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LOUISVILLE – Here then is what thoroughbred horse racing does best, what it does in such a way that it is possible – if only for a few minutes, or an hour or a day, or the two weeks that separate one Kentucky Derby from one Preakness – to look away briefly from the many problems that ever more frequently imperil the sport's relevance, or on the darkest of days, its existence. Here then is what it does: It shrinks time and spits it out beneath two spires.
It takes a 71-year-old trainer named Bill Mott, a man known for his dignity and patience in a frantic and desperate sport, and transports him across six years from one quagmire of ankle-deep Churchill Downs mud to another, from a 22-minute wait to have his horse controversially declared the winner of the 145th Kentucky Derby to no wait at all to have another (much better) horse declared the winner of the 151st. It takes him from a pickup truck in Fort Pierce, South Dakota, 58 years ago, where he remembered listening to the AM radio call of Proud Clarion's win in the 1967 Derby, to the winner's circle of the most important horse race in the United States. It takes a 38-year-old Venezuelan jockey, Junior Alvarado, who as a teenager knew only one American race, from a hospital bed in Florida, injured when his mount suffered a fatal heart attack, 41 days later to a stretch-running victory in that very same race.
All of this because, at seven minutes past 7 on Saturday night, a regal bay 3-year-old colt named Sovereignty, at 7-1 the bettors' third choice in the field of 19 horses, ran determinedly past favored Journalism in the gloaming of a cold, misty spring evening, grinding forward beneath giant light towers that illuminated a persistent mist and dwarfed those ancient and beloved twin Churchill spires, to win the Derby.
Minutes after it ended, Mott, who turned those 71 years old last July, stood in the Churchill mud, just as he’d done in 2019, when his Country House, a 65-1 longshot, finished second behind Maximum Security, only to be elevated to first after that long wait when the latter was disqualified. The delay that day was agonizing, the outcome booed by the crowd, because Maximum Security had appeared to be the best horse by a wide margin, and thus many had placed bets on him. This time Mott wore the same windbreaker and similar black boots, and a much more celebratory air. "We'll take them any way we can get them," Mott said, diplomatically, as is his nature.
But also: "This is better."
Mott has trained excellent and successful horses around the world, from two-time (1995-'96) Horse of the Year Cigar, to the popular Cody's Wish, named for a young man, Cody Dorman, with a debilitating chromosomal illness, and winner of emotional Breeders’ Cup sprints in 2022 and '23. Yet Mott most prides himself on showing up and punching a virtual clock, every morning for more than four decades, striving from South Dakota to Kentucky and working from the same barn at Churchill Downs since 1980. "To be sitting here," he said from the Derby winner’s press conference rostrum, “thinking back to that 1967 Derby, it's like going to outer space."
He clomped out the mud after talking with NBC's Kenny Rice and ascended three steps to the Churchill infield, and then walked toward the portico where the trophy would be presented. His son, Riley, a trainer himself, intercepted Mott and snatched him up in an emotional hug. "Words can't describe what it feels like," said Riley, one of Mott's three grown children. "Seeing what he does every day of his life. He's a great human being, with a great work ethic. I'm so proud of him."
(More time shrinkage from a personal perspective: I first met Riley when he was helping his father and also attending prep school at the Salisbury School in Connecticut, not far from my home. We talked about it Saturday on the Churchill infield. He was wearing a Salisbury tie and pointed to it proudly. I asked his age: "I'm 33," he said, roughly double the age of the kid I had first met. Time flying past, yet lending perspective at the same time.)
Journalism came into the race a clear and respected favorite, impressive winner of two important California prep races, including the April 5 Santa Anita Derby. His story was the most-told of any horse's; trainer Michael McCarthy's home had been damaged to the point of uninhabitability by the Eaton Fire, one of the tragic wildfires that struck Southern California in early January. Journalism left the starting gate as the 3-1 favorite, but he had never run on a wet track and just once in a field of more than five horses. "I'm more worried about a bad trip than a bad track," McCarthy told me two days before the race.
Arkansas Derby winner Sandman was the second choice at post, off at 6-1. Next came Sovereignty. Odds can often be comically irrelevant in the Derby; not so on Saturday.
The Derby is always a race that mixes jockeys' guile and, because of its cumbersome size, a massive dose of luck. None of its horses have run in such a large field or at the distance of 1 1/4 miles. Both Sovereignty and Journalism, who would contest the race nearly to the wire, each got a little trouble and excellent rides, from different regions of the giant starting gate. Journalism broke from the No. 8 position and was squeezed early, but jockey Umberto Rispoli got him near the rail into the first turn and around into the backstretch. Horses slowed in front, but Rispoli worked his way into open mud and rolled into the final turn ominously. "I got a beautiful trip," said Rispoli. "I wanted to turn for home with just a couple of horses in front of me and that's what happened."
Sovereignty's jockey, Alvarado, who is Mott's trusted house jockey, is admired by the trainer for his willingness to work in developing a horse, resisting the urge to push a horse past his readiness in an attempt to win. He started far out from the rail, in the No. 18 post, not necessarily disadvantageous, because Sovereignty is a kicker who does his best running late in the race. But he stumbled out of the gate; the official chart said he, "... clipped a rival's heels and bobbled slightly."
