Wining, Dining for The Deputy

Purveyors of cheap wine in Louisville, Ky., will be happy to know that business will be improving. Heading their way as a new customer is The Deputy, the hard-working, wine-slurping winner of Saturday’s Santa Anita Derby.

The Deputy, ridden by Chris McCarron for Jenine Sahadi, the first woman to train a Santa Anita Derby winner, didn’t weave through the stretch or anything. He only drinks a quarter-cup of red wine a day, mixed into his late feeding, and seems to handle the grape well. When it comes to the Kentucky Derby, which will bring The Deputy to Churchill Downs on May 6, whatever works is the best plan.

“It’s the $5.99 stuff,” Sahadi said. “A veterinarian [Helmut Von Bleucher] suggested that I try it with my horses a number of years ago. I gave it to Lit De Justice [her Breeders’ Cup Sprint winner in 1996]. I think horses appreciate a little variety, and this changes the taste a little bit. Hey, these horses eat the same thing, day after day, and you know that if people were put on a diet of nothing but hamburger, we’d get tired of it in a hurry.”

The Deputy couldn’t beat trainer Neil Drysdale’s No. 1 Kentucky Derby prospect, Fusaichi Pegasus, in the San Felipe Stakes last month, but Sahadi’s Irish-bred colt outfinished another Drysdale runner, War Chant, Saturday before 41,222.

War Chant, who had been unbeaten in three starts before Saturday, went off a slight favorite over The Deputy and finished second, beaten by one length. Captain Steve, for the third consecutive time, finished third, beaten this time by three lengths. Anees was fourth, the filly Surfside fifth and Cocky last in the six-horse field. All but Cocky could run in the Kentucky Derby, although by now Surfside’s trainer, Wayne Lukas, may be thinking about an easier spot, the Kentucky Oaks at Churchill on May 5.

After he had won one of five starts in England, The Deputy was syndicated for $500,000 and brought to the United Sates. He races in a partnership that includes 12 members of the Team Valor group and Gary Barber, the South African moviemaker whose 1999 film “The Sixth Sense” was nominated for a best-picture Oscar.

“Nominations are great, but this is a win,” said Barber, who owns 50% of The Deputy. “They’re both great honors. On to Kentucky!”

Barry Irwin, president of Team Valor, had a Kentucky Derby horse in 1997, with Captain Bodgit losing by a head to Silver Charm.

“The only thing similar between that horse and this one,” Irwin said, “is that they were both three years old and they’re both bay [in color)] Captain Bodgit was a big, hulking horse who needed the right pace factor because of his late-running style. This horse is actually a bit on the smallish side, but there’s nothing he can’t do. There isn’t anything he can’t handle, and there aren’t many horses like that.”

The spotlight also fell on Sahadi, who’s from a racing family but came to training only after a 1980s stint in the Hollywood Park press box, where one of her duties was handing out official charts and copies of jockey-trainer quotes after stakes races. Sahadi had room to gloat, but really didn’t, as her horse beat Captain Steve, trainer Bob Baffert’s horse. Baffert had facetiously asked a question at Thursday’s post-position draw--whether Sahadi or McCarron actually trained her colt--that touched a nerve. Sahadi didn’t find the jibe funny, and stormed away from an interview table in front of hundreds of people.

Baffert bore the brunt of his remark as he walked off the track after the race. “Hey, Bob, who trains your horse?” one fan yelled.

Irwin feels that Fusaichi Pegasus, who will run Saturday in the Wood Memorial at Aqueduct for his final prep, is still the Kentucky Derby favorite.

“Right now, Fusaichi Pegasus is the best horse,” Irwin said. “But I think the other horse won’t care for the [hubbub] at Churchill Downs, either pre-race or anything else. By race time, I don’t think the other horse will give our horse any problems.”

Drysdale, who like Sahadi has never had a Kentucky Derby starter, was pleased with War Chant’s effort.

“I think he’ll move forward off this race,” Drysdale said. “The winner ran very well. This is the first time my horse had to run under any pressure, and I’m sure he learned something.”

The last three winners of the Kentucky Derby--Silver Charm, Real Quiet and Charismatic--went to Churchill Downs after being beaten in the Santa Anita Derby.

War Chant, however, will try to win the Kentucky Derby off four starts, something that hasn’t been done since Exterminator in 1918.

The Deputy, who has three wins and one second in four tries with Sahadi, earned $600,000 from the $1-million purse. He paid $6.80 to win and ran 1 1/8 miles in 1:49, slowest time for a winner of the race since Personal Hope in 1993. He also became only the second foreign-bred horse to win the Santa Anita Derby, which was run for the 63rd time. The other was Habitony, another Irish-bred, in 1977.

“If I get the same trip a month from now that we had [Saturday], boy will I be happy,” said McCarron, who won his third Santa Anita Derby.

Surfside, ridden by Pat Day, went to the lead from her inside post, carving out modest fractions of 23 1/5, 47 1/5 and 1:11 2/5 for the first six furlongs. War Chant, in second place all that time, and moved past Surfside at the quarter pole, but McCarron was rolling with The Deputy on the outside. By the top of the stretch, The Deputy was in front.

“The only anxious moment was when I had to make a decision at the quarter pole,” McCarron said. “I felt I had every bit as much horse left as Bailey did. War Chant has a tendency to pull himself up when he makes the lead, so I had to decide whether to let him do that, or test him and make him run from there. I [decided to make him run], and I was on the better horse.”

The Deputy will be flown to Kentucky late this week. There’s a nice little package store, just across the street and not far from the quarter pole at Churchill Downs, that should have cheap wine by the case.

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Heading Higher

SANTA ANITA DERBY

THE FINISH

1. The Deputy

$6.80 to win

2. War Chant

$3.40 to place

3. Captain Steve

$3.00 to show

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RANDY HARVEY

Jenine Sahadi doesn’t participate in the Bob Baffert bashing after The

Deputy’s victory.

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