Cigar Takes Great Wide Way to No. 16

He carried 130 pounds, spotting his opposition between eight and 14 pounds.

He broke from the outside post position in a 10-horse field, with only a 200-yard run to the first turn.

He was carried six horses wide into that first turn.

He was still four wide on the other turn.

The trump card for this horse, though, is that he’s Cigar. You go to war with him, and he’s your howitzer.

Cigar won again Saturday, this time for the 16th consecutive race, tying Citation’s record, and on his way from the box seats to the winner’s circle, owner Allen Paulson said, “He’s the most for-real horse in the whole world.”

In a race that was created to bring Cigar to Arlington International, the negatives mounted as Paulson’s 6-year-old made his way around the track in the $1.07-million Arlington Citation Challenge. The horse inside Cigar in the gate, Unbridled’s Song, didn’t break sharply. Another horse on the inside, Eltish, unexpectedly joined the early scramble. Then Dramatic Gold floated out on Cigar and his jockey, Jerry Bailey, on the far turn.

“I didn’t think this horse was going to reach his limit today,” Bailey said. “But he took all the worst of it. As a result, we might have seen just how great he is.”

Feeling Bailey’s whip twice after they made the lead with an eighth of a mile left, Cigar won by 3 1/2 lengths over Dramatic Gold, running 1 1/8 miles over a deep, tiring track in 1:48 1/5. He paid $2.60, with no place and show betting, and he earned $750,000, increasing his record total to $8.8 million.

But the record that counted in front of 34,223, the second largest crowd at Arlington since the track was rebuilt after a 1985 fire, was Citation’s. The great Calumet horse won 15 in a row in 1948, returned after an injury to win one more in 1950, and no horse since then had been able to touch that streak. Now the record--for a North American-based horse since 1900--belongs to Citation and Cigar, and Cigar will be able to break it when he runs in the $1-million Pacific Classic at Del Mar on Aug. 10.

“If he’s in the same league as horses like Citation and Secretariat, I don’t know what more you can ask of a horse,” said trainer Bill Mott, who has nursed Cigar through foot problems all year. “He carried 130 from the 10 hole and he was good enough. When he left the quarter pole, he was getting away from the other horses, but he had to work for it. He was a convincing, convincing winner.”

Dramatic Gold, winner of one race in the last two years, finished second and earned $150,000, the exact bundle trainer David Hofmans was gunning for when he shipped here from California. Third place, worth $82,500, went to another California invader, Eltish, who was a neck behind Dramatic Gold and two lengths in front of Honour And Glory, the fourth-place horse. The other trailers, in order, were Tenants Harbor, Dr. Banting, Jambalaya Jazz, Polar Expedition, Unbridled’s Song and Wild Syn.

This was another drop in the free-fall career of Unbridled’s Song, who came unglued in the paddock, where virtually half the crowd showed up to see Cigar off.

Cigar, the 1995 horse of the year, hasn’t lost since Oct. 7, 1994, at Belmont Park. Arlington was the ninth track he has run over during the streak. Mott said that after Del Mar, Cigar probably will run once or twice at Belmont Park this fall before closing out his career in the $4-million Breeders’ Cup Classic at Woodbine on Oct. 26.

Bailey has ridden Cigar in all the wins during the streak except No. 1, which came under Mike Smith at Aqueduct on Oct. 28, 1994. Bailey is known as a businesslike operative who doesn’t wear his feelings on his sleeve, but Cigar brings him out of that shell.

“If a guy can’t get excited about this horse, he’s got to be made out of stone,” the jockey said. “Yeah, I’m not an emotional guy, but it almost makes me cry when I ride this horse.”

From his position near the parking lot on the first turn, Cigar continued in sixth place, outside Unbridled’s Song, in the run down the backstretch. Honour And Glory, 8-1 and the third choice after Unbridled’s Song at 9-2, set fractions of 46 4/5 seconds for the half-mile and 1:10 1/5 for six furlongs. Polar Expedition hung around in second place for almost three-quarters of a mile, and Dramatic Gold and Eltish were also ahead of Cigar early.

“My worst fear was realized when we were hung out there as wide as could be,” Bailey said.

Cigar moved up on his own nearing the far turn. On the turn, as Cigar tried to move by the drifting Dramatic Gold, Corey Nakatani felt that his 5-year-old gelding brushed with Bailey’s horse.

“That was race-riding [by Nakatani],” Bailey said. “It’s to be expected in a big race, but it made me a little mad and Cigar a little mad. He eyeballed Dramatic Gold and put him away.”

Smith, observing the rear end of the big horse that got away, marveled at Cigar.

“He’s phenomenal,” he said. “He lost all the ground, but Jerry kept him going all the way.”

Bailey estimated that Cigar ran five or six lengths farther than the horses who didn’t have to take the overland route.

“We were second to a mighty great horse,” Nakatani said.

After the race, one of the biggest smiles at the track belonged to Joe Harper, the president of Del Mar.

“We were already sold out for Aug. 10,” Harper said. “Besides Cigar, the Republican convention’s in town. I’ve got a waiting list that includes four governors.”

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Sssssssmokin’

A look at Cigar’s record-tying winning streak: *--*

Date Race Track Margin 10/28/94 Allowance Aqueduct 8 11/26/94 NYRA Mile Aqueduct 7 1/22/95 Allowance Gulfstream Park 2 2/11/95 Donn Handicap Gulfstream Park 5 1/2 3/5/95 Gulfstream Handicap Gulfstream Park 7 1/2 4/15/95 Oaklawn Handicap Oaklawn Park 2 1/2 5/13/95 Pimlico Special Pimlico 2 1/4 6/3/95 Massachusetts Handicap Suffolk Downs 4 7/2/95 Hollywood Gold Cup Hollywood Park 3 1/2 9/16/95 Woodward Stakes Belmont Park 2 3/4 10/7/95 Jockey Club Gold Cup Belmont Park 1 10/28/95 Breeders’ Cup Classic Belmont Park 2 1/2 2/10/96 Donn Handicap Gulfstream Park 2 3/27/96 Dubai Classic Nad al Sheba 1/2 6/1/96 Massachusetts Handicap Suffolk Downs 2 1/4 7/13/96 Arlington Citation Challenge Arlington Int. 3 1/2

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