PAY DAY IS HERE JOCKEY LOOKING FOR ANOTHER $1 MILLION SCORE.

Byline: Art Wilson Staff Writer

INGLEWOOD - At times, it appears Pat Day was born to win horse races. He's a four-time Eclipse Award winner, he's led the nation in victories six times and is third in lifetime wins behind only Laffit Pincay Jr. and Bill Shoemaker.

But the 46-year-old Day is most dangerous when a $1 million purse is at stake. The veteran jockey has won a record 21 million-dollar races, and he will try to add to that total today when he rides Cat Thief in the Grade I Hollywood Gold Cup at Hollywood Park.

Day has enjoyed past success at Hollywood Park, winning nine Grade I races and 12 stakes overall. It's his home away from home.

``I guess the main reason for my success there is that I've been well-mounted,'' Day said by telephone this week from Louisville, Ky., where he is about to wrap up his 28th riding title at Churchill Downs. ``The horses I've ridden have been very well-prepared by their respective trainers, and of course you have to have some breaks in the races. Obviously, things have gone our way there.''

Day rode his first $1 million winner, Wild Again, in the inaugural Breeders' Cup Classic at Hollywood Park in 1984. He remembers the race like it happened yesterday, how he had to overcome a three-horse driving, bumping finish with Gate Dancer and Slew O' Gold and then sweated out a 10-minute stewards' inquiry.

``I can't remember what I had for breakfast,'' Day joked, ``but I've been blessed with the ability to recall horses in races and their idiosyncrasies and any problems they might have had in the race.''

Day said Wild Again was a handful that afternoon.

``He'd been trying to get out basically from the time we went under the wire the first time,'' he said. ``After a quarter-mile into the race, the remainder of the race, he was leaning out pretty severely. When we came off the turn and into the stretch, given as hard as my horse had been running up to that point, when Slew O' Gold ranged up on the outside of me, I really thought that my horse would just hang it up. I don't believe I've ever ridden a horse that tried any harder than he did in the stretch run, or showed any more courage under fire than he did.

``I really wasn't sure when I went under the wire if I had won or if Gate Dancer had won. When I spoke to the stewards, I told them my horse had been trying to get out basically the whole way and that I did what I thought was a quality job of maintaining a straight course while trying to keep him running. I wasn't sure if I had drifted out and caused any of (the trouble).''

After a lengthy delay, the stewards ruled Gate Dancer was the cause of most of the bumping between the three horses and Wild Again's number stayed up.

There have been 20 more $1 million victories for Day, none in the Gold Cup. When he won the race aboard Blushing John in 1989, it was a $500,000 event. Blushing John was named top older male horse that year.

Blushing John was beaten by Sabona in The Californian, the final major steppingstone to the Gold Cup, but Day said he was confident he could reverse the outcome.

``I rode him in the Gold Cup the way I probably should have ridden him in The Californian,'' he said. ``He relaxed back off 'em early, went after the horses when he was ready and drew off in the stretch.''

Overall, Day has won four Breeders' Cup races at Hollywood Park, including two in 1987 when he guided Epitome to victory in the Juvenile Fillies and Theatrical to the winner's circle in the Turf. He also won aboard 2-year-old champion and Horse of the Year Favorite Trick in the 1997 Juvenile.

This afternoon, Day will be aboard a horse he knows well. He's ridden Cat Thief in 13 of the horse's 26 lifetime starts, including victories in last year's Swaps Stakes at Hollywood Park and the Breeders' Cup Classic at Gulfstream Park last November.

Cat Thief is the type of horse who can frustrate both a trainer and his jockey. He's won only four times, mostly because he's head strong and refuses to give his best effort every time out, according to Day.

``It's kind of like playing cat and mouse with him, it's more a head game with him,'' Day said. ``You can't manhandle him or get real aggressive with him or he gets aggressive back. So you gotta kind of finesse him into the race, and hopefully you can conserve him to the last three-sixteenths of a mile because he'll give you that burst, that short acceleration to the wire.

``I remember riding him in the Fountain of Youth and the Florida Derby last year, two races he barely lost and could have won, and I thought he was wimping on me. I say he wimped because I felt he got right down on the wire and was not persevering for me. I didn't ride him the remainder of the spring and then I got back on him for the Swaps and he showed some tremendous tenacity that day, some tremendous courage under fire. He was headed by General Challenge at the top of the stretch, fought back gamely and was not to be denied. It was just a very gutsy effort. But he doesn't do that all the time.''

So which Cat Thief can fans expect to see today?

``You don't know for sure what you're dealing with when the doors open,'' Day said. ``And he doesn't give you a fair indication in the post parade. Some horses, maybe when they fire big, they'll be really on their toes and bouncing and slightly lathered up over the shoulders. And then maybe they'll be dull and lethargic in the post parade and they run dull. He warms up basically the same way every time. There's no real indication until you actually get into the race.''

But when the stakes are high, both Day and Cat Thief have proved they can be difficult to beat.

GOLD CUP AT A GLANCE

The race: The Hollywood Gold Cup, 1 1/4 miles on the Hollywood Park main track, for 3-year-olds and up.

The schedule: Post time is 2:40 p.m. It's the fifth race on a 10-race card that starts at 12:10 p.m.

TV/Radio: Coverage on Channel 11 begins at 2 p.m.; KNX-AM (1070).

At stake: A $1 million purse ($600,000 to the winner) plus points in the NTRA Champions on Fox series.

Daily News picks: See Bob Ike's and Terry Turrell's selections on Page 14.

CAPTION(S):

photo, box

Photo: (color) Pat Day

Box: Gold Cup at a glance (see text)