BackTrack: Runaway Groom Pulls off Travers Surprise

The two bay colts angled across the small field from the outside post positions, and as they went into the first turn of the 113th running of the $200,000 Travers Stakes (G1), Conquistador Cielo had his head in front of Aloma's Ruler, which was just outside of him. The pace was brisk, but not remarkable.

Through the backstretch, they raced head and head, and it was Aloma's Ruler which had his head in front. Rounding the final turn, they were nose and nose. In the upper stretch, it was Conquistador Cielo again, briefly, with Aloma's Ruler coming back.

Was the 113th Travers going to be a re-enactment of the 93rd Travers, in which Jaipur and Ridan raced together for 1 1/4 miles—a spectacle still counted among Saratoga Race Course's most memorable?

Twenty years ago, an unheralded outsider, Military Plume, closed with a rush from last place and missed catching the two leaders by only about a length. This time, another unheralded outsider, Canadian-bred Runaway Groom, also coming from last, provided a different ending—a Jim Dandy ending. The narrow, angular gray colt, toughened by a recent victory in a 1 3/8-mile Canadian classic, swept by the two leaders and won by a half-length.

Preakness Stakes (G1) winner Aloma's Ruler was second, three-quarters of a length in front of Belmont Stakes (G1) winner Conquistador Cielo, the reigning 3-year-old which was seeking his eighth consecutive victory. The Kentucky Derby (G1) winner Gato Del Sol, second choice, was fifth and last and later was found to have chipped a bone in the left knee and will be out for the rest of the year.

Runaway Groom's victory was the climax, if not the conclusion, of an eventful week involving 1) an injury which removed one contender from the field, 2) a court action over a jockey's suspension, and 3) the usual cloud of rumors.

Hours after the race was over, trainer Woody Stephens said it was his feeling that Conquistador Cielo, recently syndicated for a record $910,000 a share, would be retired, raced no more. A decision would be made in a day or so, he said, and the sober, concerned face of Seth Hancock—who had put the syndicate together—made it pretty obvious what that decision would be. On Sunday, Stephens confirmed that the bay son of Mr. Prospector would race no more.

Few recent Throughbreds have raced so brilliantly. The highlights of his 12-race career were encompassed within five weeks. In that short period, he beat older horses in the Metropolitan Handicap (G1), running the fastest mile in New York history, came back five days later to win the 1 1/2-mile Belmont by 14 lengths, and four weeks after that won the Dwyer (gr. I), eased up, by four lengths. He ran next in the Jim Dandy (G3), winning not in sensational style, but handily, in an effort designed as a race over the track, considered so important before the Travers.

When the 113th Travers was over, the two starters (in a field of five) which had not raced earlier at the Saratoga meeting were one-two—so much for the moment—for the necessity of a race over the track.

Certainly, it was nothing new for a horse to come down from Canada and win a major New York race. Usually, such successful Canadian invaders have been owned by prominent stables in Canada and have been hailed in advance and treated somewhat royally. There were some delightful twists to this latest Canadian success story.

Runaway Groom, although winner two weeks earlier of the Prince of Wales Stakes, one of Canada's Triple Crown events, arrived at Saratoga in the middle of the night, on the Tuesday before the Travers. He was separated from his three stablemates—which were not allotted stalls—and was fortunate to get for himself something of an isolation ward, a lone stall at the end of Barn 33.

Trainer John DiMario, who has knocked about racing for more than 30 years, making more good friends than training major horses, had no place at all to stay. So, he lived out of his beat-up car parked a few feet from his horse.

Neither DiMario nor owner Albert Coppola is a Canadian. DiMario lives in New York and has spent most of his career at New York tracks. When asked where he is based, however, he responded as if he never had thought of that before, and then said: "I'm based wherever I get stalls."

Coppola grew up in nearby Schenectady, went away to World War II, and afterward ended up in McLean, Va., where he operates a number of secretarial schools. Three years ago he bought his first horse, a King Ranch 2-year-old, and turned him over to DiMario. The colt, named Skit, did not do much for Coppola, winning one race as a 4-year-old before breaking a bone. Skit did, however, heighten Coppola's interest in horses and in breeding.

"I went to Kentucky two years ago, not for the select sales, but for the others," Coppola recalled. "I was looking for stallion shares, and I visited the big farms. At one of them (Gainesway), I saw Blushing Groom. I said, 'My God, what a good-looking stallion!' When one gets into horse racing, one starts to learn about breeding and sires. The more I read, the more I became interested. If you have to pay the price these days, you have to hunt for something you like.

"I looked in the catalog (at the Fasig-Tipton Kentucky fall sale), and I saw several Blushing Grooms. One I liked was the last yearling to be sold on Saturday night. The dam was Yonnie Girl (a stakes winner and dam of six starters and six winners, one of them a stakes winner), and I thought it would bring much more than I could pay.

"I just hung in there and waited until the end, though. The bidding reached the middle 30s, and I then began to bid. I came up with him for $39,000."

The colt by Blushing Groom was consigned by Gardiner Farms of Canada, and Coppola found he had been nominated for some Canadian 2-year-old stakes.

"That made me aware that there were some other stakes up there for him," he recalled, "and I contacted a friend, Jerry Meyer (a major Canadian trainer), and he advised that I nominate him for 3-year-old races, that I should write the Ontario Jockey Club about them."

Coppola did and made sure the colt was eligible for the Triple Crown races north of the border. Meanwhile, Runaway Groom developed "all the bucked shins, the colds, the coughs, the viruses" to which young horses are heir.

