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[1] This article appeared in the November 2011 issue of Louisville Magazine [3]. To subscribe, please visit loumag.com [4].
Last November a six-year-old mare named Zenyatta brought her 19-0 record into the Breeders' Cup Classic. The horse—who will be the focus of a Nov. 4 event kicking off this year's Breeders' Cup at Churchill Downs—captivated crowds, especially during race 20 an the most breathtaking finish of all.
Jerry Moss, Zenyatta’s owner: “After she’d won her 19th in a row, then came 60 Minutes and Sports Illustrated and W magazine and Oprah. Everybody started to realize this was something different.”
Mike Smith, Zenyatta’s jockey: “The Breeders’ Cup Classic was going to be the last time she ran. Yeah, of course I was nervous. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t. It was a whole lot of pressure.”
Joe Drape, New York Times turf writer: “She had beaten the boys in the Classic the year before in California at Santa Anita, the first female to do so. It was a very focused drama. It was: Could she win and retire undefeated?”
Randy Moss, NBC, ESPN and Versus horse racing analyst: “You had a greater percentage of the crowd rooting for one horse than you’ve ever had in the Classic and maybe have ever had, period.”
Mike Battaglia, Churchill Downs line maker: “When I made her the favorite I knew everybody in America was going to be rooting for her.”
Trevor Denman, Breeders’ Cup track announcer: “I didn’t get eight hours of straight sleep the night before. I woke up at one o’clock, then three o’clock. Zenyatta was interrupting my sleep.”
Seth Hancock, Claiborne Farm president, Blame’s co-owner and co-breeder: “I’m as big a fan of Zenyatta as everybody is, what the heck? But there were a few people who’d bet their money on Blame, and this farm had bet its reputation on him. Hell, we were hopeful that we’d run well and maybe even win.”
Al Stall Jr., Blame’s trainer: “You’ve got the best male in America against the best female in America. What more could you ask for?”
Drape: “You knew it was a once-in-a-lifetime occurrence. It was magical, probably the greatest experience I’ve ever had as a sportswriter. Honestly, I can still tear up thinking about it.”
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John Shirreffs, Zenyatta’s trainer: “We got into Louisville a few days before the Classic. My wife Dottie spotted the horse plane parked, ready to unload the horses. We were in Jerry Moss’ plane taxiing down the runway, and Ann Moss, Jerry’s wife, started telling the pilot, ‘Stop! There she is!’ So the pilot stopped the plane, and Ann and Dottie got off and ran across the tarmac to see Zenyatta.”
Steve Hargrave, Churchill Downs stall manager: “When Zenyatta flew in, the atmosphere changed. We went to the airport, and she had an escort from the Jefferson County sheriff’s department to the racetrack.”
John Asher, Churchill Downs vice president of racing communications: “A police escort from the airport to Churchill Downs doesn’t happen very often.”
Hargrave: “When we came down Southern Parkway there were people with signs lining the roadsides. I think they had helicopters following us. It was like the Beatles had come to town.”
Stall Jr.: “We had one Jefferson County sheriff at our barn. I think Zenyatta had three or four, maybe five.”
Hargrave: “When she got to the barn, there must have been 200 people taking pictures.”
Dottie Ingordo-Shirreffs, Jerry Moss’ racing manager: “On Longfield Avenue, a guy would jump out of his car and take a picture of Zenyatta through the fence, and then about a half hour later he’d be back with his entire family. The police had to come a couple times and tell people to move along.”
Asher: “The entourage as she walked from the barn to the track every morning certainly ranked with the largest I’ve seen at Derby time.”
Hargrave: “I was a kid for Secretariat but can’t imagine there was more fanfare even then.”
Steve Willard, Zenyatta’s exercise rider: “I rode her once two days before and once the day before. It was cold out and she was feeling good. She was what we call ‘full of piss and vinegar.’ I had my hands full.”
Garrett Gomez, Blame’s jockey: “Actually, I was worried about my shoulder because I fell off a horse on Thursday. Friday I got through the day, but it was bothering me really bad. Five o’clock Saturday morning, I called my agent and said I was having shoulder problems. We called in a prescription for some pain medication. I took that and my main concern was just trying to make it though the day. I wanted to make sure I was capable enough to help Blame and not hurt his chances.”
