Visitors Aim for Derby Trifecta

The worst-case Kentucky Derby scenario for Kentucky breeders came true when Funny Cide, a New York-bred gelding, won the race in 2003.

But if that wasn’t deflating enough, along came Smarty Jones last year. He wasn’t a gelding, but he was a Pennsylvania-bred.

Two years, and neither Derby won by a Kentucky-bred. That’s happened only four times in Derby history, and when the 131st Derby is run at Churchill Downs on May 7, the hardboots back there will be dreading the unthinkable: three consecutive years without a Kentucky-bred wearing the roses. The only thing worse in Kentucky might be if the tobacco industry moved to Rhode Island.

The Derby is a bottled-in-bond Kentucky race, usually won by a Kentucky horse, and Kentuckians paint anything else as sacrilege. A few minutes after Gato Del Sol won the 1982 Derby, as hundreds of correspondents began cranking out their accounts of the race, there was this terse announcement in the Churchill press box: “Just a reminder, press. Gato Del Sol is a Kentucky-bred.”

Gato Del Sol prepped for the Derby at Santa Anita, and his trainer and jockey, Eddie Gregson and Eddie Delahoussaye, were based in California, so there must have been a mushrooming paranoia at Churchill that unknowing journalists might misconstrue the colt’s heritage.

This year, Kentucky breeders may be rooting against such top horses as Declan’s Moon, Afleet Alex, Proud Accolade, Closing Argument, Spanish Chestnut and Fusaichi Rock Star. Not a Kentucky-bred in the lot.

Declan’s Moon, bred in Virginia, is a double-whammy. Like Funny Cide, he’s a gelding. Two geldings winning the Derby in three years might be too much for Kentuckians to stomach. Before Funny Cide’s upset, a castrated horse hadn’t won in 74 years.

Other non-Kentucky-bred prospects in the Derby hunt include Sort It Out, Galloping Grocer and Naughty New Yorker. All were bred in New York, a state that never had a Derby winner before Funny Cide. Galloping Grocer, gadzooks, is also a gelding.

Hedging as much as they can, Kentuckians still like to claim Funny Cide as one of their own.

“Funny Cide had Kentucky written all over him,” said Charles “Nucks” Nuckols III, whose family’s farm in Midway, Ky., bred War Emblem, the 2002 Derby winner and last Kentucky-bred to win. “[WinStar Farm in Versailles, Ky.] sent the mare [Belle’s Good Cide] to New York to foal so they could get publicity for their stallion, Distorted Humor. The mare only spent about 30 days in New York. But the stallion they wanted to publicize was really standing in Kentucky.”

Seldom do Kentuckians have to spin the breeding of a Derby winner. Since Aristides, a Kentucky-bred, won the first Derby in 1875, 96 other Kentucky horses have won the race. Florida-breds are second on the list with six wins, followed by Virginia-breds with four.

California has three winners, the last Decidedly in 1962.

The large fields at Churchill Downs are usually steeped with Kentucky-breds. Last year, for example, 13 of the 19 starters were from Kentucky. It’s been even more top-heavy -- in 2001, all but two of the 17 starters were from Kentucky, as were 16 of the 19 in 1999. In the last 10 years, 70% of the Derby starters have been Kentucky-breds.

This year, however, when 358 horses were nominated for the Triple Crown, there was a sizable drop-off in the number of Kentucky-breds. The 232 Kentucky nominees represent 65% of the total, but in many years, Kentucky horses account for 70% or more, and in 2002, three out of every four nominees were Kentucky-breds.

“We expected to be down in overall horses, and we knew Kentucky’s numbers would be much lower than usual,” said Ed Seigenfeld, executive vice president of Triple Crown Productions. “MRLS was going to have a significant impact.”

Mare Reproductive Loss Syndrome, which struck many Kentucky farms during the spring breeding season of 2001 and carried over to 2002, accounted for thousands of mares aborting or producing dead foals. Research into the outbreak is ongoing. An infestation of Eastern tent caterpillars has been suggested as one of the causes.

Arthur B. Hancock III, who owns Stone Farm in Paris, Ky., feels that MRLS is indirectly behind the recent absence of Kentucky-bred winners at the Derby. Hancock co-bred and raced Gato Del Sol. He also bred Fusaichi Pegasus, winner of the 2000 Derby, and was one of the owners of Sunday Silence, the 1989 Derby winner.

“Because of MRLS, about 2,200 foals alone died,” Hancock said. “And these weren’t just ordinary breedings, they were the kind of top-of-the-line matings that would have produced crackerjack foals. We had a real good mare who was bred to Unbridled [the 1990 Derby winner], and her foal died. So I think you have to factor all this into what’s been going on at the Derby in recent years.”

According to the Jockey Club, 8,226 foals were registered in 2002, which is when this year’s Derby-eligible horses were born. That total compares with 9,837 Kentucky foals in 2001.

Until 2003-04, the last time Kentucky-breds went two years without winning the Derby was 1992-93. Lil E. Tee (the first Pennsylvania-bred) and Sea Hero (Virginia) won in those years, before Kentucky regained the stage in 1994 with Go For Gin. The first time there were two years without a Kentucky-bred winning was 1955-56, the years of Swaps (California) and Needles (Florida). A story persists about Needles, who reportedly was foaled in a railroad boxcar that may not have crossed the state line into Florida from Georgia in time for him to qualify as a Florida-bred. Nuckols has heard the story, but isn’t sure whether it’s true.

Iron Liege rescued Kentucky-breds from a third consecutive loss when he won in 1957. Had Bill Shoemaker, riding the English-bred Gallant Man, not prematurely stood up in the irons, misjudging the finish line, the Derby might have had yet another non-Kentucky-bred winner.

Carry Back (Florida) and Decidedly (California) sent Kentuckians hiding again in 1961-62, but Chateaugay revived their reputations with his Derby win in 1963.

Kentuckians are so passionate about their breeding industry that Brereton Jones, a former governor who owns Airdrie Stud farm in Midway, Ky., has launched KEEP, which stands for the Kentucky Equine Education Project. Besides lobbying on behalf of horsemen in Frankfort, the state capital, KEEP is spending $1.35 million on an awareness campaign that includes statewide billboards and radio and TV advertising. The billboards tweak other states -- Florida, New York and West Virginia, for openers -- that might think they can encroach on Kentucky’s stranglehold. In 2004, the number of stallions standing in West Virginia increased by 16%, and the number of mares bred showed a comparable increase there. For several years, West Virginia racing has been boosted by revenues from casino gambling.

“Welcome to New York, Horse Capital of the World,” read billboards standing in three Kentucky cities. Some Kentuckians didn’t get it at first.

“They went all the way,” Nucks Nuckols said. “They also put a picture of the Statue of Liberty on those boards. They’ll be using a palm tree for the Florida boards. Don’t know what they’ll use for West Virginia. A lump of coal, maybe.”