THOROUGHBRED RACING : Will Concern Be Coming West to Race? It’s a Small Concern

If there are any haberdashers who sell bow ties in Arcadia, their inventory might be around for a while. Dick Small, who trains Concern, the winner of the Breeders’ Cup Classic, isn’t necessarily coming to Santa Anita with his colt this winter.

Possibly the largest collection of bow ties in racing is now in New Orleans, where Small has Concern in training at the Fair Grounds.

Another day, another racetrack. Concern has run in 21 races, on 12 tracks, and he’ll soon make the Fair Grounds No. 13.

After a prep race in New Orleans sometime in January, Small isn’t sure. There are many races bouncing around in his mind: the New Orleans Handicap, the Strub Stakes and the Santa Anita Handicap, the Oaklawn Handicap and the Pimlico Special.

Minutes after the Breeders’ Cup Classic, Small and Concern’s owner, Robert Meyerhoff of Baltimore, were bullish about the three-race Strub series, which concludes with the San Fernando Stakes at Santa Anita on Jan. 14 and the Strub on Feb. 5.

Small and Meyerhoff have been this way before, with Broad Brush, Concern’s sire, who was second in the San Fernando, third in the Strub and winner of the Big ‘Cap in 1987.

More recently, they sent Valley Crossing to Del Mar for a fifth-place finish in the Pacific Classic in 1993.

“I wouldn’t want to say that we’re coming (to California) and then turn around and not come,” Small said from his barn at the Fair Grounds. “The truth is, we don’t know what we’re going to do.

“This horse is the fruition of a lifetime of trying (by the 70-year-old Meyerhoff), and we want to enjoy him as much as possible. We’re being very careful about what we do with him.”

Meyerhoff, who has been in racing for more than 30 years, bred Broad Brush and mated him with Fara’s Team, a mare he bought for $300,000, to get Concern.

Concern got a rest at a farm in Camden, S.C., before he was shipped to Small at the Fair Grounds. He has had two workouts since arriving.

“I’d have to put the screws to him too much to get him ready for the San Fernando,” Small said, “and I’m not comfortable doing that.

“The Strub would make more sense, and then the Big ‘Cap would become a possibility. But there’s another plan--the New Orleans Handicap, the Oaklawn Handicap and then the Pimlico Special (in May).

“The good thing about going to Oaklawn is that they’ve got that spring festival, and there’d be races there for some of our other horses.”

Oaklawn was the right place to be for Concern this year. He won the Arkansas Derby, and then Small, the consummate horseman, resisted running in the Kentucky Derby, which was only two weeks later. Concern didn’t win another race until the Breeders’ Cup, but he was always knocking at the door and came within a neck of Holy Bull in the Travers at Saratoga.

“Whatever happened to the ACRS?” Small said wistfully, referring to the multi-race, coast-to-coast American Championship Racing Series that brought the best horses together in 1991-93.

The answer is that racing dropped the series, a wrongheaded decision, and in its place has come the National Best Seven, a yawn of an idea that has been struggling to handle $100,000 in the last few weeks.

Valley Crossing earned $125,000 of the $1.5-million bonus that was offered in the last year of the series, and easy rider Concern would be the perfect horse for 1995 if the concept were still alive.

Concern began his career (on grass) at Pimlico in August 1993, and since then he has run at Philadelphia Park, Laurel, Oaklawn, Remington Park, Thistledown, Arlington International, Monmouth Park, Saratoga, Woodbine, Louisiana Downs and Churchill Downs.

Small has vanned the horse everywhere, including an arrival at Churchill less than 48 hours before the Breeders’ Cup.

“The horse looks terrific,” Small said this week. “If there had been something for him, we could have run him one more time after the Breeders’ Cup. If we came to California, it could be at the last minute. Moving to another track is one thing that’s not going to bother him.”

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Horse Racing Notes

Even if Concern doesn’t come West, and with Holy Bull’s trainer, Jimmy Croll, uncertain about his plans, Santa Anita’s meet is still going to be heavy with standout horses. The season opens at noon Monday, with the feature race the $100,000 Malibu Stakes, the opener of the Strub Series. The eight-horse field for the seven-furlong race includes Ferrara, who equaled the track record for 6 1/2 furlongs at the current Hollywood Park meet. In post-position order, the San Fernando field consists of Powis Castle, Sharp Try, Ferrara, Numerous, Timbalier, I’ma Game Master, College Town and Uncaged Fury.

With Hollywood Park’s meet ending today, substitute announcer Ed Burgart must have felt as if he were on vacation the last week. Burgart, who took over for the vacationing Trevor Denman toward the end of the thoroughbred season, continued his regular job at the night quarter horse meet at Los Alamitos and during one 14-day stretch he called 212 races at both tracks. But for the last week of Hollywood, he has been a one-breed caller, because the quarter horse season ended last Saturday. The 42-year-old Burgart, who has been announcing for 14 years, also has other duties, including a quarter horse handicap for The Times. During his double-duty days, Burgart was handicapping the highways between Hollywood Park and Los Alamitos. “If you guessed right,” he said, “it could mean the difference between a quick trip or one that takes twice the time. I know one thing now--Route 105 is no longer a secret.”