Age Not Big Hurdle for John’s Call

John Henry, John’s Call. Their names are similar, and so too have been their careers. Unappreciated, these durable geldings ran for claiming prices before they hit the big time. Hardly one-dimensional, John Henry excelled on dirt as well as on grass, and John’s Call was a steeplechaser before he settled in as a solid turf runner on the flat.

John Henry’s career, like Jerome Kern’s Ol’ Man River, just kept rollin’ along. As a 9-year-old, he won the Turf Classic at Belmont Park, one of six stakes wins that led to his becoming the oldest horse ever to win the horse-of-the-year award.

John’s Call, whose career has also been extended into his ninth year, is the latest winner of the Turf Classic--Oct. 7--and while a horse-of-the-year title is an impossible stretch, this geriatric gelding is positioned to do something John Henry never did: win a Breeders’ Cup race.

When entries and post positions were drawn Wednesday for Saturday’s eight-race, $13-million Breeders’ Cup day at Churchill Downs, John’s Call was made the 8-1 co-fourth choice for the $2-million Turf at 1 1/2 miles. For the richest race of the day, the $4-million-plus Classic, Churchill linemaker Mike Battaglia made Fusaichi Pegasus, this year’s Kentucky Derby winner, the 8-5 favorite.

Like John Henry, John’s Call was not nominated for the Breeders’ Cup as a foal, requiring his owner, Douglas Joyce of Nashville, to pay a $240,000 supplement to make him eligible. In 1984, the first year of the Breeders’ Cup, owner Sam Rubin supplemented John Henry into the Breeders’ Cup Turf for $400,000 at Hollywood Park, but the horse was injured a week before the race. Rubin forfeited his non-refundable down payment of about $133,000.

John’s Call will break a Breeders’ Cup record Saturday merely by leaving the starting gate. Three 8-year-olds, but no horses older, have run in other Breeders’ Cups. No horse older than seven has won a Breeders’ Cup race and of the 16 previous Turf winners, none has been older than 5.

Asked about John’s Call’s longevity, trainer Tom Voss thought that the horse’s light racing schedule has been responsible. Since 1997, the Kentucky-bred son of the late Lord At War and Calling Guest, the Be My Guest mare, has never raced before June in any year.

“As a result, I think, this horse is better right now than he’s ever been,” Voss said.

With 15 victories, 11 seconds, two thirds and earnings of $1.2 million, John’s Call has run 34 times, not a lot of racing for a 9-year-old. John Henry ran 83 times and earned $6.5 million, which was the money record when he was retired. At 25, John Henry might have to gum his favorite apples, but he’s still healthy and is stabled at the Kentucky Horse Park, 70 miles east of here in Lexington.

Joyce, a 43-year-old investment-management executive, bought John’s Call at a yearling auction for $4,000, thinking he had purchased a steeplechase prospect. When John’s Call was a 2-year-old, Joyce took off the horse’s halter and let him roam for the whole year in a large paddock at the family farm in Nashville.

“I just wanted to let him be a horse,” Joyce said.

Gelded before he first raced--young jumpers are frequently castrated--John’s Call began his career in late 1994 on the flat in Maryland, where Voss is based, and in New York. He had one win and two seconds in three starts, then made his debut over hurdles in 1995 at Camden, S.C. Four races brought weird results: After two close seconds, the stewards disqualified the winner and gave John’s Call the victory; in the other two he was also second, but beaten by a combined 25 lengths.

Voss, 50, a former timber jockey who turned to training more than 25 years ago, knew John’s Call wasn’t going to develop into a good steeplechaser.

“He was a wild horse then,” Voss said. “Most of the time, you couldn’t get near him. He never approached the jumps with any confidence. He wouldn’t bend his back the way horses should. Every time he came out of a jump, he’d wind up losing ground in the race. I told [Joyce] that we were going to ruin him.”

John’s Call went back to the flat, and in the summer of 1995, at Saratoga, he won two turf allowance races, outclassing the opposition. But he was also showing signs of a bowed tendon in a rear leg, an injury that is frequently career-ending.