"I clipped heels a little bit right there," said Alvarado. "I'm thinking, oh boy, I hope he didn't lose a shoe on this track." He did not. From there, Alvarado skillfully slid him to the inside rail before the first turn. Mott noted: "You don't win Grade I's (the biggest races) going four or five (paths) wide around both turns." For Alvarado his mount alone was a gift. On March 23 at Gulfstream Park, Alvarado was aboard Term in the 10th race, when Term suffered a fatal cardiac event and fell, heaving Alvarado. His injury was a hairline fracture of his right shoulder. He missed three weeks of riding and was not on Sovereignty (replaced by Manny Franco) for his second-place finish in the March 29 Florida Derby. "I was completely heartbroken," said Alvarado. "I thought that was it. I don't know if I'm ever going to get another horse like this."
In the Derby, as Sovereignty and Journalism navigated the racetrack, the pace was too fast up front, under 23 seconds for the first straight quarter and 46.23 around the turn into the backstretch. None of the early leaders would hold up. Past the quarter pole and into stretch, Journalism took the lead.
But: "I saw the blue silks coming," said McCarthy. That would be Sovereignty, in the colors of Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum's Godolphin Racing.
Pause: In racing, there are almost always complexities, even in the best of stories. Sheikh Mohammad, the 75-year-old ruler of Dubai, is respected and praised in the horse racing world, but outside racing, his reputation is materially different. The most disturbing example: In 2020, a British court "established as fact" that Sheikh Mohammad had abducted two of his daughters and threatened his wife. Mott and British Godolphin representative Michael Banahan effusively praised Godolphin for their support of racing, and that is likely sincere and valid. But outside the racetrack, the story is more complex.
Back to the race:
Alvarado said, "When we turned for home, I put him in the clear on the outside. I knew what I [had]. I knew what he was capable of, and he didn't disappoint me." They ran nearly together for 17 jumps, but any experienced race-watcher could see that Sovereignty had more steam. Sovereignty put a head in front inside the eighth pole and eased away to win by 1 1/2 lengths, Mott's second Derby, Alvarado's first. Godolphin's first, in their 14th try.
"The winner ran a better race," said Journalism's McCarthy, a racetrack concession, never needed, but often a fitting coda.
At the end of it all, the rain had ceased falling over the Downs, leaving only a cold, misty veil, It was eerily similar to 2019, but with a mirror image of emotions. Back then I wrote for Sports Illustrated that nightfall was like "... a curtain falling on a theater of the surreal." This was a curtain call, a bow to the present and the past. An interruption in racing survival drama for only joy.
Continue reading...
It takes a 71-year-old trainer named Bill Mott, a man known for his dignity and patience in a frantic and desperate sport, and transports him across six years from one quagmire of ankle-deep Churchill Downs mud to another, from a 22-minute wait to have his horse controversially declared the winner of the 145th Kentucky Derby to no wait at all to have another (much better) horse declared the winner of the 151st. It takes him from a pickup truck in Fort Pierce, South Dakota, 58 years ago, where he remembered listening to the AM radio call of Proud Clarion's win in the 1967 Derby, to the winner's circle of the most important horse race in the United States. It takes a 38-year-old Venezuelan jockey, Junior Alvarado, who as a teenager knew only one American race, from a hospital bed in Florida, injured when his mount suffered a fatal heart attack, 41 days later to a stretch-running victory in that very same race.
All of this because, at seven minutes past 7 on Saturday night, a regal bay 3-year-old colt named Sovereignty, at 7-1 the bettors' third choice in the field of 19 horses, ran determinedly past favored Journalism in the gloaming of a cold, misty spring evening, grinding forward beneath giant light towers that illuminated a persistent mist and dwarfed those ancient and beloved twin Churchill spires, to win the Derby.
Minutes after it ended, Mott, who turned those 71 years old last July, stood in the Churchill mud, just as he’d done in 2019, when his Country House, a 65-1 longshot, finished second behind Maximum Security, only to be elevated to first after that long wait when the latter was disqualified. The delay that day was agonizing, the outcome booed by the crowd, because Maximum Security had appeared to be the best horse by a wide margin, and thus many had placed bets on him. This time Mott wore the same windbreaker and similar black boots, and a much more celebratory air. "We'll take them any way we can get them," Mott said, diplomatically, as is his nature.
But also: "This is better."
Mott has trained excellent and successful horses around the world, from two-time (1995-'96) Horse of the Year Cigar, to the popular Cody's Wish, named for a young man, Cody Dorman, with a debilitating chromosomal illness, and winner of emotional Breeders’ Cup sprints in 2022 and '23. Yet Mott most prides himself on showing up and punching a virtual clock, every morning for more than four decades, striving from South Dakota to Kentucky and working from the same barn at Churchill Downs since 1980. "To be sitting here," he said from the Derby winner’s press conference rostrum, “thinking back to that 1967 Derby, it's like going to outer space."
