SKIP AWAY HOLDS SWAY; EASTERN STAR PAYS VISIT, WINS SEVENTH STRAIGHT.Byline: Kevin Modesti Daily News Staff Writer The sights and sounds didn't jibe in the minutes before the Hollywood Gold Cup The Hollywood Gold Cup is a Grade I stakes race for thoroughbred horses inaugurated in 1938 at Hollywood Park Racetrack in Inglewood, California. It was run as a handicap race until 1997 when it was switched to weight-for-age conditions. . On the odds board overlooking the Hollywood Park Hollywood Park may be several places:
``I just think that's a West-East kind of thing,'' Bailey said later, asked about the Skip Away-haters in the crowd. ``People want to hang on to that. But I would have been surprised if they'd booed him after the race.'' They didn't. They couldn't. In a definitive performance, proving even to the most skeptical Californian that he is the nation's best racehorse racehorse refers usually to thoroughbred but may also include standardbred, trotter. , Skip Away wore out defending champion defending champion n (SPORT) → defensor/a m/f del título defending champion n (Sport) → champion(ne) en titre Gentlemen by setting a fast pace and ran his winning streak Noun 1. winning streak - a streak of wins streak, run - an unbroken series of events; "had a streak of bad luck"; "Nicklaus had a run of birdies" to seven by capturing the $1 million Gold Cup on Sunday. From the grandstand, where 32,505 fans piled in to watch the most promising Gold Cup of the decade, Skip Away was welcomed to the winner's circle by rousing cheers. Bailey compared the ovation to the ones Cigar received in his charge to the career earnings record that Skip Away now threatens. ``I'll always have a special place in my heart for Cigar, but maybe Skip Away is a better horse,'' Bailey said. Skip Away, carrying 124 pounds, like each of his opponents, won by 1-3/4 lengths, covering 1-1/4 miles in 2:00, a good time on this track. Gentlemen tired in the final yards and finished third, a length behind Puerto Madero, his stablemate Noun 1. stablemate - a horse stabled with another or one of several horses owned by the same person stable companion Equus caballus, horse - solid-hoofed herbivorous quadruped domesticated since prehistoric times . There were five other horses in the race, but as it turned out, they hardly mattered. Skip Away seized the early lead as he usually does and neither of the other speedsters in the field, Budroyale and Mud Route, went after him. That meant Gentlemen and jockey Gary Stevens got no help and had to apply the pressure themselves. A virtual match race developed. With Skip Away and Gentlemen running 1-2, the quarter miles went past in a solid :23 and :46 2/5. Then, they speeded up. By the time they reached the far turn, with Gentlemen inching closer from the outside, Skip Away had gone three-quarters of a mile in 1:09 3/5. Not since Affirmed, in his Horse of the Year season of 1979, had a horse set that fast a pace and gone on to win the Gold Cup. By the time they turned into the stretch, the leaders were so close to each other, they looked like a single horse. The crowd let out the kind of roar you rarely hear at a racetrack anymore. Once they straightened out, though, it was clear that Skip Away had more left than Gentlemen had. Each horse might have been excused for tiring. Skip Away had a rough week; he dumped an exercise rider at Belmont Park and ran free for 25 minutes, fraying his hooves, and had to fly from New York New York, state, United States New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of to Los Angeles. Gentlemen hadn't raced since suffering from respiratory bleeding and finishing last in the Santa Anita Handicap The Santa Anita Handicap is an American Thoroughbred horse race held annually in the late winter at Santa Anita Park in Arcadia, California. It is a Grade I race for horses three years old and up, and is considered the most important race for older horses in North America during in March. It was Gentlemen who cracked. ``He looked great and trained great,'' said Richard Mandella, Gentlemen's trainer. ``Hopefully I was wrong, I didn't have him at 100 percent, and he'll be better at Del Mar. . . . (But) maybe he didn't get tired. Maybe he just got outrun out·run tr.v. out·ran , out·run, out·run·ning, out·runs 1. a. To run faster than. b. To escape from: outrun one's creditors. 2. .'' Gentlemen didn't switch lead legs until deep in the stretch, and by that time, Skip Away had gotten away under urging from Bailey. The only question was whether Gentlemen and Stevens could hold off Puerto Madero and Kent Desormeaux at the rail. Skip Away, sent off at 2-5, the heaviest Gold Cup favorite since Affirmed, paid $2.80. ``It might be his best race,'' Bailey said. ``Awesome race,'' said Mandella, whose streak of victories in California's $1 million races for 3-year-olds and up ended at six. It couldn't have been any better if Silver Charm had run. The 1997 Kentucky Derby winner was withdrawn Wednesday because of what trainer Bob Baffert said was a 102-degree fever. This was 5-year-old Skip Away's 16th victory in 34 starts and pushed his earnings over $8.9 million, a little more than $1 million from Cigar's record. Skip Away's victories include two at Hollywood Park - he won the Breeders' Cup Classic The Breeders' Cup Classic is a Grade 1 Weight for Age thoroughbred horse race for 3 years old and older run at a distance of 1¼ miles (2012 m) on dirt. It is held annually at a different racetrack in the United States or Canada as part of the Breeders' Cup. here in November to clinch the older-horses championship - confounding confounding when the effects of two, or more, processes on results cannot be separated, the results are said to be confounded, a cause of bias in disease studies. confounding factor the conventional wisdom that Eastern horses can't ship west and win. ``I've come here with some good horses and got my head jerked off,'' Bailey said. ``It takes a good one to come across the country and beat the likes of Gentlemen.'' THAT'S RICH Skip Away, who picked up $600,000 for owner Carolyn Hine by winning the Hollywood Gold Cup, moved closer to Cigar's record for career earnings by a U.S.-raced thoroughbred. The Top 10: Horse Earnings Races Wins Cigar $9,999,815 33 19 Skip Away (x) $8,906,360 34 16 Alysheba$6,679,242 26 11 John Henry $6,597,947 83 39 Singspiel Singspiel: see opera. singspiel (German; “song-play”) Eighteenth-century opera in the German language, containing spoken dialogue and usually comic in tone. $5,952,825 20 9 Best Pal $5,688,245 47 18 Taiki Blizzard (x) $5,544,484 21 6 Sunday Silence $4,968,554 14 9 Easy Goer $4,873,770 20 14 Silver Charm (x) $4,642,020 13 8 (x) active CAPTION(S): 5 Photos, Box PHOTO (1--Cover--Color) AS GOOD AS GOLD Skip Away wins Hollywood Gold Cup, leaves no doubt he's nation's top horse. (2--4--Color) HINE SIGHT Jockey Jerry Bailey hugs trainer Sonny Hine after winning the Gold Cup aboard front-running and strong-finishing Skip Away, then he gives Hine a grand garland. (5--Color) Jockey Jerry Bailey pats Skip Away, left, as they defeat Puerto Madero and Kent Desormeaux in the Hollywood Gold Cup. Photos by Myung J. Chun/Daily News BOX: THAT`S RICH (see text) |
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