Winning Is Schulhofer’s Best Argument

Lemon Drop Kid has been close to perfect this year, finishing first in all but one of his races, but even another win Saturday, in the $1-million Jockey Club Gold Cup at Belmont Park, won’t silence his critics.

They’ll say that Fusaichi Pegasus, the Kentucky Derby winner and the other leading candidate for horse of the year, didn’t run.

They’ll say that Lemon Drop Kid is a homebody, a horse that has trouble winning outside New York.

All Lemon Drop Kid’s trainer, Scotty Schulhofer, can do is keep winning races, then repeat his comment that the 4-year-old colt is the best horse he has ever had. Schulhofer’s soft-spoken demeanor is not conducive to campaigns, and at 74 the veteran conditioner, elected to the Racing Hall of Fame eight years ago, isn’t likely to invest in a megaphone.

“This horse always does what he has to do,” said Schulhofer, trying to deflect the naysayers after the Woodward a month ago.

In that race, Lemon Drop Kid barely beat Behrens, a horse who’s long been on the downward curve, in a time that was the slowest for the stake since it’s been run at 1 1/8 miles.

Behrens, with only one win in the last 15 months, is stepping up again Saturday, the 2-1 second choice on the morning line for the 1 1/4-mile prep for the $4-million Breeders’ Cup on Nov. 4. Others running at Belmont are Gander and Skimming, who were third and fourth in the five-horse Woodward, along with Albert The Great, Agol Lack and Vision And Verse.

Lemon Drop Kid is the 4-5 favorite. Fusaichi Pegasus, yet to step out of the 3-year-old division, will race older horses for the first time in the Breeders’ Cup Classic. A minor foot injury prevented trainer Neil Drysdale from running him Saturday, in what had been a much-awaited showdown.

“I feel sorry for Neil, missing the race, but it’s always nice to have one less worry,” Schulhofer said. “I hope we’ll meet some day.”

Since starting the year with a stewards’ disqualification, and dropping from first to fourth place, in the Widener Handicap at Gulfstream Park, Lemon Drop Kid has won four in succession and five of six, the only loss coming away from his New York base, in the Pimlico Special. Since then, he has won the Brooklyn and Suburban Handicaps at Belmont, the Whitney Handicap at Saratoga and the Woodward.

Overall, Lemon Drop Kid has won nine of 15 starts, with three seconds and two thirds, at the three New York tracks. Elsewhere, he scored his only win in seven races in an allowance at Gulfstream early in 1999.

Schulhofer hasn’t been allowed to forget that Lemon Drop Kid was ninth in the 1999 Derby, and sixth in last year’s Breeders’ Cup Classic, which was run at Gulfstream. This year’s Breeders’ Cup is in Kentucky, so a win three weeks hence would balance the colt’s books at Churchill as well as in the $4-million race that got away the first time.

Contrary to his usual style, Schulhofer rushed Lemon Drop Kid into the Derby. A late-developing May foal, the colt had had only two starts as a 3-year-old, the second an uninspiring Blue Grass, and was so lightly regarded at Churchill that he was dropped into the parimutuel field for the Derby.

After skipping the Preakness, Lemon Drop Kid won the Belmont, thwarting Charismatic’s Triple Crown bid, and after a win in the Travers he could have won the horse-of-the-year title with a victory in the Breeders’ Cup. Speed was king most of that day at Gulfstream, and before the Classic, Schulhofer told his jockey, Jose Santos, not to lose touch with the pace setters.

“We lost all chance right out of the gate,” Schulhofer recalled this week. “We bumped another horse leaving there, we were what seemed like 15 lengths behind, and we never had a chance.”

Though sixth, Lemon Drop Kid finished only 4 1/2 lengths behind Cat Thief, who won the race. Schulhofer anticipated Lemon Drop Kid’s 4-year-old season with relish.

“He’s matured,” the trainer said. “He’s bigger and stronger, and the blinkers have also helped.”

After two races this year, Lemon Drop Kid’s owners, the rhyming husband-wife team of Jeanne Vance and Laddie Dance, asked Schulhofer to replace Santos with Edgar Prado, who has won 1,345 races and three national titles, in 1997, ’98 and ’99. Santos won the Belmont and the Travers, and over the years has been one of Schulhofer’s favorite riders.

“But I couldn’t give them an argument, so I did it,” Schulhofer said.

The blinkers and Prado arrived about the same time. Prado finished third with Lemon Drop Kid in the Pimlico Special but they’ve been unbeaten together since then, Schulhofer adding the blinkers for the first race in the current streak.

“The horse had gotten to looking around a lot,” Schulhofer said. “The blinkers have cured him of that.”

Now a 6-year-old, Behrens has earned $4.5 million, including $1.7 million despite only one win in six starts this year. Behrens always shows up, but he is a horseplayer’s hemlock, seldom good enough to beat the best anymore. His loss by a head to Lemon Drop Kid in the Woodward was another narrow, painful defeat for trainer James Bond. Deputy Commander beat Behrens by a nose in the 1997 Travers, and another nose separated Victory Gallop and Bond’s mainstay in the 1999 Whitney. Three Grade I races, lost by less than half a length.

“I still think I have one of the top older horses in the country,” Bond said. “I still believe in him, even though some people may have written him off. He wouldn’t still be in training if I didn’t think he could do it.”

Notes

With five consecutive wins on dirt, Riboletta is a 4-5 favorite in the $750,000 Beldame Stakes at Belmont Park on Saturday. Beautiful Pleasure, winner of last year’s Breeders’ Cup Distaff, is even money in the six-horse field. . . . Other races at Belmont on Saturday are the $500,000 Champagne, the $500,000 Frizette and the $250,000 Forest Hills Handicap. The 10-horse Champagne field includes City Zip, Yonaguska, Point Given, A P Valentine and Trailthefox. . . . Dancinginmydreams and Raging Fever head the Frizette, which also drew 10 horses. . . . The Forest Hills includes Forest Camp, who’ll be ridden by Riboletta’s jockey, Chris McCarron. . . . Kona Gold, one of the favorites for the Breeders’ Cup Sprint, runs Saturday at Santa Anita in the $200,000 Ancient Title Breeders’ Cup Handicap. The 6-year-old gelding faces four rivals: Elaborate, This Tune Can Hum, Regal Thunder and the filly Chilukki. . . . On the same card is the $250,000 Oak Tree Breeders’ Cup Mile, which marks the return of War Chant, who’ll be ridden by Gary Stevens in his first start since an 11th-place finish in the Kentucky Derby. . . . At Keeneland on Saturday, the headliner is the $500,000 Spinster, with favored Heritage Of Gold breaking from the inside post in the seven-horse field. . . . Daliapour, who races for the Aga Khan, is the 2-1 favorite Sunday in the $1.5-million Canadian International at Woodbine. Trainer Darrell Vienna has hired Stevens to ride Lycitus, who’s 10-1 on the morning line. . . . Puerto Madero, who beat Silver Charm and Behrens in the 1999 Donn Handicap at Gulfstream Park, has been retired. The Chilean-bred 6-year-old earned $1.3 million. . . . Laffit Pincay’s last-race win with Tanya Darling was his 8,987th. . . . Purses have been cut 8% at the Oak Tree meet. On-track attendance is down 13% from last year and betting is off about 9%.