ELMONT, New York — As Triple Crown bids go, the easy part is over for California Chrome, who on Saturday will look to become the first horse in 36 years to win thoroughbred racing’s most elusive trifecta.
With the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness behind him, the 3-year-old California-bred colt will face a much tougher challenge at the Belmont Stakes, where the track is longer, most of his opponents are running on fresher legs and the pressure of making history has derailed many Triple Crown bids.
All of that matters little, however, to the blue-collar, West Coast crew surrounding California Chrome. They’re convinced their impressive chestnut stallion has destiny on its side — even if it means committing a little revisionist history in order to fully believe in Chrome’s potential.
Moments after learning that Chrome had drawn the No. 2 post for the Stakes on Wednesday, Alan Sherman, assistant of the 3-5 morning-line favorite to his trainer father, Art, invoked the name of Secretariat, who secured the Triple Crown by winning the 1973 Belmont by an astounding 31 lengths.
“Well, Secretariat was No. 5 in the Derby, No. 3 in the Preakness and No. 2 in the Belmont,” Alan Sherman said, a sly grin creeping across his face, alluding to the identical post positions Chrome has drawn in each leg of the Triple Crown.
“I did not know that, but I’m pretty happy with it right now,” Chrome co-owner Steve Coburn added when asked about the announced similarities between the starting positions for his horse and Big Red. “If it worked for Secretariat, hopefully it’ll work for us.”
As it turns out, that story was too good to be true: Secretariat ran from the 10th position in the Derby and broke from the rail in the Belmont, though he did wear the No. 2 saddle cloth in New York and both horses did draw No. 3 at the Preakness. But that won't shake Coburn’s belief in Chrome’s Triple Crown kismet.
“I knew it was going to happen when I saw that baby the first day he was born,” Coburn said. “When he was a day old I knew something big was going to happen, and he hasn’t proven us wrong yet.”
It’s hard to argue with Coburn’s Chrome confidence; no one would expect him to not believe in his own horse. But there’s a big difference between thinking you can win a race of this magnitude, with all that’s at stake, and actually doing it. And more than a few confident Triple Crown contenders have come up short at Belmont Park’s mile-and-a-half oval since Affirmed in 1978.
Whether it was Spectacular Bid in 1979, Sunday Silence in 1989, Real Quiet in 1998, Smarty Jones in 2004 or one of the other seven horses who have started the Belmont after winning the first two legs, there was always reason to believe that each had the potential to join the ranks of racing’s immortals. But all of them have missed out on history.
So the question must be asked: What makes this year and this horse different?
Well, for starters, California Chrome has a jockey with something to prove. In 2002, Victor Espinoza rode War Emblem, who finished a disappointing eighth in the Belmont after winning the first two legs of the Triple Crown. It’s also been noted that Espinoza is 2-for-67 in starts at Belmont going into this week, so he’ll take to Saturday’s race seeking to right those wrongs — and he believes he has the horse to do it.
“California Chrome is very talented, and War Emblem was too, but he was an attitude horse,” Espinoza said. “He did not like being behind horses. He liked to go in the front and just [run] one way, and a mile and a half is really, really tough for a horse who wants to be in the front. He was not saving his energy in the beginning.
“California Chrome is a different horse. He’s really kind and mellow and will do whatever I tell him to do. He respects me and I let him know that I’m the boss and that he has to listen to me during the race, and he does that.”
And though Chrome has never run a mile and a half race, Espinoza and Chrome’s trainers don’t seem concerned that the distance will be a factor. Espinoza insisted he didn’t ask Chrome to give all he had in his Derby and Preakness wins, and said he’s prepared to empty whatever reserve Chrome has left against a field that features two other horses who have run the first two legs.
“He’s got a mile and a quarter under his belt and a mile and 3/16ths under his belt, and I just can’t understand why he wouldn’t (be able to) go a mile and a half,” Art Sherman said.
“Hopefully he has his energy like before, and hopefully he’s ready for it,” Espinoza said. “I never have a strategy how I’m going to run California Chrome. Every race he does, we go with the flow.”
We’ll have to wait and see just how Espinoza decides to ride Chrome on Saturday — and a lot of that will likely have to do with how he gets out of the No. 2 post — but the general sense seems to be that if California Chrome does misfire in the Belmont, it’ll be on the jockey, not the horse.
“It’s a jockey’s race, and No. 2 is just another post position,” Coburn said. “We all get drawn a bad place sooner or later; you just have to make the best of it.
“We know this horse has a hell of a shot at winning the Triple Crown, and I honestly believe he’s going to do it," Coburn continued. "We know Chrome can do it, he can go the distance, so it’s going to be up to Victor to put him in a position where he can win this race. That’s where we’re standing right now.”
Win or lose, however, Coburn couldn’t seem more ecstatic with what California Chrome has accomplished thus far.
“To watch this little guy grow up and watch him develop and watch his personality develop and just watch his mind develop — he’s an amazing animal; he really, really is,” he said. “I wish every horse owner out there could have a horse like this, because he’s like one in a bazillion.
“This horse could have been born to anybody, and he was born to us, and we were very blessed with that. And he’s America’s horse, because we’ve got the entire country, if not the entire world behind us. We just want to hope and pray that everyone gets a clean break, every horse has a safe trip and everyone gets to come home clean and let the chips fall where they may.”
And if a little luck comes California Chrome’s way — or if it truly is fate that Chrome win the Triple Crown — well, that wouldn’t be the worst thing, either.
Said Art Sherman, with his patent crooked smile: “I’ll let you know Saturday if it’s destiny.”
You can follow Sam Gardner on Twitter or e-mail him at samgardnerfox@gmail.com.
