Word: colts
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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What do you give the monarch who has everything? Knowing Queen Elizabeth II's fondness for horseflesh, Australians decided to commemorate her silver jubilee three years ago with a Thoroughbred. A champion sire was bred to six mares. Of four foals resulting, one was a colt (the Queen preferred a filly), another was injured. The remaining pair were recently matched in a speed trial. Last week, visiting Canberra, the Queen paused to accept the winner. "A wonderful present," said Elizabeth, who dubbed the two-year-old bay Australia Fair...
Last season's top two-year-old, Rockhill Native, entered the 1980 season as the whiter book favorite, but when it came time for winter racing, he could not match his illustrious predecessors. Rockhill Native campaigned in Florida, at times giving a good imitation of a colt slogging through the swamps, not tuning up for the Triple Crown. Horseplayers promptly started looking for other contenders...
What they found was a series of colts whose owners could not even keep matters straight. Actor Jack Klugman gave his horse a feminine first name, apparently in hopes that Jaklin Klugman would become the first colt to win the Kentucky Derby in drag. Plugged Nickle's chances were rated highly after he won the Florida Derby at Gulfstream Park and the Wood Memorial at New York's Aqueduct Racetrack, but the odds on his owner's winning a spelling bee were not worth a plugged nickel...
...misnomer and misspelling was added missed opportunity. The top California colt, Codex, was ineligible to com pete after his trainer forgot to enter the horse's name on the Kentucky Derby nominating list. Codex had won the Hollywood Derby and beaten Affirmed's time in winning the Santa Anita Derby, so his absence weakened the field considerably. Training injuries kept other key colts from the contest. Adelphi University Mathematics Professor William Quirin ran a computer comparison of Derby entries and passed harsh judgment: "This is the second worst crop of three-year-olds to come along...
Genuine Risk's victory vindicated the controversial decision to enter her against colts, which are usually bigger and stronger than fillies; thus the 5-lb. weight allowance to even up the disparity. Colts mature more quickly too, coming into their full strength as runners months ahead of the female of the species. But exceptional fillies have proved the match of the males, at least on paper. The great Ruffian, who broke down in a 1975 match race against the colt Foolish Pleasure, clocked times significantly faster than any of the colts of her class over the same distances...