“It wasn’t a big hook [of a bow],” Voss said, “but it was still there.”

John’s Call was away from the races for two years, and when he returned, Voss risked losing him for a $75,000 claiming price at Saratoga in 1997.

“I figured it was a license to steal,” Voss said. “I had a horse who was well enough to run, but if anybody took a look at that leg, they probably wouldn’t want to take a chance on him.”

John’s Call didn’t win a race in 1997, running four times, and was developing a bowed tendon in the other leg. Voss rested him until June 1998, and John’s Call ran 10 times that year, moving into small stakes company. He posted five victories and earned $136,000, not much in the big picture but more than he’d earned in all his other years combined.

Toward the end of the year, Joyce wanted to see if John’s Call might do better on the jumps if he got a second chance. Voss ran him at Camden and he fell in the race. Uninjured, John’s Call finished the year back on the flat at Laurel Park, winning on a day when he could have been claimed for $50,000.

Thrown into stakes company in 1999, as an 8-year-old, John’s Call won a $100,000 stake at Delaware Park but was disqualified to second place. In the next two months, he won two stakes in Maryland, one the Laurel Turf Cup. This year, he has earned $816,240, running only four times but winning three, including the Sword Dancer Handicap at Saratoga before the Turf Classic.

“He started getting better and better, but there’s no way to explain it,” Voss said. “You used to hear stories like this in the old days, when horses would run this long with bowed tendons. But times have changed, and that’s usually not the case anymore. One thing about him is his incredible intelligence. He’s the smartest horse I’ve ever been around.”

The Breeders’ Cup Turf, which drew 13 horses, one less than capacity, is considered wide open. Montjeu, last year’s Arc de Triomphe winner in Paris, is the 5-2 morning-line favorite, but he was a soundly beaten fourth in this year’s Arc and ran second to Kalanisi in Newmarket, England, last month. Kalanisi, who is the 7-2 second choice, is a son of Doyoun, the Irish-bred stallion who sired Daylami, last year’s Turf winner.

John’s Call ran as far as 2 1/4 miles when he was a hurdler, and at Saturday’s distance he has won four of five starts, the last victory coming in the Turf Classic. He’ll be ridden again by Jean-Luc Samyn, 44, the veteran New York jockey who’s winless with two Breeders’ Cup mounts.

“I think they made a mistake with this horse’s [registration] papers,” Samyn said shortly after winning the Turf Classic. “I don’t believe he’s really 9 years old.”

Notes

If all 105 entered horses start, that will be four more than last year at Gulfstream Park, where the Breeders’ Cup ran eight races for the first time. There were seven races all the other years. . . . The shortest morning-line price on the card is Riboletta at 4-5 in the Distaff. . . . Captain Steve, who likes to run close to the lead, will need a clean break from the inside post to gain early position in the Classic. The well-regarded Giant’s Causeway, from England, also runs close to the pace and he’ll start from No. 14. Fusaichi Pegasus drew No. 9. He won from the 15 hole in the 19-horse Kentucky Derby. . . . Jerry Bailey, who leads the country in purses with $15.5 million, has mounts in all eight races, just as he did a year ago. Bailey has won with nine of 59 mounts overall. Pat Day, who has six mounts Saturday, has needed 89 mounts to win a record 11 Breeders’ Cup races.

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Not an Age-Old Problem

Some of the older horses that have run in the Breeders’ Cup:

OLDEST WINNERS

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Year Horse Race Track Age 1993 Cardmania Sprint Santa Anita 7 1999 Elmhurst Sprint Gulfstream Park 7 1989 Steinlen Mile Gulfstream Park 6 1990 Bayakoa Distaff Belmont Park 6 1994 One Dreamer Distaff Churchill Downs 6 1996 Lit De Justice Sprint Woodbine 6 1998 Da Hoss Mile Gulfstream Park 6

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OLDEST STARTERS

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Year Horse (Finish) Race Track Age 1986 Truce Maker (14th) Mile Santa Anita 8 1994 Cardmania (3rd) Sprint Churchill Downs 8 1995 Friendly Lover (11th) Sprint Belmont Park 8

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