He clomped out the mud after talking with NBC's Kenny Rice and ascended three steps to the Churchill infield, and then walked toward the portico where the trophy would be presented. His son, Riley, a trainer himself, intercepted Mott and snatched him up in an emotional hug. "Words can't describe what it feels like," said Riley, one of Mott's three grown children. "Seeing what he does every day of his life. He's a great human being, with a great work ethic. I'm so proud of him."
(More time shrinkage from a personal perspective: I first met Riley when he was helping his father and also attending prep school at the Salisbury School in Connecticut, not far from my home. We talked about it Saturday on the Churchill infield. He was wearing a Salisbury tie and pointed to it proudly. I asked his age: "I'm 33," he said, roughly double the age of the kid I had first met. Time flying past, yet lending perspective at the same time.)
Journalism came into the race a clear and respected favorite, impressive winner of two important California prep races, including the April 5 Santa Anita Derby. His story was the most-told of any horse's; trainer Michael McCarthy's home had been damaged to the point of uninhabitability by the Eaton Fire, one of the tragic wildfires that struck Southern California in early January. Journalism left the starting gate as the 3-1 favorite, but he had never run on a wet track and just once in a field of more than five horses. "I'm more worried about a bad trip than a bad track," McCarthy told me two days before the race.
Arkansas Derby winner Sandman was the second choice at post, off at 6-1. Next came Sovereignty. Odds can often be comically irrelevant in the Derby; not so on Saturday.
The Derby is always a race that mixes jockeys' guile and, because of its cumbersome size, a massive dose of luck. None of its horses have run in such a large field or at the distance of 1 1/4 miles. Both Sovereignty and Journalism, who would contest the race nearly to the wire, each got a little trouble and excellent rides, from different regions of the giant starting gate. Journalism broke from the No. 8 position and was squeezed early, but jockey Umberto Rispoli got him near the rail into the first turn and around into the backstretch. Horses slowed in front, but Rispoli worked his way into open mud and rolled into the final turn ominously. "I got a beautiful trip," said Rispoli. "I wanted to turn for home with just a couple of horses in front of me and that's what happened."
Sovereignty's jockey, Alvarado, who is Mott's trusted house jockey, is admired by the trainer for his willingness to work in developing a horse, resisting the urge to push a horse past his readiness in an attempt to win. He started far out from the rail, in the No. 18 post, not necessarily disadvantageous, because Sovereignty is a kicker who does his best running late in the race. But he stumbled out of the gate; the official chart said he, "... clipped a rival's heels and bobbled slightly."
"I clipped heels a little bit right there," said Alvarado. "I'm thinking, oh boy, I hope he didn't lose a shoe on this track." He did not. From there, Alvarado skillfully slid him to the inside rail before the first turn. Mott noted: "You don't win Grade I's (the biggest races) going four or five (paths) wide around both turns." For Alvarado his mount alone was a gift. On March 23 at Gulfstream Park, Alvarado was aboard Term in the 10th race, when Term suffered a fatal cardiac event and fell, heaving Alvarado. His injury was a hairline fracture of his right shoulder. He missed three weeks of riding and was not on Sovereignty (replaced by Manny Franco) for his second-place finish in the March 29 Florida Derby. "I was completely heartbroken," said Alvarado. "I thought that was it. I don't know if I'm ever going to get another horse like this."
In the Derby, as Sovereignty and Journalism navigated the racetrack, the pace was too fast up front, under 23 seconds for the first straight quarter and 46.23 around the turn into the backstretch. None of the early leaders would hold up. Past the quarter pole and into stretch, Journalism took the lead.
But: "I saw the blue silks coming," said McCarthy. That would be Sovereignty, in the colors of Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum's Godolphin Racing.
Pause: In racing, there are almost always complexities, even in the best of stories. Sheikh Mohammad, the 75-year-old ruler of Dubai, is respected and praised in the horse racing world, but outside racing, his reputation is materially different. The most disturbing example: In 2020, a British court "established as fact" that Sheikh Mohammad had abducted two of his daughters and threatened his wife. Mott and British Godolphin representative Michael Banahan effusively praised Godolphin for their support of racing, and that is likely sincere and valid. But outside the racetrack, the story is more complex.
Back to the race:
Alvarado said, "When we turned for home, I put him in the clear on the outside. I knew what I [had]. I knew what he was capable of, and he didn't disappoint me." They ran nearly together for 17 jumps, but any experienced race-watcher could see that Sovereignty had more steam. Sovereignty put a head in front inside the eighth pole and eased away to win by 1 1/2 lengths, Mott's second Derby, Alvarado's first. Godolphin's first, in their 14th try.
"The winner ran a better race," said Journalism's McCarthy, a racetrack concession, never needed, but often a fitting coda.
At the end of it all, the rain had ceased falling over the Downs, leaving only a cold, misty veil, It was eerily similar to 2019, but with a mirror image of emotions. Back then I wrote for Sports Illustrated that nightfall was like "... a curtain falling on a theater of the surreal." This was a curtain call, a bow to the present and the past. An interruption in racing survival drama for only joy.
Continue reading...
