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'Freak' May Make Kentucky Derby History

By RICH PODOLSKY,

AOL

Posted: 2008-05-03 18:21:47

Webster's defines a freak as "someone or something that is markedly unusual or abnormal." On the race track, there's only one horse that fits that description today - Big Brown.

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What Big Brown has accomplished in three races is leave everyone in awe that has seen him run. The thing about Big Brown that is scary, is that he has come from nowhere. There’s nothing special about his breeding, being a son of a sprinter named Boundary, who isn’t on anyone’s Top 10 sires list.

But the lack of classic breeding hasn’t slowed Big Brown. When he finally made it to the races last August at Saratoga, he was entered in a distance race for 2-year-olds on the grass. Not only would he have to negotiate the distance, but he was going to have to race around two turns for the first time. And at odds of 16-1, he wasn’t exactly a hot tip.

What Big Brown did was take the lead and laugh at anyone who came near him. He kept increasing his lead until he won by 11 1/4 lengths, an astounding margin for a maiden race at a race track that draws the best 2-year-olds in the country. Michael Iavarone, a major partner of IEAH Stables, was watching the race and couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

"At the quarter pole," said Iavarone, "I picked up the phone and called (trainer) Rick Dutrow and said, 'turn on your TV right now. I have to own this horse!' "

It turns out Iavarone wasn't the only one watching the race. Within a few hours, owner Paul Pompa, Jr. had a $1 million offer, but Pompa wasn’t about to let him go that easily. Pompa had bought Big Brown for $190,000 because he was a half-brother of Snake River Canyon, a horse Pompa owned briefly owned who impressed him.

After turning down offers up to $2 million, Pompa finally got one he couldn’t resist. IEAH told Pompa he could keep 25 percent of the horse after valuing him at $3.5 million.

Rick Dutrow, who is not known as a trainer of Triple Crown candidates, took over the training.

Getting Big Brown to his second race was no easy feat. Dutrow had to wait because Big Brown developed two different quarter cracks in his hoofs. Quarter cracks cause pain and sometimes infection, and often require months of healing time. It wasn’t until March 5 that Dutrow felt the horse was ready to run again, and on a limited amount of workouts. This time he’d be running on dirt at Gulfstream Park against winners in another distance race.

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Before the race Dutrow worked him out alongside Diamond Stripes, one of the best handicap horses in the world. "He just carried him (Diamond Stripes) around the track,” Dutrow said. "That’s how I knew he was going to be all right. When I watch him work, he just looks like an absolute freak. Talent like he has makes up for a lack of experience."

In that second race, he was never more than a length behind. Jockey Kent Desormeaux waited for the right moment, and let Big Brown show his stuff. He dragged Desormeaux to the lead and continued to increase the margin winning by an astounding 12 3/4 lengths.

Then a little more than three weeks later they entered him the prestigious Florida Derby, often a springboard to winning the Kentucky Derby. But no one said it was going to be easy.

Big Brown drew the far outside 12 post, which was a death signal to most trainers. It was like starting from another zip code. Going into the Florida Derby, no horse had won from the 12 post the entire Gulfstream meet, and with such a short run to the first turn it was near impossible for any horse, no matter how great.

None of it bothered Big Brown. He zipped to the lead in amazingly fast fractions that would have stopped most horses. He kept running as if he didn't have a care in the world, romping home by five lengths. No one ever got near him. "We could have gone round the track again," said Bennie Stutts, Jr., trainer of second-place finisher Smooth Air, "and we would have never come close. He’s just a freak."

Erasing all doubts, Big Brown now will try to accomplish something no horse has done in 93 years - win the Kentucky Derby with only three lifetime starts. The great Curlin tried it last year, and failed, finishing third. The book says you have to have a lot more than three races under your belt to be fit enough to win the Derby at its 1 1/4-mile distance. But "the book" doesn’t scare off John Nerud, 95, who owned and trained possibly the greatest "freak" of all, Dr. Fager.

"Big Brown is fit now to go a mile and a quarter,” Nerud told the Bloodhorse’s Steve Haskin. "I bred for only one thing - speed. If they have speed and they can carry it, you’ve got something. This horse has a very high cruising speed and he can carry it. And he’s a freak."

2008-04-24 13:46:55