Word: baffert
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Thoroughbred trainer Bob Baffert, whose horses won the Kentucky Derby in 1997 and '98, didn't have a steed good enough to enter this year's Run for the Roses. Neither did Russell Reineman, a Chicago businessman and stable owner who had been trying to unload a Derby hopeless called War Emblem--a 3-year-old with a small chip in each ankle and a big chip on his shoulder. "He's a mean-spirited horse," notes Baffert...
...Baffert saw something in War Emblem that Reineman didn't--a nasty competitor begging to get loose on a big track. So did Prince Ahmed bin Salman, an American-educated, Saudi Arabian stable owner who had charged Baffert with finding him a Derby runner, and the two hoped their hunch would pay off. Did it ever. War Emblem won the Derby in style, going off as a 20-to-1 shot and leading wire to wire. Two weeks later, in the Preakness, the "speed" horses were supposed to drain War Emblem like a cheap battery. He won going away. "Baffert...
...Emblem now heads for the Belmont Stakes this week, trying to become the first horse to win the Triple Crown since Affirmed in 1978. It's a great script, at least to anyone who isn't in the horse-racing game. Back at the barn, though, Baffert is getting a whiff of some sour oats from other trainers. The notion is that he "bought" the Derby for nearly $1 million, using his Middle Eastern ATM to pry War Emblem loose from a struggling Chicago businessman, since Reineman's company, Crown Steel Sales, was losing money. This, in a sport...
...horses like War Emblem. The horse did well enough so that over the winter Reineman reportedly tried to dump him for $300,000 but again found no takers. Then War Emblem won the Illinois Derby, and with the Kentucky Derby approaching, notes then trainer Bob Springer, "people get crazy." Baffert and bin Salman got crazy enough to buy 90% of War Emblem for $900,000. Reineman probably felt like a million...
...wife as "the dominant female." But you can't help feeling for the guy as he sits glued to the TV the week before Derby Day, biting his nails and yelling at the talking heads who won't shut up about white-haired golden boy Bob Baffert and his giant stallion Point Given. By the time Jorge Chavez, the 4-ft. 10-in. jockey who clawed his way up from the slums of Lima, Peru, to a seat atop Monarchos, hits the homestretch, you are rooting...