Something is glaringly missing in all the conjecture about this year's so-called Triple Crown – the energy and the engrained memories that all you “improvers of the breed” bring to the sport. When Chic Anderson up in the Belmont announce booth intoned, “they're on the turn and Secretariat is moving like a tremendous machine,” my feet felt like they came off the ground and the sweat poured out of me as a full-throated roar enveloped the race track.
Even if you weren't there but are old enough to have seen the race on television, it's a memory that must be forever etched in your psyche, Secretariat running like the wind at the end of a mile-and-a-half. My longtime CBS colleague Heywood Hale “Woodie” Broun, who was part of that broadcast team, said he saw fans waving their $2 winning tickets in the air, never intending to cash them in. “That was to be their souvenir because when you are in the presence of something marvelous, some little piece of it, like a piece of glitter, drops on you and you've got it. You've got that ticket. Part of Secretariat's glory is with you!”
That's what separates the Belmont crowd — with a Triple Crown on the line — from other major sporting events. It's a fan's race, corporate connections or a large stash of cash be damned! Connections and money may be a prerequisite to attending any Super Bowl or seventh game of the World Series. But any guy or doll with an eye on history can usually force their way into “Big Sandy” on Belmont day — just not this year.
A record 120,139 showed up in 2004 when the popular Smarty Jones lost his Triple Crown bid to Birdstone. Still, another 102,199 came in 2014 to watch West Coast heartthrob California Chrome lose to Tonalist. And 90,327 were rewarded when undefeated Justify brought home the bacon two years ago. While there won't be any spectators Saturday at the 152nd Belmont, the betting handle could be huge and that would really be something to celebrate for a Thoroughbred sport that is forever looking over its shoulder because of a lack of unity in its leadership.
When the Covid pandemic took over our lives a few months back, the usual calendar markers — birthdays, weddings, Belmonts — were snatched from us. And the Belmont took a bigger hit when it was not only placed first in the Triple Crown lineup, but also had its distance shortened to a mile-and-an-eighth. That shouldn't be too tough a get for these maturing 3-year-olds, but it will not really battle-test them. For nearly a century now the Belmont has always been the musclebound cleanup hitter. Now it's just a table setter trying to get on base.
For the record, the “test of the champion” Belmont has a storied history. It was first a “wrong way” race, run clockwise, English style until 1920. It had its beginning in Jerome Park, birthplace of modern American racing located in the Bronx, New York. Leonard Jerome, founder of the American Jockey Club had a daughter, Jennie, who gave birth to Winston Churchill. And, on a grand opening day in September of 1866, the biggest celebrity in the house was Civil War Commanding General of the Army Ulysses S Grant, soon to be President of the United States.
Turf writer Joe Palmer and his classic book, “This Was Racing”
I found those incidental facts in “This Was Racing,” selected columns by the splendid turf writer Joe H. Palmer, published in 1953. Palmer, a Kentucky-born college professor and PhD candidate who went on to grace the sports pages of the New York Herald Tribune alongside the columns of his Hall of Fame pal, the great Red Smith, had no doubt that the Preakness and even his sacred Kentucky Derby paled in comparison to the Belmont.
In his opinion, “The Belmont is a better race than either of them, and who has to tell you so? Why, a Kentuckian, probably now barred. If you doubt it, read down the list of winners and then dig into the books to see how they went into the stud and sent the great racers back.”
Palmer loved the race track too, “It hasn't the homey charm of, say, Keeneland or the intimacy of Pimlico, or the nostalgic somnolence of Saratoga — (but) Belmont lies over other metropolitan tracks like ice cream over hay and the quality of its racing is the highest in the nation.”
The Belmont has always held a sweet spot with me, ever since I began covering the Triple Crown for CBS News back in 1969 with Woodie Broun. That's the year Canadian industrialist Frank McMahon, owner of Majestic Prince, uttered the immortal words, “the Cripple Crown.”
We were interviewing McMahon on the eve of the race, where his horse was a short favorite over arch-rival Arts and Letters and rumors were rampant that Majestic Prince was not sound. The pair had been a neck apart in both the Derby and Preakness, with Arts and Letters flying at the end, but coming up a head short each time.
Frank had been out partying the night before and looked it. Woodie asked him what it was like to be on the cusp of history. He stared into the camera for what seemed like an eternity and then out came something like, “Well Woodie, the Cripple Crown …” Majestic Prince finished a game second to Arts and Letters, but came out of the race lame and never raced again.
So, maybe that's all we have this year, a “Cripple Crown” that few denizens trackside will be talking about this Belmont day due to the peculiar circumstances surrounding the race. And to all those who want to shake up the old order or to change the classic Belmont distance, beware. History is never kind to those who ignore it.
For now, let's consider the words of Joe Palmer from Kentucky, who wasn't shy back in the day in reminding the hard-bitten New York bettors that on Belmont day it's history that matters most. “On race day I want a band. I don't care if it plays 'The Sidewalks of New York' or 'Camptown Races' when the Belmont field comes out, but I want it to say something that says to the assembled multitude, 'Look chums, this isn't the ninth race. This is the Belmont!'”
E.S “Bud” Lamoreaux III is a creator and former executive producer of CBS News Sunday Morning with Charles Kuralt. He won four Eclipse Awards for national television excellence.
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