LOS ALAMITOS : Croghan Finds Success Comes Easier When He Can Take Things Easier

Ross Croghan has several reasons to be smiling these days.

The harness driver, who is back on the track at Los Alamitos for the first time since the fall of 1992, was tied with Frank Sherren for the lead in the standings with 13 victories through Saturday. Last week, Croghan won five races in 17 drives, his best week of the year.

Croghan is training only six horses, down considerably from the 40 he had in the late 1980s and early ‘90s. Included in his current small stable is Romantic Music, the leading 4-year-old filly pacer at Los Alamitos. Last winter, Croghan changed his approach to racing. He temporarily quit driving because of back trouble and began cutting down his stable.

“I think I needed to get away from doing it so much,” Croghan said. “I was driving in training from 8 a.m. to midday nonstop six days a week, 40 miles a day. Now it’s just six miles a day.

“I got rid of a lot of complaining owners that expected to win every week, and with them went the headaches and the back pain.”

Croghan trained a small stable during the 1993 winter-spring meeting at Los Alamitos, winning 20 of 56 starts, which ranked him second among trainers. Last summer, he split his stable into three divisions, sending some horses to Sacramento, others to Hazel Park and Kentucky. In the fall, most of them, with the exception of a few California-breds, were reunited at Hazel Park.

Croghan did not drive at Los Alamitos in 1993, but resumed during the summer at Hazel Park.

“I drove in a couple of stakes at Lexington and pretty much was full time by July,” Croghan said. “My back has been real good. I haven’t had any trouble with it. I think it’s a combination of things, but it’s definitely (helped by a) lesser workload.

“We did very well in Detroit. Happy Star Bo won the invitational, and we won a lot of races. (At the end of the season) we weren’t sure if we’d be racing (in California), so I sold everything.”

Romantic Music won the $26,640 Electioneer Futurity for her age group Friday. It was her 16th victory in 23 starts and pushed the earnings for her career past $94,000.

Croghan has trained Romantic Music throughout her career. Last year, she won 10 of 13 starts and didn’t race after the Sacramento meeting ended in August. Friday’s race was one of her easiest. Croghan guided her into the early lead and won by a length over Sinali in the slow time of 1:59 1/5.

Romantic Music is owned by Doug and Laurette Odney of Granada Hills, whose home was severely damaged in the Jan. 17 earthquake.

“Houses in our neighborhood were condemned,” Doug Odney said. “I believe ours is repairable. We got lucky. We have a lot of cracks. A crystal vase, which was Romantic Music’s trophy from Sacramento, was our worst loss. It’s got a chunk out of it, but it’s back up on the mantle. It’s got more character now.”

Romantic Music has raced against her own age group and against older mares in invitational events this year. Both of her 1994 victories have come in races for 4-year-olds. Against older horses, she was second to Brilliant Colors on Jan. 8 and was a troubled fifth behind Greta Lobell on Jan. 21.

Romantic Music will race in filly and mare invitationals on a regular basis for the rest of this season. This may be her last season before being sent to the breeding shed.

“She’s as good as the other mares, but I don’t think she’s better,” Croghan said. “After this season, it’s probably broodmare time. (She has) legs you don’t look at because if you did, you would never enter her. She’s never been lame; she just looks like she should be.”

The future is also a question mark for Croghan. The 40-year-old Australian native was at Hollywood Park last fall, assisting a thoroughbred trainer. A switch to the more lucrative thoroughbred circuit is an option he is considering.

“I spent a month there learning,” he said. “I wanted to see if I could do it. It’s a possibility at this point. I enjoy Southern California too much to think of moving back to those other places.”

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Sacramento attorney Ron Zumbrun filed suit in Sacramento County Superior Court against the California Horse Racing Board and members of the quarter horse industry last month, alleging that those groups failed to provide parity and equality for harness racing at Los Alamitos in 1993 and ’94.

Zumbrun and his wife, Ann, own a few horses in training at Los Alamitos. In the past, they have raced several stakes winners, including Exclusive Miss, Ms. Exclusive and Baroque.

Both the California quarter horse and harness racing industries consider Los Alamitos to be a home base. Zumbrun’s suit contends that California racing law dictates that the CHRB is required to assure equality between breeds. It also contends that the 1990 sale of 50% of Los Alamitos to Edward Allred of Long Beach was made on the premise that equal racing opportunities would be made available to both quarter horses and harness horses. Allred, who is president of the Horsemen’s Quarter Horse Racing Assn., which conducts quarter horse racing at Los Alamitos, is also named in the suit.

Harness interests have not had many racing opportunities at Los Alamitos since Lloyd Arnold, 25% owner of the track, retired as a promoter of harness meetings in November, 1992. Chris Bardis of Sacramento, an owner of harness horses, also owns 25% of Los Alamitos. Neither is currently promoting race meetings.

Instead, the harness industry has formed two groups of horse owners who have leased Los Alamitos for the past two winters to continue harness racing in Southern California. Last year, harness racing was held at Los Alamitos from mid-January to mid-April, with quarter horses, Arabians and thoroughbreds racing the rest of the year.

The 1994 calender isn’t much different. Harness racing ends at Los Alamitos on April 2, and a quarter horse meeting is scheduled to begin on April 15.

In 1991 and ‘92, each breed spent about six months racing at Los Alamitos. Quarter horses also went to Bay Meadows in 1991 and to Hollywood Park in ‘92; harness horses also went to Sacramento in 1992 but didn’t race at a second site in ’91.

The current meeting was announced at a California Horse Racing Board meeting on Dec. 16 after last-minute negotiations between harness horsemen and Los Alamitos track owners. Zumbrun spoke to the board that day and asked for six months of harness racing at Los Alamitos, or for quarter horses to be restricted to the same number of racing days as the total allocated to the standardbreds.

“Harness racing has not been treated fairly, and there hasn’t been proper attention to our dates,” Zumbrun said this week. “We are entitled to a full meeting in 1994. The quarter horse industry dictated our dates and we didn’t get our April dates, which were our most profitable last year. With only three months of racing (this year at Los Alamitos), horsemen can’t move here from Florida to race.”

The lawsuit comes at a time when harness racing once again faces an uncertain future for the remainder of ’94. The Premier Harness Racing Assn., which is conducting the current harness meeting, has had disappointing mutuel handles in the first month of the season. The PHRA is not pursuing a meeting at Sacramento, although others are considering one.

Los Alamitos Notes

There were six stakes last week. Aside from Romantic Music, other winners included Heated Debate, 4-year-old trotting fillies; Hays My Game, 4-year-old trotting colts; Pip’s Fonzo, 4-year-old pacing colts; Fast N Loose, 3-year-old pacing fillies, and Maxanali, 3-year-old pacing colts. . . . There is a twin-trifecta carryover of $17,749 for Thursday.