Photo from Google Images
There may never be another big red like Secretariat or an owner like Penny Chenery in the sport of horse racing. But, horse races are all about excitement and this sport needs a Triple Crown winner.
“I’m truly hoping there will be another Triple Crown winner,” Chenery told FOXSports.com by phone from her Colorado home last week, adding that she hasn’t been this excited about a horse since Barbaro, who won the 2006 Kentucky Derby before being tragically injured in the Preakness. “It’s good for racing, it gets everybody excited, and it’s such a feel-good moment. And the owners of California Chrome seem to be people who I would enjoy celebrating with. I’m all for it, and I hope it happens.”
Chenery is not the only one who knows this sport and believes that California Chrome is the horse to end the sports 36-year drought of having a Triple Crown winner. Triple Crown winners are in an exclusive club with only 11 members. There hasn’t been a Triple Crown winner in my lifetime!
In 1978, Affirmed was the last horse to win the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness, and the Belmont Stakes. Since 1978, there have been 12 horses who have won the Derby and the Preakness, but have fallen short on the longest track, the 1 ½ mile Belmont. In 2008 Big Brown just stopped and in 2013 I’ll Have Another was scratched the day before the Belmont.
While California Chrome has the racing world on his side, stats are not. Eight of the 11 horses that have won the Triple Crown were born in Kentucky. Virginia, Texas and Florida also have a Triple Crown winner. No California born horse has won. California Chrome’s trainer, a 77-year-old guy who calls his business Dumb-Ass Partners, Art Sherman is also a fan favorite- mostly because DAP just makes you laugh.
California Chrome also catches your attention with the nasal strip across his nose. He wears it for the same reason that humans would wear a breathing strip. After the Preakness, New York quickly changed their rule to allow all horses to race with nasal strips. And his personality is similar to Secretariat in that he loves a crowd and attention. A horse that ‘poses’ for pictures by sticking out his tongue; is a horse that I want to root for.
What really makes me laugh is that California Chrome has signed an undisclosed deal with Skechers. I know Skechers as a shoe company for children. I guess they are really trying to be a marketing company with this sponsorship deal. Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t believe that many children will be watching the Belmont. The median age of horse racing viewers are 50-60 years old. What grown adult is wearing Skechers? (No offense if you wear Skechers, I just prefer heels.)
Also haunting California Chrome is what racing insiders call his ‘modest pedigree’ with no Kentucky blueblood. His pedigree makes him an underdog. His father is Lucky Pulpit, who was the son of the son of the 1992 Belmont winner, A.P. Indy. “Once in a while, there’s a gene that passes through a horse that (makes him) extra special,” says Art Sherman.
Sherman also said if California Chrome wins the Triple Crown he will be worth $30 million. While other racing insiders project his worth to be is closer to $15-$20 million. That price tag is still a dream come true for co-owners, Steve Coburn and Perry Martin, who paid $8K for the mare (female) and another $2,500 for the stallion (male) to breed California Chrome. (Top pedigree stallions can cost between $75-$100,000.00)
California Chrome was born on February 18th, the same birth date of Coburn’s late sister, Brenda, who passed away from cancer at the age of 36. Three weeks before California Chrome was born, Coburn said he saw him in a dream and knew he would be special. With the irony of not having a Triple Crown winner in 36 years, Coburn believes that Brenda is California Chrome’s guardian angel and will welcome California Chrome to the exclusive club and the first Triple Crown winner to be born in California.