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Only nine winners of the Kentucky Derby
have won the Travers – two of the
country’s oldest stakes races.
After Aristides captured the first Derby
at Churchill Downs in 1875, D’Artagnan
won the 12th Travers at Saratoga. The first
Derby winner to take both stakes was Hindoo
in 1881.
Only one Triple Crown champion succeeded
in both contests: Whirlaway in 1941.
In the last 14 years, two of three Derby
champs visited the Travers’ winners’ circle:
Sea Hero in ’93 and Thunder Gulch
in ’95. But six horses that lost
at Churchill Downs won Saratoga’s
showcase race often called the Mid-Summer
Derby.
In fact, the race staged from ’27
through ’32 was run as the Travers
Mid-Summer Derby. In ’30, Jim Dandy,
who had a Travers’ prep named after
him starting in ’64, shocked Triple
Crown champ Gallant Fox.
Street Sense, the overwhelming 3-5 morning
line favorite, could become the first horse
to take the Kentucky Derby, Jim Dandy and
Travers.
The colt surely will be the post-time
favorite in a field that may reach nine
in the 138th running. The purse was jacked
up from $600,000 in ’06 to $1 million.
The son of Street Cry, thanks to the successful
strategy of trainer Carl Nafzger, has rebounded
from narrow defeats this year.
After being nosed out by Dominican in
the Blue Grass Stakes, he roared back to
defeat Hard Spun and Curlin in the Kentucky
Derby.
After losing by a head to Curlin in the
Preakness Stakes, he skipped the Belmont
Stakes and defeated several horses in the
Jim Dandy that will go in the Travers:
runner-up C P West, the second choice at
5-1, and third-place finisher Sightseeing,
6-1.
Between ’04 and ’89, five
winners of the Belmont Stakes captured
the Travers, including Birdstone, trained
by Nick Zito, who has had at least one
runner in seven of the last eight years.
Birdstone, one of three Zito entries in ’04,
ended the Triple Crown bid of Smarty Jones
in the third jewel. He sends out C P West,
an also-ran at Pimlico and Belmont after
skipping the Kentucky Derby, and the 20-1
Helsinki, fourth in the Lemon Drop Kid
Stakes at Saratoga.
Other challengers in the seven-horse field
are Loose Leaf, victorious in the Lemon
Drop Kid; 12-1; Grasshopper, three victories
in five races, 8-1; and For You Reppo,
with a lone maiden triumph, 20-1.
Some pretty good horses that lost or skipped
the Derby, but won the Preakness and Belmont
went on to score in the Travers:
Man o‘ War, who didn’t run
in the ’20 Derby; Native Dancer,
second to Dark Star in ’53 at Churchill
Downs; Damascus, third in the ’67
Derby; and Point Given, off the board in
Louisville in ’01, but captured the
Haskell, too.
Other winners of the Travers that failed
to capture a Triple Crown race include:
Alydar, perennial runner-up to ’78
Triple Crown winner Affirmed, moved to
first via disqualification over his nemesis;
Holy Bull, 12th in the ’94 Kentucky
Derby, who defeated Concern en route to
best 3-year-old and Horse of the Year honors;
and Medaglia d‘Oro, who also captured
the ’02 Jim Dandy.
Prior to 1890, the Travers was staged
at 1 ¾ miles. It wasn’t held
several years dating back to 1896. Anti-gambling
legislation shuttered all New York tracks
in 1911-12. The race was run at 1 ½ miles
1890-92 and 1 1/8 miles in 1895 and 1901-03.
The distance has been 1 ¼ miles
since ’04 when Broomstick won in
2:06 4/5. The fastest time was posted in ’79
by General Assembly -- two minutes flat.
A nose decided the race seven times from
1916 to ’98. Damascus posted the
largest winning margin -- 22 lengths.
William Travers, Saratoga’s first
president that steered building of the
track, owned the winner of the inaugural
race in 1864 when the purse was $2,940:
Kentucky.
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Posted on 8/23/2007 7:54:30 PM
Horse Betting - Travers Preview and History
By Greg Melikov
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