Taking Care of Bid-ness

Not long before the 1980 Malibu Stakes at Santa Anita, somebody wasn’t shy about expressing his thoughts on certain visitors from the East.

“We were in the saddling paddock and one loudmouth was yelling, ‘Go back to Maryland where you belong . . . and Flying Paster is going to show you what he can do,’ ” remembered Harry Meyerhoff, one of the owners of a 4-year-old colt who was making his California debut.

“The guy was getting more and more nasty and finally a couple of people said to me, ‘Don’t pay any attention to him. We’re all for your horse.’ When they said that, it made me feel great.”

Minutes later, Meyerhoff, his wife Teresa and his son Tom felt even better about Spectacular Bid’s reply.

Spectacular Bid won the Malibu by five lengths in 1:20, establishing a track record for seven furlongs that still stands. It was also the ignition of an extraordinary year for the charcoal gray son of Bold Bidder and the mare Spectacular.

Spectacular Bid won the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness and eight other races in 1979, then was sent west by the Meyerhoffs and trainer Bud Delp to compete in Santa Anita’s Strub Series. He more than lived up to the first half of his name that winter, spring and summer.

The Malibu was the first of four devastating performances between Jan. 5 and March 2 at Santa Anita. He and regular rider Bill Shoemaker completed a sweep of the series with wins in the San Fernando and Charles H. Strub Stakes, then wrapped up his stay in Arcadia by splashing to victory under 130 pounds in the Santa Anita Handicap, which will be run for the 63rd time Saturday.

Spectacular Bid ran 1 1/4 miles in the Strub in 1:57 4/5, the existing U.S. record for the distance on dirt. Behind him were Flying Paster, Relaunch and Valdez, all stakes winners.

Flying Paster’s second-place spot in the Strub came after similar finishes in the Malibu and San Fernando, and the talented California-bred, winner of the Santa Anita and Hollywood derbies in 1979, was second again in the Big ‘Cap.

“I tried every tactic I could think of, and I couldn’t beat that gray horse,” said former jockey Don Pierce, who rode Flying Paster many times. “I did everything I could except grab ahold of him. I saw and I rode against a lot of great horses, like Secretariat--who I believe was the best--Kelso and Dr. Fager, and Spectacular Bid fit right in there somewhere.

“Flying Paster ranks with Hill Rise as the best horse I ever rode. If it wasn’t for Spectacular Bid, he would have been horse of the year because he would have won all those races.”

Spectacular Bid, purchased by the Meyerhoffs’ Hawksworth Farm for $37,000 as a yearling, completed one of the finest seasons ever by a race horse with wins in the Mervyn LeRoy Handicap and Californian at Hollywood Park, the Washington Park Stakes at Arlington Park and the Amory L. Haskell Handicap at Monmouth Park before heading to New York.

After bypassing the Marlboro Cup because of his 136-pound weight assignment, Spectacular Bid had a walkover in the Woodward Stakes at Belmont Park in what turned out to be the final race of his career and the end to a perfect (nine for nine) year.

Unopposed after Winter’s Tale, Dr. Patches and Temperence Hill were scratched, Spectacular Bid completed the 1 1/4 miles in 2:02 3/5, faster than five earlier winners of the Woodward, including Kelso in 1962 and Buckpasser in 1966.

Syndicated for a then-record $22 million, Spectacular Bid won the Eclipse Award as the champion older horse and horse of the year. He retired with 26 victories in 30 starts and earnings of $2,781,607, another record at the time.

In all, he set four track records at three venues as a 4-year-old, and there are those who would argue he was, as his trainer said all those years ago, “the best horse ever to look through a bridle.”

Of course, Harry Meyerhoff would be among those who agree, saying Spectacular Bid and Seattle Slew, the 1977 Triple Crown winner, were the finest horses he has seen.

“Everything that horse did gave me a thrill,” Meyerhoff said from his home in Maryland. “I’d like to have another one someday three-quarters as good.

“He was a very smart horse with the right physique, the biggest heart, and he didn’t want to get beat.”

Meyerhoff, who remains active in the sport and now has 15 horses, enjoyed his visits to California that year.

“We wanted to run him on the West Coast as a 4-year-old,” he said. “We tried to run him a lot of different places so people could see him.”

Delp, still training in Maryland, didn’t believe Spectacular Bid would race in 1980.

He assumed the colt would be retired after his 3-year-old season, which, besides two-thirds of the Triple Crown, included victories in the Hutcheson, Flamingo, Fountain of Youth, Blue Grass, Florida Derby and Marlboro Cup.

“Harry called and asked me, ‘How would you like to spend the winter in California?’ ” Delp said. “I told him I wouldn’t mind.”

