Claiming Their Triple Crown

Steve Cauthen and Affirmed win the Belmont and the title

They did it. The kid and the colt, Steve Cauthen and Affirmed, became the eleventh winners of the Triple Crown of American Thoroughbred racing last Saturday by taking one of the most thrilling races in the history of the sport. They measured up to the demanding 1 1/2-mile Belmont Stakes--"test of the champions" --and moved into the most select circle of racing royalty. Affirmed's honor was made grander still by the rousing challenge of his gallant rival, Alydar, who shadowed Harbor View Farm's chestnut in lockstep around the graceful, sweeping turns and down the long, open straightaways of New York's Belmont Park. At the wire, Affirmed won this race of matchless drama by a head.

The five-horse field got away cleanly, Cauthen steering Affirmed into an immediate, if slow-paced lead. Alydar's trainer, John Veitch, had feared a repeat of Affirmed's easy gallop on the lead at the Preakness and planned to up the pace if Cauthen tried to lope off with the race once more. Said Veitch: "Alydar will be Affirmed's shadow."

And so he was. On the second turn, with slightly less than a mile to run, Jockey Jorge Velasquez moved Alydar up on the outside and parked his big, handsome colt on Affirmed's right shoulder. Down the long backstretch the two colts ran stride for stride, coats glistening in the big move to the finish. The field was already left far behind. Affirmed and Alydar flew out of the final turn and into the home stretch, driving for the wire, joined in desperate struggle. With 3/16 of a mile to go, Alydar pushed in front by a nose, but Affirmed, running now on heart, reclaimed the lead with 20 yds. left. They thundered home, two great colts running in splendor. When it was over, Steve Cauthen put the dimensions of their duel with eloquent simplicity: "This was a horse race."

By winning the Belmont, Affirmed added $110,580 to his purses, raising his total winnings to $1,133,807. He is the youngest millionaire in racing history. His victory came a year and a day after Seattle Slew won his crown. The two colts are the first back-to-back Triple Crown winners in racing history, and, with Secretariat (1973), the second and third in six seasons. The remarkable conjunction marks a halcyon period for the three-year-olds' classics. Eleven years passed between the first winner, Sir Barton (1919). and Gallant Fox (1930); a full quarter-century separated the triumphs of Citation (1948) and Secretariat.

The odds on a colt's matching the demands of the Triple Crown are long enough to fire larceny in a bettor's soul and break a breeder's heart. Almost 30,000 Thoroughbreds are foaled annually on North American farms, but only about 3% ever win a stakes race, much less one of the Triple Crown races. Breeding Thoroughbreds is far from an exact science. Says Brownell Combs II, the manager of Spendthrift Farms, regularly one of the tops in the sport: "You breed the best mare you can possibly get to the best stallion you can possibly get and then you hope for the best." And Combs adds: "Breeding Thoroughbreds is like rolling dice."

The grind of training and racing takes a further toll. The Triple Crown is contested on three different tracks at three different distances during a five-week period. The strain on the horses is enormous. Says Trainer T.J. Kelly: "Sure, every horse is bred to be a champion. But it's like they say, 'Many are called, but few are chosen.' There's a lot that can happen to a horse, and even the best can't run if he's injured."

Great horses have run brilliantly, only to have bad racing luck ruin their claims to the crown. The most notable: Native Dancer, whose single loss in 22 races came in the 1953 Kentucky Derby. The galvanic gray colt, the first racehorse TV celebrity, was bumped on the clubhouse turn at Churchill Downs and then had his running room blocked as the field came into the final stretch. He was beaten by a neck. In other years, outstanding colts have killed off one another's hopes. Swaps won the Derby in 1955, but Nashua took the Preakness and the Belmont. Two years later, Iron Liege, Bold Ruler and Gallant Man each won a leg of the Crown. Sham ran the 1973 Derby in a time that was the second-fastest ever clocked in the event--only to lose by 2% lengths to Secretariat, the record setter.

And some truly remarkable horses never had a shot at the title. Man o' War was not entered in the Derby (Triple Crown fever did not grip the horse world in 1920), although he did win both the Preakness and Belmont stakes. Kelso, slow to develop, did not run in the trio of races in 1960, but he matured magnificently as the season went on and was named Horse of the Year after his victories in the fall. He was to win that title four more times.

Affirmed's achievement is all the more remarkable because of the relentless opposition of Alydar. Not since the great rivalry between Swaps and Nashua have two such outstanding colts competed head to head so spectacularly. Their struggle began in June 1977, when the two-year-olds met over 5 1/2-furlongs at Belmont. Affirmed won. Three weeks later Alydar came home in front. When their owners brought them to the showdown last weekend, the two colts had chased one another for a year in eight races at five tracks scattered across three states. Affirmed had won six of the eight, but the margin between the two was incredibly thin. After 7 9/16 miles of racing, Affirmed led Alydar by a total of three lengths--just 3/5 of a second of furious running. Affirmed's lead in the Belmont was the briefest flicker of a second. Close, but enough. With Steve Cauthen urging him on last weekend, Affirmed showed again that he was a champion that deserved the Triple Crown--a young horse and a young rider winning glory together in the spring of 1978.

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