Officer Is (Latest) Name and Winning Is His Game

By any name, the undefeated 2-year-old colt Officer is expected to be the heaviest favorite on Saturday’s eight-race Breeders’ Cup card at Belmont Park. Don’t laugh. Officer’s name has changed so often that it’s amazing the Jockey Club, whose duty it is to register such things, has managed to keep up.

In racking up five consecutive victories--four in California and one at Belmont--Officer has used only one name, but before his first start, Ahmed Salman, the Saudi Arabian prince who races the horse under his Thoroughbred Corp. banner, kept changing his ID. Officer had more aliases than a protagonist in a John LeCarre’s spy thriller.

Before Salman came along with his hefty bankroll, Officer was simply Hip No. 79--his designation in a 2000 auction catalog. Marty and Pam Wygod’s River Edge Farm consigned the California-bred to the sale and Rudy Delguidice, an agent for Becky Thomas, bought him for $175,000.

Thomas is a Florida pinhooker, a bloodstock agent who buys young horses with the idea of quickly reselling them at a profit. In the case of Officer, the markup was huge: In March, as an unraced 2-year-old, the colt was sold to the Thoroughbred Corp. for $700,000. That’s the most paid for a horse that was both bred and conceived in California.

This sturdy son of Bertrando and St. Helens Shadow started out as Ashen, but Salman never really liked that name, so he dug deep and paid the Jockey Club the $100 fee to change the name to Pasquale’s Best. That was the name trainer Bob Baffert used when he nominated Officer to this year’s Del Mar Futurity. But Salman found another $100 lying around and changed the name again, this time to Thriving.

Even that name didn’t seem to have the right ring for everybody. Then one day an office worker at the Thoroughbred Corp. came in, bemoaning that she had just been given a speeding ticket by a police officer. “Hey, Officer--that’d be a good name for a horse,” somebody said, and the Jockey Club picked up another $100 to re-register the colt for the fourth and last time.

Name changes of horses are not permitted after they’ve raced. Nobody would want to fool with Officer’s name even if they could. Eclipse Award voters have all but penciled it in on their preliminary ballots for best 2-year-old.

“I’ve heard of a few horses having three names before they ran,” said a Keeneland official familiar with the renaming of horses. “But never four. That might be an unofficial record.”

Officer has gone untested in his five starts, winning by margins that range between 11/2 and eight lengths. He’s never faced more than six rivals--and one day ran against only two--but in the $1-million, 11/16-mile Breeders’ Cup Juvenile he’ll be part of a 13-horse field that will run around only one turn on Belmont’s 11/2-mile oval.

Still, the Daily Racing Form, in its preliminary morning line, has made Salman’s colt a 3-5 favorite. Next on that line are two more California-based horses, Siphonic and Came Home, who are also undefeated. Siphonic has run only twice and Came Home, after three starts, will be running for the first time since Sept. 1. He was scratched from the Norfolk Stakes at Santa Anita on Sept. 29 because of a minor injury.

“I can’t say Officer’s the best 2-year-old I’ve ever had,” said Baffert, whose Point Given lost by a nose to Macho Uno in last year’s Juvenile. “Comparing horses is kind of tough to do. But I will say that Officer is the most precocious 2-year-old I’ve ever had. He has done things so easily.”

Point Given, the best 3-year-old in the country, was supposed to be Baffert’s ticket to Saturday’s $4-million Breeders’ Cup Classic, but he was injured in August and has been retired.

“I’ve got Officer to carry the torch now,” Baffert said. “With Point Given gone, Officer is my new hope.”

Simon Harris has galloped both Point Given and now Officer for Baffert in New York.

“I’m glad they’re two different horses,” Harris said. “The first time I got on Point Given, it took us about 20 minutes to get over to the track. I couldn’t sit on him for more than a few seconds before he would rear up. He was a nut before he ran in the Champagne last year. I’d wake up the next day after riding him and my hips would be so sore. Officer is completely different. He’s real relaxed.”

Officer will be ridden for the sixth consecutive time by Victor Espinoza, who won his first Breeders’ Cup race with Spain--a Thoroughbred Corp. horse trained by Wayne Lukas--last year at Churchill Downs.

“It was as easy as it looked,” Espinoza said after Officer’s 33/4-length win in the Champagne here Oct. 6. “He is so professional. He’s the best horse I’ve ever seen. At the top of the stretch, he started looking around a bit and started to slow down. I tapped him lightly with my whip and he took off. It was a great performance.”

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