Thursday, 12 October 2017 15:05

Arcaro, Shoemaker and Hartack, Race Riding Nobility

By Joe Raucci | Families Today

They were in a universe of their own, their accomplishments legendary. To put it into perspective, the Triple Crown races that include the Kentucky Derby, Preakness and Belmont Stakes are of the utmost importance on the horse racing calendar. That being said, three Hall of Fame jockeys accounted for a staggering 37 victories in that series. Let’s take a look at them. 

Eddie Arcaro gets first billing here. He was called “The Master.” It is fair to say Arcaro is to race riding as Babe Ruth is to baseball: incomparable. Born to Italian immigrants and brought up in the midst of the Great Depression, the young Arcaro, with his scant five-foot two frame was a perfect fit for the career he chose. He made his mark early on, making his debut in 1934 and winning his first of five Kentucky Derbies with Lawrin in 1938. From that day on until his retirement in 1962 he ruled the horse racing world. 

In 1941, Arcaro rode his first of two Triple Crown winners with vaunted Calumet Farms Whirlaway. In 1948, the great Citation would be his second. Citation’s regular rider, Al Snider, was lost in a boating accident during a freak storm in the Everglades. Arcaro was retained as his jockey. Not only did Citation win the Triple Crown, he amassed sixteen straight victories with Arcaro aboard. In a gentlemanly gesture, Arcaro split his share of Citation’s earnings for the entire season with Al Snider’s widow, truly a mark of class!

Arcaro had become a money rider. He was the go-to-guy. Owners and trainers alike sought his services. Arcaro won stakes races in bunches. We know about the Triple Crown. Here he shined. Five Derbies, six Preakness Stakes, and the same amount of Belmont scores. You added right. Seventeen times he led his mounts into the winner’s circle of these storied events, a record that has stood the test of time.

There is more. New York racing’s main event every year was the Jockey Club Gold Cup. At two miles it was a grueling test for America’s top race horses. The Master with his keen sense of pace during the running of a race, was aboard 10 winners of this famed race. As his close friend and confidant for many years Tommy Roberts nailed it, “Eddie had a clock in his head.”

Eddie Arcaro, this country’s greatest jockey, was inducted into The Hall of Fame on Union Avenue in 1958. He retired at the age of forty-six in 1962.

When the time had come to pass the baton, Willie Shoemaker was waiting. If anyone was ever born to be a jockey, the Texas native fit the bill. Born in 1931, he weighed in at a scant two pounds four ounces. Little Willie was placed in a shoebox and somehow made it through the night, thus his nickname “The Shoe.” He grew into a four-foot ten-inch, 90-pound teenager. “The Shoe” was smart enough to realize that the place for him was the race track. In 1949, he won his first race at Golden Gate Fields, near  San Francisco. The following year he won 388 races. Then in 1951, he was aboard a remarkable 485 winners, a record that would stand for 22 years.

Shoemaker became a household name. Better things were about to happen, and it came in the form of Swaps. This California bred was “The Shoe’s” first big-time horse. He would give Shoemaker his first Kentucky Derby and set an unbelievable five world records in his stellar career. The one flaw for this duo was the highly anticipated match race that pitted Swaps against the great Nashua. He was ridden by Eddie Arcaro who hustled Nashua to the lead and never looked back, besting Swaps by a half-dozen lengths.

While Arcaro was always comfortable calling New York home and doing his winter business at Hialeah Park in southern Florida, Shoemaker loved the California circuit. 

His Triple Crown total wins are impressive. He won four Derbies, a Preakness and six Belmont Stakes, eleven in all. Here he stands alone in second place behind Arcaro. His record in major stakes races in California is astounding. He was aboard ten Santa Anita Handicap winners. As for the equally important Hollywood Gold Cup, he took home eight.

In a career that spanned five decades “The Shoe” had many great thrills in his magnificent  career. The one that stands out had to be his charge down the stretch, aboard Ferdinand to win the 1986 Kentucky Derby. Yes, it was his fourth. What makes it so special is the fact that Shoemaker was 54 years old at the time. He retired four years later and when he hung up his tack, he held records for races won and money earned over his 31-year career. He, like Arcaro was enshrined in the Hall of Fame. The greats he rode included Damascus, Forego, Swaps, Gallant Man, Round Table, and Spectacular Bid.

Last though not least, let’s take a look at the life of Bill Hartack.  His story begins in the coal mining country of Pennsylvania. At the age of eight Hartack lost his mother in a car accident and led an impoverished childhood. It did not stop him from becoming valedictorian of his high school class. Furthering his education was not a priority for Bill. He, as Arcaro and Shoemaker before him, headed to the racetrack. And did he ever. His first win came at Waterford Park in 1952 and his career took off like a comet. So fast was his climb to success, he was elected to the Hall of Fame at age 26 in 1959.

Hartack took a different road than his famous rivals. While they were happy being spotlighted in the major racing capitols of New York and California, Hartack preferred the less lucrative New Jersey and Chicago area venues to ply his trade. He stands in a tie for third on the all-time list with nine Triple Crown trophies. It is his mastery of the Kentucky Derby that stands out among his many accomplishments. He tied Arcaro’s record of five when he took his last aboard Majestic Prince in 1969. Even more special is the fact that he got his last in his ninth Derby mount. It is safe to say that Bill Hartack owned Churchill Downs on Derby Day.

Excepting his Derby conquests, Hartack’s career faltered just as fast as it had risen. Weight problems, along with a prickly personality were instrumental in bringing him down. When the owners and trainers had their chance to get even for his antics, they took pleasure in watching the downhill spiral. A notorious loner, Hartack found few friends in his time of need. Hartack had had enough. In the late seventies he headed to Hong Kong, where he finished his career with a successful stint.  When he returned to the U.S., he became a steward at various tracks; He was made for it:  a no-nonsense, professional who knew the rules and how to apply them. If one put his life to music, Frank Sinatra’s classic “My Way” would be a perfect fit. It seems apropos that he died alone at camp on a hunting trip. He was 74 years old.

Bill Shoemaker, who had broken nearly every bone in his body in mishaps on the track, would never have dreamed that a car accident would put him in a wheel chair for the final years of his life. He passed away in 2003 at the age of 72. Arcaro led the good life after hanging up the saddle. He became a sportscaster and analyst for network racing programs, resided in Miami Beach and played his favorite past time, golf. He passed away in 1997 at the age of 91.

Simply put these three, though small in stature, stood taller than a mountain when horse racing was “The Sport of Kings.”

At The Spa

All three icons of the sport made their way to the Spa. Arcaro called Saratoga his August home. “The Shoe” guided many of the all-time greats to the winner’s circle here, and Hartack, on rare occasion, flew in to showcase his outstanding skills. It was on one of these visits that the following dialogue took place. 

My great friend Bill Moseman was working the famous square bar at the long-gone Joe Collins restaurant on route 9, south of town. A customer came into pick up an order to go.  Billy looked at the credit card slip. It was signed: Bill Hartack. 

Always fast with a one liner Moseman, said: “You look like a man who won five Kentucky Derbies.” “That would be me,” Hartack replied. It could only happen in this magical place called Saratoga.

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