He was not ready to run last year until November, when it snowed. He went to Florida for light training and then, DiMario being in New York, to George Arnold in Kentucky. Runaway Groom made his debut in April at Keeneland, just missing by a nose, broke his maiden in his third start, then won again.

"I have tapes of all his races," Coppola said, "and there is not one race in which he faltered."

Coppola decided to send him north for the Queen's Plate (Can-IR). Arnold was not available for a stay in Canada, so, "I called DiMario," Coppola said. "I said, 'John, I'm in trouble. I need someone to bail me out—take him to Canada for me.' "

DiMario got into his old car and headed north. Runaway Groom ran in the Queen's Plate, and the colt, at 38-1, passed 16 horses on the rail and finished second to Son of Briartic in the 1 1/4-mile Canadian classic.

It was a month until his next Canadian objective, the Heresy Stakes, a prep on grass for the Prince of Wales. Runaway Groom never had run on turf. DiMario took him to Belmont Park, put him in a grass allowance race, and won.

At Belmont, he was stabled near Alfred Vanderbilt's barn, and, Coppola recalled, he attracted Vanderbilt's favorable comment one morning:

"Mr. Vanderbilt said, 'I really like this colt. He is a runner.' I told him, 'But he's not like your gray (Native Dancer).' But he said he thought this colt looks like what you try to breed."

Back in Canada, Runaway Groom (whose groom is Sal DiMario, the trainer's nephew) narrowly missed winning a division of the Heresy at Woodbine. In the Prince of Wales at Fort Erie, he came from far back over a deep course to win by a head, with Queen's Plate winner Son of Briartic third.

DiMario recalls that, after the race, Coppola said: "Now for the Travers." DiMario thought: "My God, what's he talking about?"

The Prince of Wales was the toughest race I ever saw," DiMario added, "10 seconds slower than the course record it was so deep and holding. I never saw a horse so dehydrated."

After Runaway Groom showed he had come out of the grind of the Prince of Wales in good condition, he was vanned to Saratoga. There was room for him only because he was a Travers nominee. Three Coppola 2-year-olds were ready to run, but were issued no stalls, and wound up with a harness race trainer two miles from Saratoga.

"It was touch and go if he would be ready for the Travers," DiMario said. "I had a couple of days, and I had to be lucky. I got lucky."

Joe Cantey, a good friend of DiMario, was stabled near Runaway Groom's barn. Runaway Groom had no exercise boy, so Cantey suggested that Henry Cochran, his 150-pound assistant, work Runaway Groom.

"He was great," DiMario said. "I had to have the right boy. If I had the wrong boy, he would have goofed up something. This boy was like a machine, like he had had him all his life. The last 72 hours, everything jelled. The morning of the race, I knew I had a shot—but, of course, when it came to beating Conquistador Cielo, I didn't know."

During the week, there were the usual stories surrounding any big horse—that Conquistador Cielo was not right. The colt countered the rumors with a three-furlong work in :34 2/5 on Friday morning.

Things did not go so well for Wavering Monarch. Winner of three straight since the Kentucky Derby, and the colt which many thought would be second choice, bruised a hoof and was declared out.

Five went to the post. Conquistador was 2-5, Gato Del Sol second choice at 4.20-1, and Aloma's Ruler third choice at 5.60-1. The crowd of 41,839, second-largest in Saratoga history, put a considered amount of money on the colt that had not gotten much attention prior to the race, so Runaway Groom was only 12.90-1. Lejoli was the longest shot, at 14.50-1.

Runaway Groom hit his head in the starting gate, bloodying his mouth, and was squeezed back a bit as Aloma's Ruler and Conquistador Cielo crossed the field to set the pace. Jeff Fell had been lined up tentatively as Runaway Groom's rider, but also had become Conquistador Cielo's probable back-up rider if Eddie Maple failed in his court action to delay a seven-day suspension. Maple's lawyer obtained a stay from a Nassau County judge, and Fell stayed on Runaway Groom, and was in luck.

Stephens said of the race later: "My horse was a little rank. We would have liked to be on the outside instead of on the rail. Every time Maple got him settled, the other horse (Aloma's Ruler, ridden by Angel Cordero Jr.) eased up, and they went head and head."

Conquistador Cielo was wearing front bandages for the first time, not because of the rumored suspensory trouble, Stephens said, but because during the week X-rays showed "fuzz around the sesamoids," in his left fore. Stephens thought maybe "the boot" (the electrical bone-healing device that has been used on the colt over several months) might be the cause. A week before the race, Stephens discarded the boot, and the bandages, he said, were used as a sort of substitute support.

When the call came to Conquistador Cielo in the stretch, he did not have his usual response, while Runaway Groom was coming on fast outside of the two leaders. Owner and trainer of the Canadian knew then that they had a shot.

"I knew this was his big run," Coppola said. "He just lines up and lets it go."

DiMario said that, "When I saw he was not far out of it, I felt real good about it."

The race was run in a mediocre 2:02 3/5 on a very fast track, the last quarter-mile in :26 4/5, with Runaway Groom getting it about a second faster. The Canadian colt came out of the race in fine shape and was scheduled to leave in a few days to return to Woodbine for the final leg of the Canadian Triple Crown, the 11/2-mile Breeders' Stakes. Coppola's $39,000 yearling won $132,900, raising his career total to $268,312, and DiMario, complimented by the owner for "a magic training job," had "the horse you wait for a lifetime to train."