Stall Jr.: “We actually took Blame to the racetrack the day of the Classic to do a little jogging. Everything with Blame was pretty straightforward. He always did everything right. When I saw that he’d eaten all of his feed from the night before, I knew he was ready.”
David Ingordo, Zenyatta's Bloodstock agent: “The day of the race Zenyatta looked like a statue, not a hair out of place.”
Denman: “John Shirreffs had her in absolutely impeccable condition. Her coat looked exceptional — no sweat at all, really dry skin. I was very confident; I thought, ‘She’s going to win today.’”
Asher: “Zenyatta had actually come to Churchill the year before to run a race on Derby weekend, and they elected not to run her because the track conditions weren’t great. My lasting memory of her was from that visit. Here was this monstrous and imposing horse that handled herself like a 10-year-old at dance recital. I was in the paddock when she was in there schooling one day, and she was standing in the stall and raised her head up so high. I thought, ‘It’s the Loch Ness Monster.’”
Stall Jr.: “I was there basically all day because I had a horse in an earlier race. Everywhere I turned, whenever I walked through the crowd, it was Zenyatta this, Zenyatta that. Posters, hats, shirts. Lots of women, especially.”
Ingordo-Shirreffs: “I think a lot of women were looking for a sport to get behind. And they found her.”
Randy Moss: “People were underestimating the differences between racing on synthetic surfaces — which she had done in California for virtually her entire career — and racing on dirt. As a rule, the pace in dirt races is much faster than the pace in synthetic races. And she was a horse who liked to drop back.”
Hancock: “Blame had three winning races at Churchill, and we knew he liked the track. Taking it one step further, he’d even won there at night.”
Willard: “Closer to race time, Zenyatta got on edge, moved around the stall a little bit more. She was sort of venting, letting some tension free.”
Shirreffs: “I just focused on the thing I had to do next — the small steps. There’s a certain comfort in hanging around the barn.”
Stall Jr.: “I saw John Shirreffs the morning of the race when Zenyatta was out on the track. He was away from this huge crowd, and I just happened to be standing right there. I reached over and said good luck, and he said good luck to me. We shook hands, and that was it.”
Ingordo-Shirreffs: “There was only one time through all of this that John ever, ever, ever showed signs of being nervous. It was about midnight, and he was leaving to go to the track to get Zenyatta on the van to go to the airplane. We have a little procedure here in California. Every morning when (Shirreffs) leaves for the barn, Sophie the dog and I walk him to the door. At that moment he looked at me and went, ‘Whew.’ I said to him, ‘Oh, John.’ And he said, ‘Well, dear, this doesn’t come without a little bit of pressure.’”
*****
Mike Penna, Horse Racing Radio Network owner: “We were in the radio booth, right on the finish line above the press box. People were lined up on both sides of the gap where the horses were going to come onto the track from the barn area. They had to be 200 or 300 people deep. As she was coming through you could tell it was her because it was starting to get dark and you could see the flashbulbs popping.”
Denman: “This was like a boxing match. There might have been world champions in the pre-fight lower divisions, but all of a sudden, here was Muhammad Ali stepping into the ring.”
Drape: “Everyone had butterflies; I had butterflies, and I’ve seen a gazillion races.”
Jerry Moss: “This was much more pressurized in every way. There were cameras on us. My wife and I do not seek publicity. We enjoy our privacy, certainly. We were aware that there were always cameras on us from afar — from TVG or HRTV, the usual racing channels. But even for the Breeders’ Cup Classic at Santa Anita, I don’t believe there were cameras directly in front of us.”
Stall Jr.: “I had more nerves than usual, just knowing it wasn’t your ordinary day at the races — Zenyatta, a $5 million purse. When it got dark, that made it dramatic.”
Randy Moss: “Out of almost 30 handicappers in the Daily Racing Form — which is America’s horseracing bible — the vast majority of them picked against Zenyatta. I said, ‘Let’s not get carried away and think that this is a lay-up for her, because she is in for the most challenging race of her life.’”
