Lately, It’s Cigar’s Foes Getting All the Ulcers : Breeders’ Cup: Overwhelming favorite to win $3-million Classic was treated for stomach ailment before 11-race winning streak.

The mystery behind Cigar’s transformation from a can’t-win grass horse in California to a can’t-lose dirt horse anywhere remains unsolved, even as Saturday’s $3-million Breeders’ Cup Classic at Belmont Park approaches.

“Only the good Lord knows,” says Mack Miller, a Hall of Fame trainer, and that observation will have to do, because there is no sign of a definitive explanation coming along.

Bill Mott, Cigar’s trainer, allowed a new theory to be tossed into the proverbial hopper Monday when he conceded that owner-breeder Allen Paulson’s 5-year-old had been successfully treated for an ulcer.

Cigar’s surgery for a chipped knee, done when he was a 2-year-old, has been well documented, but the ulcer is something else again. In fact, when Paulson, contacted by phone at his California office, was asked about the ulcer, he acted as though he was hearing about it for the first time. Owners don’t need to ask many questions when they have a horse who’s on an 11-race winning streak.

At Cigar’s barn Monday morning, Mott concluded a free-wheeling chat with reporters by reacting guardedly to a question about Cigar’s stomach problems.

“He had an ulcer,” Mott said. “We discovered it some time after we got him.”

When Cigar went to Mott’s barn, early in 1994, he had raced ineffectively in California, winning one of seven starts on grass and one of two on dirt under trainer Alex Hassinger.

“We always thought he was a good horse,” Paulson said. “After the surgery on the knee, we thought that the grass would be easier on him. But all he could come up with was all those seconds and thirds. But we felt that by running on grass, he was building up the bone that they operated on. The horse had such a good conformation that we couldn’t give up on him. And then he just loved the dirt.”

There are more examples of horses switching from dirt to grass and becoming stars than there are horses moving from grass to dirt. Lure, a bust on dirt, became a two-time winner of the Breeders’ Cup Mile, a grass race. John Henry, who earned $6.5 million and won two horse-of-the-year titles, was no slouch on either turf or dirt, same as Round Table, and Secretariat was voted champion grass horse the same year he swept the Triple Crown on dirt.

Finding horses that have done what Cigar has done is not easy, and in the annals of grass-to-dirt conversions, he has probably accomplished more than any horse. Trainer Charlie Whittingham took Perrault, whose forte was grass, and finished first in the Santa Anita Handicap, albeit a victory that was negated when the stewards disqualified him in favor of John Henry. Garthorn, under Bobby Frankel, was a European grass specialist who won multiple dirt stakes.

No incantations accompanied any of these turn-arounds.

“With Lure, it was a case of desperation,” said Shug McGaughey, who trained him. “He just wasn’t doing anything on dirt, and we didn’t have any options left.”

Trainers have been known to use grass races as preps for stakes on dirt. Skywalker, who was seriously injured in the 1985 Kentucky Derby and required surgery, finished second at Santa Anita in the Koester Handicap, a grass race, about a month before he won the Breeders’ Cup Classic there in 1986.

Said trainer P.G. Johnson: “In 1988, I got a filly called Maplejinsky ready for a couple of important dirt races by running her on the grass. The year [1985] that Chief’s Crown won the Travers, [trainer] Roger Laurin got him ready with a grass race at Saratoga.

“Maplejinsky won the Monmouth Oaks and the Alabama [both dirt stakes] right after I ran her on grass. The grass race was a mile and a quarter at Belmont, around two turns. She needed a two-turn race, and the grass race was the only option I had. Belmont is a mile-and-a-half track on dirt, so there are hardly any two-turn races on the main track.”

Cigar had the breeding to be a grass champion, so students of pedigrees look at his family, top to bottom, and shake their heads.

“It’s amazing what this horse has done on dirt,” said Ron McAnally, who trained John Henry. “His breeding is all turf. His sire is Palace Music, who was by The Minstrel. And on the dam’s side, you’ve got Solar Slew, who’s by Seattle Slew.”

Of course, if Cigar were competing in California with the undetected beginnings of an ulcer, that might explain a poor record on any surface. A New York trainer, asking that his name not be used, said that he saw the X-rays of Cigar’s stomach in early 1994 and was told by the technician that “this is an example of a real bad ulcer.”

In describing Cigar’s condition, Mott said, “It was caused by stress and acid in the stomach. We had him treated, giving him [prescription drugs] similar to what you might give a human with an ulcer. He’s fine now, but we still monitor his condition closely.”

Mott, 42, has trained more good horses on grass than dirt. His Breeders’ Cup winners have both been in the Turf, with Theatrical in 1987 and Fraise in 1992. He was asked Monday if breeders will face a choice when Cigar goes to stud, probably in 1997. Will they send him their grass mares, to take advantage of his grass pedigree, or will they mate dirt mares to him, to match his impeccable record on the main track?

“By the time this horse gets to stud,” Mott said, “I’d think that they’d want to send anything to him.”

Horse Racing Notes

Jade Flush, a filly that Allen Paulson owns in a partnership, took a bad step at Belmont Monday while working out for the Breeders’ Cup Distaff and suffered a broken lower right foreleg. Second, beaten by only a head, against Inside Information in the Spinster, Jade Flush will be sent to Kentucky for surgery. Her racing career is over. . . . Trainer Wayne Lukas has named Mike Smith to ride Tipically Irish in the Juvenile Fillies, after Laffit Pincay rode her to victory in the Oak Leaf at Santa Anita. . . . Lukas has tentatively named Donna Barton to ride Hennessy in the Juvenile. Barton won the Sapling with the colt at Monmouth Park in August. Lukas is running two other horses in the Juvenile, with Gary Stevens riding Honour And Glory and Jerry Bailey getting the assignment on Editor’s Note.