now yer talkin' my old kentucky home JP! born in Looeyville i was! my dad owned thorobreds had a horse also out of Bold Ruler name Mythical Ruler. damn good horse. anyway my buddy Lenard Lusky is doing some promo and merchandising for this movie! have to ask him if he got to meet Diane Lane
i've had hots for her since she broke in as an actress. had this one my radar for DL and the racing angle.
Secretariat to me is the greatest, not that Whirlaway isn't a solid choice to be sure! still, Secretariat set the Derby and Belmont records and should have had the Preakness too but a glitch in the timing system of the day prevented him for claiming it. old school stop watches had him under the record. so give to him anyway LOL. at least till
Farma Way won the 1991
Pimlico Special in 1:52 2/5 official time. would have been a record for 'bout 18 years.
The Kentucky Derby
Despite the loss in the Wood Memorial,
Churchill Downs bettors made Secretariat the 3–2 favorite over Sham in the 1973
Kentucky Derby. Secretariat broke last but gradually moved up on the field in the backstretch, then overtook
Sham at the top of the stretch, pulling away to win the Derby by 2 1/2 lengths. Our Native finished third.
On his way to a still-standing track record (1:59 2/5), Secretariat ran each quarter-mile segment faster than the one before it. The successive quarter-mile times were 25 1/5, 24, 23 4/5, 23 2/5, and 23. This means he was still accelerating as of the final quarter-mile of the race. It was 28 years before any other horse won the Derby in less than 2 minutes (
Monarchos in 2001).
The Preakness Stakes
In the
Preakness Stakes, Secretariat broke last but then made a huge, last-to-first move on the first turn. After reaching the lead with 5 1/2 furlongs to go, he was never challenged and won by 2½ lengths, again with Sham finishing second and Our Native third.
The time of the race was controversial. The infield teletimer displayed a time of 1:55. The track's electronic timer had malfunctioned because of damage caused by members of the crowd crossing the track to reach the infield. The
Pimlico Race Course clocker, E.T. McLean Jr., announced a hand time of 1:54 2/5. However, two
Daily Racing Form clockers claimed the time was 1:53 2/5, which would have broken the track record (1:54 by
Cañonero II). Tapes of Secretariat and Cañonero II were played side by side by CBS, and Secretariat got to the finish line first on tape, though this is not a reliable method of timing a horse race. The Maryland Jockey Club, which managed the Pimlico racetrack and is responsible for maintaining Preakness records, discarded both the electronic and Daily Racing Form times and recognized 1:54 2/5 as the official time. However, the
Daily Racing Form, for the first time in history, printed its own clocking of 1:53 2/5 next to the official time in the chart of the race.
Subsequently, Tank's Prospect (1985) and Louis Quatorze (1996) have run 1:53 2/5, equaling the time attributed to Secretariat by the Daily Racing Form.
Farma Way won the 1991
Pimlico Special in 1:52 2/5, setting the current track record.
As Secretariat prepared for the
Belmont Stakes, he appeared on the covers of three national magazines:
Time Magazine,
Newsweek, and
Sports Illustrated. He had become a national celebrity.
The Belmont Stakes
Only four horses joined Secretariat for the June 9, 1973, running of the
Belmont Stakes, including
Sham, who had finished second in both the Derby and Preakness, along with three other horses thought to have little chance by the bettors: Twice A Prince, My Gallant, and Private Smiles. With so few horses in the race, and with Secretariat expected to win, no "show" bets were taken. Secretariat was sent off as a 1–10 favorite to win as a $2.20 payout on a $2 ticket and paid at 20 cents more – $2.40 – to place
[2]. Before a crowd of 67,605, Secretariat and
Sham set a fast early pace, opening ten lengths on the rest of the field. After the 6-furlong mark,
Sham began to tire, ultimately finishing last. Secretariat astonished spectators by continuing the fast pace and opening up a larger and larger margin on the field. Viewers heard the wonder in CBS Television announcer
Chic Anderson's voice as he described the horse's pace: "Secretariat is widening now! He is moving like a
tremendous machine!"
In the stretch, Secretariat opened a 1/16 mile lead on the rest of the field. At the finish, he won by 31 lengths (breaking the margin-of-victory record set by Triple Crown winner
Count Fleet, who won by 25 lengths) and ran the fastest 1½ miles on dirt in history, 2:24 flat, which broke the stakes record by more than 2 seconds. This works out to a speed of 37.5 mph for his entire performance. Secretariat's world record still stands, and in fact, no other horse has ever broken 2:25 for 1½ miles on dirt. If the
Beyer Speed Figure calculation had been developed during that time,
Andrew Beyer calculated that Secretariat would have earned a figure of 139, the highest figure he has ever assigned.
[3] Many bettors holding 5,617 winning parimutuel tickets on Secretariat never redeemed them, presumably keeping them as souvenirs (and because they paid only $2.20 on a $2 bet).
Secretariat became the ninth Triple Crown winner in history, and the first in 25 years.
how great was Secretariat? he has actually been ranked in lists of "Greatest Athletes" which is of course primariliy a
HUMAN list
Sports Illustrated named him 35th best "athlete"
Secretariat named 35th-greatest athlete
http://espn.go.com/sportscentury/athletes.html
article
http://espn.go.com/sportscentury/features/00016464.html
Secretariat The Movie