Dora Delgado, Breeders’ Cup senior vice president of racing and nominations: “By the time the Classic rolled around, it was actually the first time in Breeders’ Cup history that we’ve closed the paddock and wouldn’t let anybody else in. It had reached maximum capacity.”
Stall Jr.: “I noticed the swollen crowd. When I gave Garrett Gomez a leg up on Blame, I was trying to find a place to go. I literally had nowhere to go because people were standing on every square inch of that paddock. I muscled my way in front of some media.”
Delgado: “We brought in pretty much all of the Jefferson County sheriffs we could, anybody that we could get to line the paddock path to keep people from following Zenyatta out to the track. She was like a rock star with groupies.”
Shirreffs: “As a way of expressing herself, she learned to really reach forward with her front legs and walk. That was her dance.”
Willard: “That’s when you knew she was geared up.”
Stall Jr.: “Blame was so cool and calm. We just saddled him up, and he just stood there. With Zenyatta, they were shushing everybody.”
Asher: “I remember Mike Smith coming out of the paddock and urging people to clear back.”
Jerry Moss: “Normal horses — the other horses in the Classic — none of them had to put up with that.”
Asher: “It was an electric moment when she hit the track. A rose-colored sky was the backdrop. The lights were on, and the stands were full. All the cameras were going off and it looked like the grandstand was glittering.”
Stall Jr.: “Blame was so relaxed going into the gate. Halfway asleep, just the way he always was.”
Randy Moss: “You could see her going to the starting gate doing her little prance, which as far as I was concerned was actually a bit disconcerting. When people saw Zenyatta doing her little dance, they immediately ascribed human characteristics to a horse, and they said, ‘She’s showing off for the crowd.’ There may have been a little bit of that, but most of it was nervousness.”
Denman: “I had to stop myself a few times to take a few breaths. I didn’t want to get too excited too early.”
*****
Smith: “For whatever reason, she fumbled along those first few jumps out of the gate, kind of lost her footing. It was so dark and the lights were flashing everywhere. She was just distracted for a moment or two.”
Willard: “She was about 25 lengths out of it. I was concerned, but I’d seen her pretty far back before.”
Jerry Moss: “She was starting to get very, very, very far back. Even for her, this was a lot to contend with.”
Randy Moss: “She probably dropped a little farther behind than she would have ordinarily because when the dirt started hitting her in the face — having not been accustomed to that — it was more stinging and a lot harsher than what she was used to.”
Shirreffs: “The big thing for me was, I wanted to see her get into her rhythm. Whenever she established a nice rhythm and got into her stride, usually good things happened. It took her a little bit longer than usual.”
Delgado: “I actually called the vets on the radio and said, ‘Tell me there’s nothing wrong with her.’ They said, ‘Nope, she’s just trailing the field.’”
Hancock: “It looked like the Red Sea parting when they broke from the gate. The horse on the inside of Blame broke in and the horse on the outside of him broke out. I mean, there wasn’t a horse within two or three yards of him on either side.”
Gomez: “The pressure never came from either side of me. It was like, ‘Alright, cool.’”
Stall Jr.: “Down the front side for the first time, Haynesfield, who was to Blame’s inside, started running to the front. We just slid right over and took his spot, and we had a perfect position as we hit the wire for the first time — off the pace, on the rail, saving ground.”
Shirreffs: “In that race the horses were broken up into two groups, and she was behind the second. At that point, I don’t know if the rider knows that there’s three or four lengths between the first and second group.”
Smith: “I was so far back that I couldn’t see anything, really.”
Ingordo: “Around the first turn I thought, ‘Well, we’ve come this far, and that’s the end of it.’”
Gomez: “If you watch the race, Mike was only about five lengths behind me the whole time. The farthest he was back was under the wire the first time.”
Jerry Moss: “Fortunately, the race was a mile and a quarter, and she had a chance to finally get used to it.”
Denman: “I use binoculars. You always watch a jockey’s wrists. When you want to pick a horse up, you grab a hold of those reins. The reins to a racehorse are like the accelerator to a car. Mike started putting his foot down on the accelerator just a wee bit in the first turn.”