Before Spectacular Bid’s win in the Malibu, Delp recalled a brief meeting with Flying Paster’s owners, Mr. and Mrs. B.J. Ridder, and trainer, Gordon Campbell.

“They were very nice people,” he said. “They shook hands with me, but they thought they were going to whip my ass. If I had their horse, I would have felt the same way. Flying Paster would have been a champion if he hadn’t run at the same time as ‘Bid.”

There was concern the morning after the Malibu, though.

“He cooled out well, but the next morning, he short-stepped a couple of strides when he came out of his stall, then he was fine,” Delp said. “I felt the [left] leg and there was a little heat in his ankle.”

X-rays taken were negative for any fractures, but a blemish was detected. The injury was diagnosed as a ligament strain by veterinarian Alex Harthill.

“I called Harry from the barn, and everybody agreed we wouldn’t race the horse unless he was 100% sound,” Delp said.

Various treatments dealt well with the problem, and Spectacular Bid’s year continued. He won the San Fernando by 1 1/2 lengths and his margin in the record-setting Strub was 3 1/4 lengths.

Spectacular Bid’s third win in California came five days after Flying Paster had worked a mile in 1:33 2/5, two-fifths faster than the track record at the time. “All the press came over and asked me about the work,” Delp said. “I asked them what the time was. They told me and I said, ‘Not the time of the work, but what time did he do it?’ Somebody said, ‘7 a.m.’ and I said, ‘We’ll see what he can do at 5 o’clock on Saturday afternoon.’ ”

Spectacular Bid’s victory in the Santa Anita Handicap a month later gave him a sweep of the Malibu, San Fernando, Strub (which was called the Santa Anita Maturity before 1963) and Big ‘Cap. Only Round Table 22 years earlier had completed the same parlay before and no horse has done it since.

Under a heavy, continuous rain, a frequent occurrence that winter, more than 49,000 people came to see the Big ‘Cap, and the 3-10 favorite didn’t disappoint.

The lone member of the five-horse field not wearing mud stickers and spotting his rivals from 7-17 pounds, Spectacular Bid sat second to San Antonio Handicap winner Beau’s Eagle most of the way, took the lead with a quarter of a mile to go and Flying Paster rallying directly to his outside, and drew away to win by five lengths.

He finished the 1 1/4 miles in 2:00 3/5, running the last quarter in 23 4/5 seconds.

“I was told by everybody that if your horse didn’t have stickers when that track was sloppy you may as well not run,” Delp said. “But ‘Bid had just been shod three or four days before and I wasn’t going to mess with his front feet the day of the race. . . .

“Shoemaker rode four horses before the Handicap and I told him to call me if he had any questions about the condition of the track. If he had, I would have scratched the horse. I left it up to Shoe.

“After Shoe rode three races, he let me know the track was fine. ‘Bid just galloped and Shoe never even let him run. The only bad thing about the day was that I didn’t have an umbrella.”

The wins continued until a recurrence of the ankle problem, before what was to have been his final start in the Jockey Club Gold Cup at Belmont Park on Oct. 4, hastened his retirement.

“There was no horse that I ever saw run that he couldn’t beat,” Delp said. “There’s no way Seattle Slew could have beaten ‘Bid. Secretariat couldn’t have beaten ‘Bid, no way. ‘Bid would have gotten in front of him at the start and how in the hell was he going to catch him?”

Shoemaker, the world’s winningest rider until Laffit Pincay Jr. surpassed him in December, agreed with Delp.

“I would say he was the best horse I rode,” said Shoemaker, who retired in 1990 with 8,833 victories. “It’s hard to compare horses of different decades because they have different characteristics and different ways of running.

“Bold Ruler and Swaps were great horses. . . . [Spectacular Bid] had a great stride and he had a nice temperament. He was very easy to ride. When you pushed the button, he would go.”

Delp, who has about 3,400 wins in his long career, feels Spectacular Bid has been overlooked, claiming it is because he and Harry and Tom Meyerhoff are disliked by some.

Although he won the Eclipse in 1980 as the nation’s outstanding trainer, Delp did not attend the awards dinner in Los Angeles early the next year. He resented that the award for top owner went to Mr. and Mrs. Bert Firestone, who won the ’80 Kentucky Derby with the filly Genuine Risk, instead of the Meyerhoffs.

A considerable disappointment as a stallion, Spectacular Bid was moved from Claiborne Farm in Kentucky to Milfer Farm Inc. in Unadilla, N.Y., in 1991.

Neither Delp or Meyerhoff have seen their favorite thoroughbred, now 24 and almost completely white, in some time, but the memories remain vivid.

“I didn’t realize at the time how special it was to have him,” Meyerhoff said. “Horses like Spectacular Bid don’t come along very often.”

*

* SANTA ANITA HANDICAP

* When: Saturday.

* TV: Ch. 11, Coverage begins 2 p.m.