‘Er… no, I’m not. It may be a new strain. We will all have to wait for the results of blood tests.’
He didn’t exactly exude confidence, but he changed direction by then naming the scratched horses and, as Norman had indicated, they were three of the four most favoured for the win.
Was it just the way my mind worked, or was that rather convenient for the fourth?
Life in the backside returned to normality, if that was the right term for the excitement generated by Derby Day morning at Churchill Downs.
The remaining seventeen Derby hopefuls were trotted up in turn in front of the state senior veterinary officer for him to decide whether each animal was sound and also, in the light of what had occurred earlier, for them to have their temperatures checked. Fortunately, after a thorough inspection, all were declared well and fit to race.
After the medical examination each was then presented to the press in what can only be described as a beauty pageant for horse and owner.
Occasionally, in England, especially at the Cheltenham Festival, connections of a particular horse might wear a necktie in similar shades as their racing silks, or perhaps a knitted scarf in comparable tones — nothing too ostentatious, you understand.
There was clearly no such restraint in Kentucky.
One of the Derby owners was decked out in a three-piece suit cut from cloth boldly printed with his green-and-yellow racing colours, complete with matching tie, baseball cap and even coordinating green-and-yellow-striped shoes. The poor horse looked positively embarrassed to be standing next to him for the photographs. But there was more. The owner’s wife and family were similarly attired in green and yellow and, in case you couldn’t work it out, each of them wore a huge button badge with the name of their horse printed large across it.
And the man was as brash as his outfit, telling all the assembled press that his baby was a certainty to trot up and collect the trophy. None of them really believed him as the horse in question was one of the rank outsiders, but that didn’t seem to dampen the owner’s enthusiasm.
Meanwhile, away from the limelight of the press parade, I watched behind the media tent as another owner, inconsolable in his grief, was trying to come to terms with the fact that his prized Thoroughbred star, strongly tipped to be a Triple Crown winner, would now not even get to the starting gate of the first leg.
It is not generally polite to stand and watch a grown man cry, but I felt sorry for him. Only a handful of racehorse owners ever have the privilege of owning a potential champion and this man’s dream of glory had been snatched away by a virus so small he would need an electron microscope to see it.
And there would be no coming back next year to have another go. The Kentucky Derby, like all the ‘classic’ races, was for three-year-old horses only. This might have been the unfortunate man’s only chance in life of owning a Derby runner, let alone the favourite — no wonder he was in tears.
Horseracing history is full of heartbreaking ‘if only’ stories and this one, like all the others, would quickly be forgotten by everyone except those whose lives it touched most closely. The victor that afternoon would be hailed as the conqueror of all and, in future years, no one would ever mention the three who failed to line up at the start.
Such was life.
But for this moment, it was almost too much for the desolate owner to bear and he sobbed openly. Fortunately for him, all the TV crews and photographers were busy snapping the fancy suit and striped shoes around the other side of the tent.
At ten o’clock the focus of attention for some switched from the backside barns to the racetrack proper.
The Derby was far from being the only race of the day. In fact, there were twelve additional contests scheduled, ten before and two after, and, for the owners, trainers and jockeys, the support races were clearly worth winning too. In addition to the Grade 1 Derby itself, there were three Grade 2 stakes, plus two other Grade 1s, each with purses in excess of half a million dollars.
But for the enormous crowd already teeming into the public enclosures there was only one race that mattered, the one due off at precisely twenty-six minutes to seven in the evening. Everything about the day was building up to the moment when the starting gates would swing open and the ‘most exciting two minutes in sport’ would begin.
Fortunately, there was still plenty of time for eating and drinking before then, especially drinking, with the sickly sweet mint juleps on sale in special commemorative glasses from the moment the entrances opened at eight am.
Frank and I tried to get another breakfast at Wagner’s but decided the line was too long, stretching out the front and right round the corner of the street, so we found a drive-thru burger outlet and sat in the Suburban munching our way through English muffins filled with bacon and eggs.
‘No grits today, then?’ I said with my mouth full.
‘We’re not far enough south. They have it at home in Alabama.’
‘McGrits?’ I said, laughing at my own joke.
Frank didn’t think it funny in the slightest.
13
As Frank had suspected, our movement throughout the grandstands was much restricted compared to the previous day. Indeed, I was lucky to be able to get in at all as I didn’t have a magic badge and a simple ‘I’m with him’ didn’t seem to work with the gateman today.
‘No ticket, no entry,’ he kept repeating.
Fortunately, Frank was able to rustle up Norman Gibson on his mobile phone, and he soon arrived, together with the racetrack head of security. Eventually the gateman relented and allowed me through, but he clearly didn’t like it. Perhaps he thought I looked a bit shady, and he was probably right. I hadn’t had a shave for four days, not since I’d decided to go undercover as a groom, and I was already sporting some substantial stubble.
If I thought that the Gold Cup at Cheltenham or the Grand National at Aintree were jam-packed, it was nothing in comparison to Churchill Downs on Kentucky Derby Day.
At least at Cheltenham and Aintree it was just about possible to move from the grandstands to see the horses in the paddock and then get back to the stands to watch the race. Here, it was virtually impossible.
Several hundred of those with general admission tickets had no intention of ever seeing the race itself. They had arrived early to bag a preferred spot on the paddock rail from where they would not budge, couples taking turns to elbow their way to the restrooms and the beverage outlets, so as not to lose their place. In the grandstand boxes, suites and glass-fronted restaurants, meanwhile, the patrons wore their tamper-proof, colour-coded wristbands with pride and tended to stay where they were between races, venturing only as far as the nearest bar or betting window.
As the afternoon progressed, the excitement built, with rock bands playing in the infield and a string of A-list celebrities swaggering along the red carpet. At two o’clock, the Vice President arrived in a bulletproof limousine with much fanfare and the playing of the ‘Star-Spangled Banner’.
There was some general dismay among the crowd that three of the best horses had been scratched from the race but it didn’t seem to diminish people’s enjoyment unduly.
Frank and the other FACSA special agents were assigned to assist with enhanced security measures for the Derby horses, so I made my way through the grandstands to find somewhere to watch the racing. That sounds easier than it actually was because, unlike on British racecourses, there was no standing concourse at the front. Rather, the ticketed seating went right down to the running rail.
I managed to talk myself past another gateman and into a spot in front of a temporary grandstand on the clubhouse turn, but it lacked any shade and, boy, it was getting hot, with the sun baking down from a cloudless sky. I began to wish I had one of the straw hats that were clearly popular all around me.