Zito delivers with Da’Tara when Big Brown fails to « Tuesday’s Horse

Big Brown fails to deliver

It is reported everywhere by sports writers, broadcasters and racing pundits that the connections have no idea what went wrong with the horse.

Well, I saw the race, quiet unexpectedly, and there are several explanations, but here is the simplest and most likely:

Big Brown came out of the gate hard. Drawn from the number 1 position on the inside he experienced a lot of crowding as the other horses raced for the rail to get a good position. Several strides in Big Brown was bumped badly, knocked off his stride and had to be snatched up. Big Brown then had to navigate quite a bit of traffic to get the position he would hold for the rest of the race, on the outside third from the raile.

With his head high in the air, Big Brown pulled hard and jockey Kent Desmoreaux seemed never to be able to settle him into a comfortable stride. Although it was not a fast run race, those extra exertions to me is where Big Brown lost the race.

Add the hot weather, longer distance and that he also may have not liked the ground, and Big Brown’s poor performance can be explained. Only because Big Brown was going for the Triple Crown and has an admitted doper for a trainer who ran Big Brown on a badly cracked hoof has it all been so highly scrutinized.

There is the factor so often overlooked. Big Brown is a living,breathing, thinking, feeling creature. What he was experiencing mentally on the day we may never know, but it does matter. The blessing is that the jockey took care of the horse, and when he realized Big Brown had nothing left in the tank, pulled him up, thereby protecting the horse from injury, and possibly much worse.

Jockey Kent J. Desormeaux reins in Big Brown during the
140th running of the Belmont Stakes horse race at Belmont Park in
Elmont, New York, June 7, 2008.

Big Brown failed in his bid to become horse racing’s 12th Triple Crown
winner when he finished in last place to the winner Da’ Tara.

REUTERS/Lucas Jackson

Big Brown finished last.

Sunday, the papers say, Big Brown was all alone except for the staff who handle and care for him.

No one knows what Big Brown’s fate is now. More racing perhaps, with a match up against Horse of the Year Curlin in the Breeder’s Cup, and then off to the breeding shed. Another big win would help plump up the price for Big Brown’s services at stud. The experts say his stallion fees began falling before he left the racecourse.

Jun 10, 2008

"I Took Care of Him"

"Something was wrong. He's the best horse I've ever ridden. I took care of him."
~ Kent Desormeaux, Big Brown's jockey after the Belmont Stakes

What did happen to Big Brown during the grueling Belmont Stakes? The simple answer is that he just "hit the wall." It's not exactly uncommon among athletes, equine or otherwise. But why and on this day of all days?

Desormeaux also said, "The track wasn't holding him up. He slipped." Thoroughbreds are are notoriously of such a temperament that something like that can throw them completely off their game - and this goes for even a relatively laid back guy like Big Brown.

Thoroughbreds are also notorious for having thin, shelly hoof walls, and Big Brown did miss some training time because of a quarter crack. Was that enough to make such a difference?

If Desormeaux had continued trying to place him, might Big Brown have had one of those catastrophic breakdowns for which fatigue is known to be a huge risk factor? Fortunately, we will never know the answer to that one, but it certainly seems well within the realm of possibility.

Have we not had a Triple Crown winner for 30 years because modern TBs are so inbred and have been bred for speed alone for so long that the lengthy Belmont Stakes, coming so soon after the Derby and Preakness, is too much for them to handle anymore? Especially considering that they really are just babies.

If so, how much has that contributed to the heartbreaking deaths of the likes of Eight Bells and Barbaro? In breeding for ever more refined (i.e. lighter) bone, have breeders past the point at which bone density and training can compensate for lack of pure size?

There have been many questions recently about track surfaces as well. Those surfaces are a part of the whole American style of racing - running faster and shorter on dirt, as opposed to slower and longer runs on turf which are much more in keeping with what horses are naturally adapted to do. Are American Thoroughbreds being bred to run faster than flesh and blood can cope with?

Honestly, I do not know. I don't pretend to know. Unfortunately, I don't think anybody else knows either. I've never followed racing much, and I certainly never watch. If I'd seen Ruffian or Barbaro or Eight Bells go down... Let's just say that those are images I don't care to have to remember. It makes me feel crappy enough as it is.

I do know however that the above questions need answers, and soon. And I haven't even mentioned the whole area of steroids - which Big Brown was getting once a month except for May - and other questionable drugs which have been in all too common use.

Personally, I wish Big Brown all the best. He's a good horse, and I hope he lives a long and happy life. Sure, we all wish he had won the Triple Crown, but, you know, he doesn't care at all. And since I think the horse must come first in everything we do with them, that's good enough for me.

For the sake of all the other racing horses, I do feel the issues that made so many headlines this season must be addressed - sooner than later. There are so many things wrong with racing at present, but, fortunately for Big Brown, Kent Desormeaux isn't one of them.