Claiming tales ch. 3

Old Yorkville Farm continued

Old Yorkville Farm is sitting pretty as we enter May 1997. After losing Memories of Linda to the claim box, a part of the owner’s experience I really enjoyed was searching the daily claiming races to see who would be a viable claim. October Moon Stable is struggling somewhat, so we were going to be selective in our decision making for Old Yorkville.

Finally, a candidate. $18k claiming race, 6 furlong sprint at the Big A. The horse’s name: Prince Heaven. The Prince (as we lovingly referred to him thereafter) was coming off a long layoff. What interested us was that he had raced in the prior year’s Travers Stakes ! The Prince was owned and trained by Robert Perez, who had a habit of racing his horses over their head (especially in the big 3 year old events). The Prince ran with Louis Quatorze into the far turn and tired badly after that, but we thought he could be an effective sprinter.

We entered the claim. The Prince showed good early speed and finished 2nd. We won the claim and we were ecstatic. Mr Perez, however, was quite enraged that “that kid Galluscio” (our trainer Dom) had claimed his horse away from him. We all got a good chuckle out of that.

We entered The Prince in a $25k claimer at Belmont Park. He showed real good speed again, but got nailed late by Tycoon Todd, settling for 2nd. Little did we know that Tycoon Todd would be a future Old Yorkville runner.

We decided to keep The Prince at the same claiming level, and at six furlongs. On June 27th, The Prince ran in the ninth and last race on the card, six panels for $25k. Dom secured the services of Chris Antley to ride. Chris was having one of his best days, having won four of the eight races earlier on the card. Speed was king that day at Belmont, and all four of Antley’s winners led wire to wire.

In the paddock, when Antley came out to chat with us, Dom was trying to tell him that he was concerned with a couple of other speedballs in the race and wanted Chris to take The Prince back off the early pace. Antley just walked away from him, saying “yeah, right Dom” while rolling his eyes.

Chris knew what he was doing. He broke the Prince on top, and never looked back, winning wire to wire in 1:09 2/5 for the six furlongs. The winner’s photo caption reads “Chris Antley’s Fifth Winner Of The Day”, and Chris has his hand out showing 5 wins. I did learn a little something that day about jockey – trainer interactions.

Our joy was short-lived. The Prince came down with laminitis shortly thereafter, and had to be euthanized. Luckily, we had insured him for his claiming price, so it was not a total loss. This would not be the last time we had to put in an insurance claim.

The Prince’s winner’s photo hung in my office cubicle at 2 World Trade Center until it too met an unfortunate early demise in the September 11, 2001 attack. Luckily, I was able to duplicate it from my Mom’s copy.

As we all know, Chris Antley also met with an unfortunate and early death. This game can be so joyful yet so sad at the same time, though Chris’s problems may or may not have been racing related. I’ll always remember how he saved Charismatic’s life at the end of the 1999 Belmont Stakes; most of Old Yorkville Farm was in attendance that day.

Back to the daily claiming race analysis to find that next Old Yorkville success story. We finally settled on another sprinter, Knackattack (I must admit I thought it was a cool name). Knackattack was another late runner like Memories of Linda. The Saratoga meet was coming up and Dom would be taking Knackattack along. Old Yorkville was hopeful for a winner at Saratoga, which would be quite a coup for us humble owners. Knackattack was entered in a six furlong, $35k claimer. Pat Day was in town to ride in other races, and Dom was able to secure him for the ride. Pat said he liked the horse, but finished out of the money. When he came back after the race, Pat was more than gracious and said maybe he could ride Knackattack again at Belmont if things worked out.

On Sept 20 at Belmont in the opening race, a six furlong $35k claimer, we lucked out again. Pat was in town to ride in the feature, and once again Dom had secured his services. This time, Day came flying up the fence to get the win. Afterwards, he said “see sometimes things do work out for the best”. It would be the last time Pat Day rode for Old Yorkville Farm. Love To Gamble was an also-ran in this race; he got off to a bad start and finished 10th; he would become our next claim after we would lose Knackattack to the claim box in his next race.

Love To Gamble failed to run well for us, and we lost him to a claim for less than we had paid for him.

This pretty much closes out 1997 for Old Yorkville Farm – lots of highs, some lows but an exciting year to say the least. I’m going to pause here in the Old Yorkville Farm story, so until the next chapter, happy racing amd may all your entries be winning ones.

If you missed my prior articles, they can be found at the following links:

Chapter 1

Chapter 2