Quote:
Originally Posted by Dunbar
Do you have the 11 individual odds handy enough to post? I'm curious about the range.
--Dunbar
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I believe Charismatic was the highest at 1.6-to-1
Big Brown and Spectacular Bid the lowest at 0.30-to-1.
Some very bizarre stories involved with all 3 horses.
* Charismatic broke down right after the finish line.
* Big Brown had an issue with an unhinged shoe and was eased and Did Not Finish.
* Spectacular Bid had stepped on a safety pin according to his trainer. The pin had become embedded in his hoof. However, after the discovery of the injury, Spectacular Bid did not seem lame and was entered into the Belmont.
In the Belmont, jockey Ronnie Franklin guns Spectacular Bid into a speed duel with a 90/1 hard ridden longshot over a dull racetrack. The opening fractions that Bid and Gallant Best battled through in the Belmont were 23 2/5 and 47 3/5th around a turn - earlier on in the day - in a one-turn mile race - that seasons champion sprinter Star De Naskra (he wired the 7f Carter last out) battled with Darby Creek Road (DCR still holds the 7f track record at Saratoga to this day - and was stretching out off of a 6f race) .. through fractions of 23 4/5 and 46 3/5 running a straight line in a one-turn mile.
Spectacular Bid uncharacteristically never switched leads in the Belmont. He faded in the final furlong to finish 3rd -- though his two pace rivals who went with him, Gallant Best and General Assembly, both faded much worse and were beaten 20+ lengths. General Assembly won the Travers by 15 lengths and Gallant Best earned five different Graded Stakes placings later in that season and was a stayer.
After the Belmont, Spectacular Bid was reported to have had an infection that threatened his life and one requiring the hoof to be drilled to cure the problem.
Quote:
Delp shipped Bid to his base at Pimlico the day after the Belmont, ultimately summoning prominent Kentucky racehorse veterinarian Dr. Alex Harthill to treat the colt when an abscess failed to materialize on the colt's injured hoof within a week. Harthill recommended immediate action, warning the trainer that Bid might develop a catastrophic infection.
Joined by the Meyerhoffs, Delp watched as Harthill used a tiny plane to shave approximately three-eighths of an inch from Bid's hoof. "Then you could see a dark spot," remembers Delp. Harthill next pulled a minute drill from his little black bag. Delp flinched. "I said, 'Damn!' So he used that drill to go right down through that little black spot. And pretty soon the thick, dark contents came out of there like a fountain. And he looked up at me and said, 'Hey, Bud, where are all those sons of bitches who called you a liar?' That didn't bother me; I was worried about my horse."
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Even though Spectacular Bid drifted out and never switched leads and fell apart in the stretch -- I think the ride by Franklin bothered him more than the hoof issue.
Franklin's misadventures over just a six week span that year were the stuff of legend:
* He was fined for kicking a horse at Pimlico after losing a race
* He was fined for cursing a Pimlico security guard who asked to see his ID badge
* He was fined after he got into a fist-fight with Angel Cordero in the Belmont Park jockeys room the week of the Belmont Stakes
* One day before the Belmont, he was named in a paternity suit by a waitress who said he fathered her 5-month old child.
* Nine days after the Belmont Stakes, he was found by a cop with cocaine in a parking lot at Disney Land. The cop became suspicious after he saw him snorting it in the parking lot.
* As a result of the Disney incident, he lost the mount on Spectacular Bid and never rode him again.