Smith: “You try to make it up but you don’t want to make it all up at once because you’d wind up not having anything left for the finish.”
Gomez: “I didn’t want to make this early run, didn’t want to flatten out too early and have Zenyatta come running by us. I was doing a lot of timing in my head, believe it or not.”
Denman: “Mike didn’t put his foot flat on the accelerator until they got to the top of the back stretch.”
Ingordo: “Most horses have a run in them that lasts a quarter mile, an eighth of a mile. That’s what most horses do: They wait and wait and they explode for a quarter mile. Well, Zenyatta did it for three-quarters of a mile or seven-eighths of a mile. When Mike started moving her, she made a sustained run and got faster and faster.”
Hancock: “We were hopeful Blame could stand her off because we knew she’d be coming. Hell, she always was.”
Gomez: “We went into the far turn and Lookin at Lucky was probably five wide and started to make a run. Instead of going with him, I felt like I could drop in and cut the corner without asking my horse to run and still stay at almost the exact same spot with Lookin at Lucky. All the sudden, when I cut the corner, it was weird because Blame jumped up into the bridle and knew it was race time. Before I knew it I was even with Lookin at Lucky again, and the first thing in my mind was, ‘Don’t forget about her.’”
Denman: “Blame got the perfect trip. I’m using a little poetic license, but Garrett Gomez’s boots were touching the horses next to him, which means there was exactly enough room. If either of those horses on either side of him had moved over one foot, he would have been stuck. But the gap was perfect, and he exploded through it.”
Drape: “When Zenyatta sailed into that far turn, Mike went inside, which he normally doesn’t do. I saw him go inside and knew he was doing everything he could to make up ground.”
Smith: “I knew I was going to have to cut the corner. And I was just going to hope I could find a way out of the pack. But I certainly couldn’t go around the whole field after being 20 lengths behind. Quality Road was backing up so fast that I really had to maneuver around him, which slowed me down a bit. If I could have gotten a straight shot it certainly would have helped. When I finally did get clear, I made my big kick.”
Stall Jr.: “Blame struck the front between the three-sixteenths and the eighth pole. Then I saw Zenyatta coming on the outside, and it’s a blur from there.”
Asher: “She was just gobbling up track with each of those incredibly long strides.”
Hancock: “You could be blind and know she was making her surge because you could hear the crowd. If there were 70,000 people there, 65,000 of them were pulling for her.”
Drape: “She looked really agile when she popped out. I’m listening to Trevor Denman, and he’s shouting, ‘Zenyatta! Zenyatta! Zenyatta!’ And I’m saying to myself — and even a little bit out loud — ‘She’s gonna get there! She’s gonna get there! She’s gonna get there!’”
Jay Hovdey, Daily Racing Form executive columnist: “People were standing on their chairs. And on each other’s shoulders.”
Delgado: “I was watching from the winner’s circle, watching her catch up inch by inch by inch.”
Willard: “I lost my voice every time she ran and that’s how it was that day.”
Jerry Moss: “I was holding my breath.”
Gomez: “I rode Blame hard enough where I was trying to let him go ahead and run, but at the same time, I felt like I left a little bit of extra gas in the tank so when she came, he could fight her off.”
Hovdey: “You see her making her move — you know that it’s gotten there 19 times before — and there’s no reason on Earth to think it won’t happen again.”
Gomez: “If you watch the last sixteenth of a mile, I angled out toward her and let Blame feel the heat from her. He pinned his ears and he was not going to let her go by.”
Smith: “I was riding my heart out, riding for all I’m worth.”
Shirreffs: “She was coming and coming — just coming!”
Drape: “And then — boom! — the wire comes up, and there was no doubt she missed.”
Asher: “When the replay went up on the screen, people realized that unless some miracle occurred, there was no way she got there.”
Smith: “I needed Blame to fold just a little bit, but he dug in as hard as he could and held me off.”
Hancock: “He was always a horse that would fight like hell, and once again, he did. I got a picture of the finish here in my office that shows Blame beat her by the scantest of noses.”
Asher: “The wind came out of that crowd.”
