Passing the Baton

With the passing of Genuine Risk on August 19, at the very ripe old age of 31 from natural causes, the mantle of current oldest living Kentucky Derby winner has passed to Alysheba. Those of you who read this blog regularly might remember that Alysheba was the nemesis of our horse, Bet Twice, back in 1987.

Alysheba won the Derby and the Preakness; Bet Twice was second in both. And Bet Twice won the Belmont by 14 lengths. Alysheba was fourth.

An interesting article by legendary racing writer William Nack, from the Sports Illustrated "vault," sheds some light on Alysheba's uncharacteristic finish in the Belmont. "Did he [Alysheba] lose because he had a rough trip, which he did, or because he was suffering from the stresses of an enervating campaign? Or, and here we go again, was it because he ran without Lasix? Running free of Lasix in the Haskell Handicap at Monmouth Park in August, Alysheba again lost to Bet Twice by a neck. Free of it again for the Travers at Saratoga three weeks later, he finished sixth...On the juice for the Super Derby a month later, he won...On, off, off, on....How good was Alysheba? The question lingers, unanswered and unanswerable," he writes."It's wrong, flat wrong for any graded stakes race to be contested by horses running with the help of any drug..."

The article is dated January 25, 1988, twenty years ago and the practice still persists. Worse, Nack's prediction then that "permissiveness in the use of medication may corrupt the breed itself," has come to pass. "There are a lot of horses going to stud today who would never have made it to the racetrack without drugs. Drugs may interrupt this natural process of ferreting out the good from the bad and one wonders what the effect of this will be on the thoroughbred breed in years to come."

Look no farther than Big Brown's feet for your answer. It is even more curious to note that one of the leading proponents of limiting drugs in racing before this year's congressional hearing on the subject was Jack Van Berg, Alysheba's trainer. "It's drug warfare out there," he notably said. Perhaps the baton truly has been passed full circle...