Nod to Legend Tom Durkin for NTRA Moment of the Year

Longtime NYRA racecaller Tom Durkin addresses the crowd at Saratoga Race Course following his final call on Aug. 31. (Photo by NYRA)
In most instances, trying to select racing’s top moment of the year produces a ground swell of hemming and hawing while trying to choose between a slew of worthy contenders.
Not this year, though.
All it took was a quick look at the 10 National Thoroughbred Racing Association Moment of the Year nominees to settle on a clear-cut winner.
Yet, before revealing which one was the best of the best, let me say that jockey Rosie Napravnik’s announcement of her pregnancy after the Breeders’ Cup Distaff was the most startling moment of 2014 – in any sport - and the Breeders’ Cup Classic – bumps and all – was the year’s most exciting race.
The top moment, though, took on place on Aug. 31 at no better of a setting than Saratoga Race Course.
While following horse racing for more than 40 years, I’ve been fortunate enough to witness three Triple Crown sweeps and countless thrilling finishes and championship-caliber performances.
Yet, I’ve seen anything to rival all of the emotions rolled into track announcer Tom Durkin’s final call.
That August afternoon blended an unlikely mix of melancholy and anticipation. There sadness over Durkin’s retirement after a 43-year career – the last 24 of them at Aqueduct, Belmont and Saratoga for the New York Racing Association – and also an eagerness to see how someone as witty and colorful Durkin would bow out.
In the end, the final chapter of Durkin’s career was vintage Durkin. After heavy rain turned Saratoga’s main track into a quagmire, the 64-year-old announcer coined the perfect phrase as he labeled Condo Commando’s 13 1/4-length score in the Spinaway Stakes as “splashtastic.”
As much as that phrase was the perfect exclamation point for Durkin’s illustrious career, what happened next at a trackside farewell ceremony for Durkin was simply amazing.
After any race, be the winner a Zenyatta or a Cigar, there’s usually some people who would have been happier if another had won the race. Yet for Durkin, there was nothing but love from the likes of fans, horsemen, jockeys, track workers. As he walked down the stairs from the announcer’s booth to the track, fans gathered around him and chanted “Tom-my Dur-kin.”
DURKIN AT SARATOGA ON AUG. 31

Photo by NYRA
Durkin’s final words were impeccable as well.
While saying thank you for so many great years, in particular he bestowed his gratitude on “the one person completely and entirely responsible for this wonderful life I’ve had the privilege to live in horse racing. …  That person is you, the racing fan, the horseplayer. Thank you. Thank you for it all, thank you for everything.” 
And then, he exited with the words, “Long live horse racing.”
After a tumultuous year for horse racing, those words and the uplifting feeling generated by Tom Durkin’s final day behind the microphone were the perfect elixir to generate hope and optimism about the sport.
They were also at the heart of the moment of the year.
DURKIN (third from right) WITH THE CONNECTIONS OF CONDO COMMANDO

Photo by NYRA