Drape: “The press box was as still as could be.”
Denman: “I was almost dazed. It’s the most emotionally drained I’ve been after calling a race.”
Ingordo-Shirreffs: “I turned to the Mosses and said, ‘I think she got beat.’”
Jerry Moss: “Ann and I were shocked. It was just sitting there realizing that you’d lost the race. Simple as that.”
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Mario Espinoza, Zenyatta’s groom: “She was confused because she’s always supposed to go to the winner’s circle. I was trying to walk her back to the testing barn, and she didn’t want to come. She was pulling me toward the winner’s circle.”
Jerry Moss: “The moment after the race, the camera’s in your face: ‘What do you think?’ My wife’s sentiments were, ‘I wish she’d have stuck out her tongue,’ because she’s practical and thought Zenyatta’s tongue might have gotten to the wire first.”
Shirreffs: “It was an emotional time for us. It was her first defeat. But there was also a lot of pride. It was an amazing performance.”
Drape: “Mike Smith at the press conference — you don’t really see athletes cry so much. He was in tears mainly because he thought he had failed her.”
Smith: “We had our own little secret bond. I don’t know what I was more emotional about: getting beat or knowing that this was it, that I’d never have the chance to ride her again.”
Hancock: “It was pretty strange because normally when a horse comes back after winning a big and exciting race like that, everybody gives him a little round of applause. They weren’t booing, but there weren’t many people clapping for Blame.”
Stall Jr.: “I saw that Garrett was raising his arms, like a football player trying to get the crowd excited.”
Gomez: “Blame was the forgotten-about guy who won the Breeders’ Cup Classic.”
Willard: “Another jump or two, she would have won it. But it wasn’t to be.”
Stall Jr.: “I studied the replay. Mike Smith had a clear shot. He hit Zenyatta either 21 or 23 times with a whip. That tells me he had plenty of track in front of him if he had enough time to do that, right? And I think Garrett hit Blame three or four times.”
Smith: “No idea how many times I used my whip. I don’t watch the race anymore so I couldn’t even tell you.”
Hancock: “She never did catch him, during the race or galloping out. I think if they’d have gone around again he would have beat her.”
Shirreffs: “We all went our separate ways after seeing her back at the barn. Dottie and I had a quiet dinner and went back to the hotel and went about life the next day.”
Smith: “Even in defeat, I think she proved to everyone how great she really is. To make up 20-some-odd lengths against those types of horses is beyond incredible.”
Randy Moss: “The irony of the situation was that she lost one race in her life and in my opinion that was the best race she ever ran.”
Stall Jr.: “I guess in a perfect world for almost everybody, Zenyatta would have nailed Blame by a couple of inches and that would have been the perfect fairytale. But this isn’t Disneyland.”
*****
Asher: “My favorite memory was the next morning, Sunday. It was the most extraordinary thing I’ve seen at a racetrack. I walked my daughter’s friend back to Zenyatta’s barn, and as I turned the corner toward the grazing area along Longfield Avenue, I saw this huge throng down by a tree. There was a half-circle of people on the grass on the inside of the fence and a half-circle of people on the other side of the fence, the folks who had gotten out of their cars on Longfield. And there was Zenyatta in the middle of it.”
Willard: “They all knew that this was her swan song.”
Ingordo-Shirreffs: “People were passing flowers over the fence.”
Jerry Moss: “Somebody gave her a cake and she ate it.”
Shirreffs: “She used to get a cold Guinness two times a day, so we made sure she had that.”
Ingordo-Shirreffs: “It was like a big Santa Claus line of people wanting their picture taken with Zenyatta.”
Asher: “The groom would take her over to the fence and people would stick their fingers through the openings just to get a chance to touch her.”
Shirreffs: “She’s one of the few horses I’ve ever seen that would look at people. I’ve had a lot of horses that have the look of the eagle — staring over the crowd into the distance. Zenyatta had the unique ability to look right at people. I was really struck by how she would make eye contact.”
Asher: “I remember they took her in to give her a little break, and the crowd broke into applause. And the second they started clapping, she started doing that little dance. She thought it was race time again.”
Photo: Courtesy Zenyatta