Favorites Have Taken Their Lumps in Three Previous Classic Races

Although Ferdinand and Alysheba have drawn most of the attention going into today’s running of the $3-million Breeders’ Cup Classic at Hollywood Park, the three-year history of the race shows a plague on the favorites.

In the first Breeders’ Cup, at Hollywood Park in 1984, Slew o’ Gold was an odds-on favorite and finished a troubled third as Wild Again survived a three-horse rush to the wire in a surprise that paid $64.60.

Proud Truth scored a milder upset in 1985 at Aqueduct, but he was still only the fifth betting choice in an eight-horse field and paid $16.80. Favored Chief’s Crown ran fourth.

Last year at Santa Anita, there wasn’t much difference between Turkoman and Precisionist in the betting, but they ran 2-3, respectively, as Skywalker won at $22.20.

Is there an imitation of Wild Again, Proud Truth or Skywalker lurking in today’s field? Well, there’s no need to find an imitation of Skywalker, since he’s back after a busy spring at stud and is trying to become the first horse to win two Breeders’ Cup races.

Once again, he’s not highly regarded. Third to a victorious Ferdinand at Santa Anita two weeks ago, Skywalker’s opening price will be 6-1.

Although attractive, those odds are really not enough to add a horse to the Classic’s short but daffy tradition. More of a horse in this mold is Good Command, who will go off at 10-1 or more.

“If anybody is going to pull an upset, it could be us,” said Gary Jones, who has succeeded Charlie Whittingham as Good Command’s trainer. “He comes into this race off of a brilliant race, and he hasn’t had a hard campaign this year.”

Running 1 1/8 miles at Keeneland in the Fayette Handicap Oct. 10, Good Command came home in 1:46 4/5. He not only broke the track record that had been set in 1957 by Round Table, a horse of the year, but he smashed it to bits. Round Table’s time was three-fifths of a second slower.

Good Command’s Keeneland race was only his fourth start--and second win--of the year. He also won the Budweiser Breeders’ Cup Handicap at Del Mar in September. A 4-year-old son of Top Command, who died recently, Good Command was away from the races for seven months, until last July, after undergoing arthroscopic knee surgery.

Good Command is Jones’ only starter in the seven-race, $10-million Breeders’ Cup, which has championship implications for Ferdinand, Kentucky Derby winner Alysheba and several other horses on the card, such as Groovy and Theatrical.

The 43-year-old Jones has had three previous Breeders’ Cup starters, twice failing to win the Classic with Turkoman, who was third in 1985 and second, 1 lengths behind Skywalker, last year.

“One horse is enough in the Breeders’ Cup, if he gets the job done,” Jones said.

Turkoman has been sent to stud, after winning the national male handicap title last year.

“Top to bottom, this is probably a better field than last year’s Classic, and I’d love to have Turkoman to run again,” Jones said. “His performance last year had a lot to do with where they were holding the dance, and he never liked Santa Anita. I don’t want to take anything away from Skywalker’s victory, but my horse was 6 wide and 10 lengths behind with three-sixteenths of a mile to run, and he still almost won.”

Other trainers have pointed out that at Keeneland, Good Command carried only 118 pounds, 8 fewer than Round Table had on his back the day he set the record in the Blue Grass Stakes.

The Classic is run under weight-for-age conditions, which means that Good Command must carry 126 pounds, the same as Ferdinand, Skywalker and three other starters. Because he’s a 3-year-old, Alysheba carries only 123.

Good Command hasn’t carried this much weight since last year. At Del Mar, he won while toting only 114 pounds. Whether Good Command can pack the weight and run against a better group of horses than he’s seen all year is a concern for Jones.

The Preston brothers--Jack, Art and J.R.--have a better chance to reach the Breeders’ Cup winner’s circle with Groovy, who will be favored in the Sprint, the first race of the day at 11:17 a.m. The Classic is the seventh race, the last Breeders’ Cup event on a nine-race card.

The Prestons, who operate an oil-drilling business in Houston and own a 337-acre farm in Kentucky, bought Groovy for $4 million but paid only $75,000 for Good Command in a sale that dissolved a partnership with Murty Farm, the co-breeder of the horse.

At Jones’ barn Friday morning, the Prestons were making phone calls for tickets for friends, and wondering what they’d do in the three-plus hours that separate the races in which their horses are running.

“It’ll be even longer than that if Groovy doesn’t win,” one of them said.

Horse Racing Notes

Trainer Jack Van Berg said he never considered running Alysheba without Lasix, the anti-bleeder medication, in the Classic. “He’ll run on Lasix and he’ll win,” Van Berg barked. Van Berg ran Alysheba without Lasix, even though he was eligible to use it, in a race earlier this year, and there are Eclipse Awards voters who may not support the colt because he has had his best performances while medicated. . . . Instead of giving complete medication information to the bettors, California tracks only indicate horses running on Lasix for the first time, and this is the list for the Breeders’ Cup: Sharp Romance in the Sprint, Sonic Lady in the Mile, Regal Classic and Flying Victory in the Juvenile and Gulch in the Classic. . . . Blazing Bart has been scratched from the Turf, making room for Circus Prince off the also-eligible list.

Insurance on Groovy for $4 million costs the Preston brothers about $240,000 annually. . . . Because of pressure from horsemen who want to breed their mares to Groovy, the Prestons must make a decision in early December, before the Eclipse Awards results are announced, about whether they’ll race him another year. . . . Tom Meeker, president of Churchill Downs, says that there’s too much emphasis on the television ratings for the Breeders’ Cup. “They should settle for what they can get and not worry about it,” Meeker said. “There’s too much competition from other sports at this time of the year. The reason our ratings are so high for the Kentucky Derby is that we’re the only game in town that day.” . . . Alysheba is attempting to win the Classic after a 54-day layoff.

With Ferdinand and Alysheba in the Classic, it marks the first time that Kentucky Derby winners have raced one another since 1979, when Affirmed defeated Spectacular Bid in the Jockey Club Gold Cup at Belmont Park. Other matchups between Derby winners include Seattle Slew’s victory over Affirmed in the Marlboro Cup at Belmont; Seattle Slew running second and Affirmed fifth in that year’s Jockey Club Gold Cup; Secretariat beating Riva Ridge in the 1973 Marlboro; Swaps beating Determine in the 1955 Californian at Hollywood Park; and two 1950 Santa Anita races--Ponder beating Citation in the San Antonio Handicap and Citation turning the tables in the Santa Anita Handicap. In the 1918 Bowie Handicap, there were three Kentucky Derby winners in the same race, and age prevailed, with the 5-year-old George Smith winning, 4-year-old Omar Khayyam running second and 3-year-old Exterminator finishing third.

Sunday’s Hollywood Derby will be run in two divisions for the seventh straight year, with the first worth $170,100 and the second $172,100. The lineup for the first half consists of Stately Don, Tertiary Zone, Lockton, Zaizoom, Noble Minstrel, Creative Financing, Tout Est Permis, Salud y Pesetas and Khariyda. Running in the second half are Irish Rue, The Medic, Ten Keys, Light Sabre, Blue Finn, Louise a la Plage, Motley and Political Ambition. The distance is 1 1/8 miles on grass. . . . Purdue King, the 7-10 favorite ridden by Chris McCarron, outlasted Chinese Gold by a head to win the $94,750 first division of the Hoist The Flag Stakes for 2-year-olds Friday, and 16-1 shot White Mischief, ridden by Jose Santos, won the $112,625 second division by 3 1/2 lengths over King Alobar.