BREATH OF FRESH AIR? OR BLOWHARD?

Byline: Kevin Modesti

When William Livingston was 16, he and three friends were driving in a '36 Ford near a noisy carnival, couldn't hear the bells at a railroad crossing and wound up stalled on the tracks. In the collision that followed, the car was thrown against a heavy post, and Livingston struck his head on a rear window.

The next thing he knew he was standing outside the car looking in at his own unconscious body, and a cop was saying, ``He's dead.'' Whereupon Livingston's out-of-body experience ended and he came to in the back seat. He was carted off to the hospital with a splitting headache.

``I saw the bright light,'' he said, describing his near-death.

Livingston told this story the other day in order to suggest that the concussion explains some of his behavior in the 50 years since. That part was his idea of a joke. Livingston doesn't think he's nuts. Of course a lot of people around North American racetracks disagree.

A month ago, Dr. William Livingston, 67, was unknown outside Artesia, N.M., where he operated a veterinary clinic, mixed his own brand of quasi-medical potions, and kicked around the fringes of the thoroughbred breeding industry.

Then, Livingston did something you only see in the movies. He entered a $3,000 claiming horse, a regular loser even at the leaky-roof tracks of New Mexico, in the $2 million Breeders' Cup Turf, which in some years is the classiest race in the world. The horse, a 7-year-old named Ricks Natural Star, had a 2-for-23 record and lifetime earnings of $6,093. Plus, he hadn't raced in more than a year, and had recorded only one full-fledged workout.

In Toronto, where the Breeders' Cup races were held, track officials and others concerned about safety and integrity strained to come up with an analogy. It was like a high-school sprinter challenging Michael Johnson, they said. Like a '36 Ford racing at Daytona.

Livingston was either crazy or ignorant in the ways of big-league horse racing. But the officials found themselves powerless to dissuade him or otherwise keep the hapless ``Rick'' out of the starting gate. After all, Livingston had paid $40,000 in entry fees, just like the sheiks and jet-setters he was challenging.

By raceday, Livingston was rivaling the great Cigar's trainer for camera time, and the fans had embraced Rick as a lovable loser. Rick gave the crowd a thrill, narrowly leading the 1-1/2-mile race in the first quarter-mile. But then reality set in, and to the surprise of absolutely nobody except Livingston, Rick finished the race more than 30 seconds behind the other horses.

The Breeders' Cup people sighed deeply and said, well, at least nobody got hurt. They figured Livingston had had his fun and would go away.

Not so fast. This week, Livingston and his only horse resurfaced at little Los Alamitos Racecourse in Orange County, where Rick is scheduled to run Friday night in an 870-yard race against good quarterhorses. The track, which hopes to capitalize on the horse's ``cult following'' and Livingston's emergence as the sport's leading ``character,'' will pay the owner a $5,000 appearance fee.

Should Rick win, Livingston will get a $40,000 bonus. He said he plans to donate it to arthritis research. More likely, he'll have to settle for a small share of the race's $8,000 purse.

Some other horsemen are aghast. One used the word ``mockery'' to describe the promotion. Why encourage an owner to violate one of racing's unwritten rules: Don't humiliate the horse.

This wouldn't be the first time somebody thought Livingston was a couple of furlongs short of a mile.

This is a guy who says that, back home in New Mexico, he got Rick into shape by running him alongside a pickup truck. Livingston had his right hand on the wheel and his left on the bridle. Rick gave the pickup a few playful kicks while sprinting along at 40 mph. Sometimes Livingston conditioned the horse by running him in circles at the end of a 60-foot tether.

Of those who disparage such techniques, Livingston sniffs, ``They're people who don't know how poor people train horses.''

This is a guy who claims that in pursuit of homespun remedies, ``I've made more successful discoveries than any university in the world'' but he can't find anybody to market them.

There's his anti-aging powder - the ``Ponce de Leon Food Supplement'' - which he claims to have used for 15 years though you could hardly tell by looking at him.

``It helps when I play racquetball,'' he said - though, seeing how his belly protrudes and his dusty blue jeans hang below his hips, his club membership must have expired.

There's the oral preparation he said will send cat leukemia into remission, the dab-on treatment for arthritis (which, by the way, he said will also clear up psoriasis), and the enhanced fertilizer that he proposes to sell for $1 a pound.

Livingston said he hopes this foray into horse racing will earn him the money, or at least the publicity, to develop his own corporation.

Then there is his remedy for navicular disease, a circulatory problem in horses' feet that is a common cause of lameness. Livingston claims he has cured the condition in Ricks Natural Star since purchasing the horse from his former owners for $3,000 during the summer. He thinks the freedom from pain should allow Rick to improve by dozens of lengths.

It didn't happen in the Breeders' Cup. And if it happens at Los Alamitos, it still will be the greatest turnaround in horse-racing history.

Of course, Livingston doesn't believe Rick deserved to lose the Breeders' Cup race. He is reported to have complained to the Ontario Racing Commission, alleging that track officials not only treated Rick shabbily during the week but cost him the race by ordering jockey Lisa McFarland to stay out of the better horses' way.

``My training methods didn't meet their standards,'' he said sarcastically, explaining his conspiracy theory. ``The Breeders' Cup horses are supposed to be the elite horses. And here comes this horse who's earned $6,000.

``They thought if this horse won, it would have made the quality of their horses questionable. But it wouldn't. They're the best horses in the world. But they're not the only horses in the world.''

So Livingston has come to California, looking for new mountains not to conquer. He has a goal. ``I'd like to beat John Henry's money record,'' he said.

John Henry, third on the all-time list, earned more than $6.5 million. At Rick's present rate of $1,200 a season, it will take 5,000 years to match that. For a guy with anti-aging powder, though, anything is possible.

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Photo

Photo: Ricks Natural Star is the pet project - some say folly - of Dr. William Livingston, who will bring his goofy road show to Los Alamitos on Friday night.

Associated Press