LOS ALAMITOS : The Dream Doctor Outduels His Toughest Opponent Twice

The Dream Doctor’s racing career has been closer to a nightmare for owners Don and Kathleen Clift.

The 5-year-old gelding has started only eight times in three years, winning seven races, including an allowance race Thursday. He has also defeated a variety of illnesses that on two occasions nearly cost him his life.

The Dream Doctor was the first horse that the Clifts raised at their Orange Park Acres home, and like all horse breeders, they were eagerly awaiting the gelding’s first start.

But instead of trips to the races, the year was filled with visits to equine hospitals. The Dream Doctor suffered a lung virus early in 1989 and was given only a 50-50 chance to survive.

“We left him at the hospital for two days and the (veterinarians) called and asked if we wanted to go through with it,” Don Clift said. “We just couldn’t put him down without a battle.”

Gradually, The Dream Doctor regained his strength and spent the winter of 1989-90 at the Clifts’ home. Trainer John Visscher took him in early 1990 and he made his racing debut that April, winning a $6,250 claiming race for maidens. It was the last time he raced with a price on his head.

The Dream Doctor ran five more times that year, winning four races, including the California Sires Cup Derby in November. He was given a rest during the winter because of leg problems. “He wasn’t lame, he just wasn’t right,” Visscher said.

Visscher kept the gelding on the sidelines until September of 1991 before entering a 350-yard allowance as a prep for the Vessels Maturity trials, which were approaching. In the allowance, The Dream Doctor looked hopelessly beaten shortly after the start when the horses on each side shut off his running path. But jockey Eddie Garcia moved him to the outside, and in fewer than 150 yards, The Dream Doctor made up more than a length to win by a neck.

Considering the short distance of the race and The Dream Doctor’s push-button acceleration, it was stunning victory. “He was just awesome,” Visscher said. “It was the most exciting race I’ve ever seen.”

The Dream Doctor never made it to the Vessels trials. The morning of the race, Patricia Visscher, John’s wife, noticed that the gelding hadn’t finished his feed from the previous night. He also had a fever. The Clifts’ phone rang at 5:30 a.m.

“John called and said we’d best get out there because he was deathly ill,” Don said. “By the time the vet got there, he’d gone into shock. It was almost noon before we could put him in a trailer and stabilize him (for the trip to the hospital).

“John rode in the trailer with him. As it turned out, he had an abscess in his lung that had burst and dumped all that poison in his blood stream. The vets gave us another ultimatum. He’s been awful good to us, so we said let’s give him every opportunity to survive.”

The Clifts were told that if the abscess had burst the next morning, the morning after a race, that The Dream Doctor might not have had the strength to challenge the illness. Instead, for the second time in his life, he fought off death.

After a few weeks in the hospital, he was back in good health and was able to return to the Clifts’ home, where he stayed until mid-February. His race on Thursday was his first since Sept. 1 and resulted in a neck victory against a strong field of older horses. “We have him back and they think everything’s cleared up,” Kathleen Clift said. “(Veterinarian) Melinda Krpan has done a great thing.”

The Dream Doctor will have another chance at the Vessels Maturity. The trials for the 1992 running are June 13; the $100,000 final is June 27.

“I hope the end result is different,” Don Clift said. “We’re a little gun shy. I’m sure people can understand that.”

Waverino is the fastest qualifier for Saturday’s $125,000 Los Alamitos Derby, the first major 3-year-old race of the meeting and a race that trainer Dennis Ekins hopes will vindicate the opinion he had of Waverino as a 2-year-old.

Waverino won only three of eight starts last year, including a minor futurity in Utah. He skipped the major fall futurities last year, but he made an impressive return on May 16 in trials for Saturday’s race.

He won the second of four trials by three-quarters of a length, running 400 yards in 19.95 seconds. By comparison, the second-fastest qualifier, Bobby Beduino, who won the third trial, was timed in 20.06 seconds. The field also includes Time To Lead, Cadillac Cool, Speckled Shorts, Sir Austin Duncan, Dash Down First, Early Secret, Looking Good Smith and Blue Blister.

Waverino won the Dixie Downs Futurity in St. George, Utah, in April of 1991 before heading to Bay Meadows, near San Francisco. The Chicks Beduino gelding was seventh in the Bay Meadows Futurity in July and raced briefly last fall before Ekins and owners Ed and Collette Lisenby decided to rest the gelding.

His trial victory was his first start since last November. “We hope he has the opportunity to redeem himself, show what we hope is an awful good 3-year-old and back up some of the comments we made on his as a 2-year-old,” Ekins said.

Lisenby has owned quarter horses for six years and Waverino represents his first Los Alamitos Derby starter. Last year, he raced Tolls Touch, who won the California Sires Cup and Governor’s Cup Derbies.

Other contenders include the lightly raced Cadillac Cool and Time To Lead, both of whom will be making their first stakes appearances, and Sir Austin Duncan, who has finished second or third in three stakes.

Los Alamitos Notes

Reeds Signature became the first double stakes winner of the meet on Friday night with a nose victory over High Class Gal in the $20,950 Charger Bar Handicap for fillies and mares. She is owned by Paul Reed, a Lake Matthews home-builder who bred the 4-year-old filly as well as the filly’s first and second dam. Trained by Jesse Maldonado, Reeds Signature was second in the Ed Burke Futurity in 1990 and third in the Las Damas Handicap in January of 1991, but didn’t win a stakes until the Miss Princess Handicap on May 8.

The California Horse Racing Board’s May meeting will be held Friday in Cypress, and the allocation of the defunct Orange County Fair dates is on the agenda. The Fair Board decided in late April to end its involvement with thoroughbred racing at Los Alamitos, leaving a three week gap between the end of the quarter horse meeting on July 25 and the beginning of the fall harness meeting on Aug. 21. Quarter horse officials will ask the board to lengthen the current meeting until Aug. 9, while harness officials hope to remain in Sacramento until Aug. 15.

Refrigerator, seventh on the quarter horse winnings list with $1,355,211, is the 122-pound high-weight for Friday’s $20,000 Shue Fly Handicap over 350 yards. The 4-year-old gelding is owned by Jim Helzer of Arlington, Tex. The first leg of the California Challenge Handicap for Arabians is also Saturday.

Deceptively won the $215,428 Kansas Futurity at Ruidoso Downs on Sunday, running 350 yards in 17.22 seconds and breaking a 19-year-old track record by 2/100ths of a second. It was the 2-year-old’s second start and was achieved over a sloppy track. She won by 1 3/4 lengths and was eased in the last 50 yards by jockey Jerry Yoakum. The time equaled the fastest time set last year by 2-year-old champion Corona Chick and was only 3/100ths of a second off the world mark. Deceptively is owned by Roger Knight of Madisonville, Tex., and trained by Bruce Bell, who trained at Los Alamitos last fall. Deceptively, by Runaway Winner, is a half-sister to Femmes Frolic, who qualified for several futurities at Los Alamitos last year, including a third-place finish in the El Primero Del Ano Derby in January.