite for horse of the year.

Much has been made--and will continue to be made--about In Excess becoming the first horse to win those four stakes in the same year since Kelso in 1961.

Maestro, a beat of historical perspective if you will: When Kelso won those races, he carried 130, 133, 130 and 126 pounds--the Woodward had weight-for-age conditions in those days. In Excess’ baggage in the same races was 117, 119, 121 and 126.

Still, In Excess ran the 1 1/4-mile Suburban in 1:58 1/5, a track record for Belmont Park and a faster time than Kelso ever ran at that distance. With the Woodward, which brought together Farma Way and Festin, the horses In Excess couldn’t handle earlier in the year, trainer Bruce Jackson’s colt dismissed charges that he wasn’t as good as his record because the opposition was weak.

In Excess began the winter on a high note at Santa Anita, running on dirt for the first time and winning the San Gabriel Handicap and the San Fernando Stakes.

Then he got sick. Jackson kept running him, though, because he thought In Excess was over the illness.

“He fooled me,” Jackson said. “He acted like he was all right, and I thought he was better than he was. In the Santa Anita Handicap, he had dead aim at the leaders, but then he just flattened out.”

In Excess, who is owned by Jack Munari, a land developer and golf-course planner from Paso Robles, didn’t return to the races for 10 weeks, when he began that streak in New York. In Excess worked a fast five furlongs at Belmont last weekend, then was shipped to Kentucky to get ready for the Breeders’ Cup.

This will not be remembered as a hallmark year for horses:

--Farma Way, a gritty colt who has earned $2.5 million while running 11 times at seven tracks East and West, is winless since May.

--Festin, who has battled Farma Way all year, has won only two races in nine starts.

--Strike The Gold, the Kentucky Derby winner, hasn’t sniffed another flower since the roses, and Hansel, his main rival in the Triple Crown series, was injured and has been retired.

--Those top fillies, Lite Light and Meadow Star, got rough around the edges, and Meadow Star is through for the year.

--Another 3-year-old filly, Dance Smartly, is undefeated in seven starts and has beaten colts, but she still bears the stigma of being a Canadian horse, pending what she does in the Breeders’ Cup Distaff.

What all of this means is that In Excess could have won horse-of-the-year honors without running in the Breeders’ Cup Classic, although the voters would have thought less of Munari and Jackson for abstaining. In Excess’ people have borne enough criticism all year about picking their spots, so they will show up in Kentucky.

“The owner has been buying a lot of horses, and he wants to go,” Jackson said. “The Breeders’ Cup has been his goal.”

The Classic is 1 1/4 miles, and those who bet against In Excess will say that he is not a true distance horse, that he has won only one of three starts going that far. But the two losses were at Santa Anita, when In Excess wasn’t at his best, and in the victory, in the Suburban at Belmont Park, he blew their doors off.

In Excess’ margin in the 1 1/8-mile Woodward was 1 3/4 lengths over Farma Way, but with little urging from jockey Gary Stevens, and the victory was much easier than that.

“The race could have been a mile and quarter and they still wouldn’t have beat him,” Jackson said.

The ranks of older horses at Belmont Park are so thin that only five will contest Saturday’s 1 1/4-mile Jockey Club Gold Cup, an $850,000 race.

The surprise entry from trainer Wayne Lukas, who had expected to run Go And Go, is Twilight Agenda. There is little speed in the race, and Twilight Agenda is expected to try to win going wire to wire.

The others running are Festin, Strike The Gold, Chief Honcho and Mountain Lore. Jackson has a high opinion of Chief Honcho, who was second to In Express in the Suburban and the Whitney.

“I like that horse,” Jackson said. “He runs his eyes out.”

All of the starters carry 126 pounds except Strike The Gold, who runs with 121 because he’s a 3-year-old.

Horse Racing Notes

Two fillies--Crnagora and Kartajana--will be part of the large field running Sunday in the $500,000 Oak Tree Invitational at Santa Anita. . . . A field of 10 has been entered for Saturday’s $100,000 Harold C. Ramser Sr. Handicap. Flawlessly, with Chris McCarron riding, is the high weight for the one-mile turf race at 123 pounds, followed by Nice Assay at 120. . . . Ebonair, the 4-5 favorite who finished second, a length behind Richard Of England, in Wednesday’s Sunny Slope Stakes, bled in the race.

With off-track betting at Hollywood Park and Los Alamitos, on-track crowds of under 10,000 will be commonplace at Santa Anita. Thursday, the crowd for live racing at Santa Anita was 8,186, and there were 3,206 at Hollywood and 1,744 at Los Alamitos betting through satellite facilities. Counting the entire off-track network and on-track business, the attendance was 18,451 and the handle $4 million. On a comparable day a year ago, the overall Oak Tree totals were 17,205 and $3.9 million, with no betting at Hollywood or Los Alamitos.