Bet Twice Wins With the Bump and Run : Pimlico Stewards Ignore His Body Checks on Lost Code; Alysheba 4th

The same race track that didn’t think enough of Codex carrying out the filly, Genuine Risk, into the middle of the stretch in the 1980 Preakness didn’t make much out of another herding incident in a big race Saturday.

Bet Twice, the maverick colt who almost sent Alysheba to the ground in the stretch run of the 1987 Kentucky Derby, tried pushing Lost Code in the direction of the grandstand for more than a sixteenth of a mile toward the end of the $500,000 Pimlico Special.

After Bet Twice and jockey Craig Perret crossed the finish line three-quarters of a length in front, the Pimlico stewards considered a foul claim by Pat Day aboard Lost Code for seven minutes and let the victory stand.

The controversial outcome brought back the Special, a race that was discontinued 30 years ago, in a resounding way that Pimlico officials hadn’t intended. A stake that was the showcase for Seabiscuit’s match-race victory over War Admiral in 1938, and a race that was won by 11 horses that went on to be named horse of the year, the Special now has a history of a horse winning a race who may not have deserved it.

When Day pulled up Lost Code after they crossed the finish line and brought the horse back, he was astounded to see that the three stewards hadn’t posted their “inquiry” sign. This necessitated a foul claim by Day that required the stewards to review the race.

“We’ll never know whether the contact between the two horses affected the outcome and whether the stewards did the right thing,” said Day, who was riding Lost Code for the first time because Perret, who won two stakes with the horse in Arkansas this year, elected to stay with Bet Twice. “But there were three bumps and they cost my horse a little bit of ground and stopped his momentum. It was all very detrimental to his chances.”

Because of the foul claim, a poor performance by 3-5 favorite Alysheba--his dullest outing since his Travers last August and the first loss for the 1987 Kentucky Derby winner in four starts this year--was largely relegated to the back burner.

This was the 1987 Preakness redux, with Alysheba, Bet Twice and Cryptoclearance, the 1-2-3 finishers then, all in Saturday’s field. Alysheba must have forgotten how much he liked Pimlico a year ago, struggling home fourth, 4 lengths behind Bet Twice, and Cryptoclearance, about 11 lengths back at one stage, came from last in the six-horse field to finish third, a length behind Lost Code.

The other finishers were Little Bold John, who may have softened up Lost Code early even though his jockey, Donnie Miller, didn’t plan it that way, and Lac Ouimet. Lac Ouimet bled from both nostrils while finishing last.

This was the third time Bet Twice won a major race at the expense of Alysheba. Second in both the Derby and the Preakness, Bet Twice thwarted Alysheba’s Triple Crown bid by winning the Belmont, then beat him in the Haskell Handicap at Monmouth Park.

Winning for the for the 10th time in 19 starts for owner Blanche Levy and partners, Bet Twice earned $425,000, which included a $100,000 bonus because he was a Triple Crown nominee. Bet Twice, with career earnings of more than $3 million, was the third betting choice in a crowd of 20,027 and paid $15, $5.60 and $3.80. Lost Code, like Alysheba losing for the first time this year, paid $4.80 and $3.20 and Cryptoclearance paid $3.80.

From the No. 5 post position, Bet Twice chased Lost Code through early fractions of :46 2/5, 1:10 2/5 and 1:35 2/5, before finishing the 1 3/16 miles in 1:54 1/5, which broke by 1 3/5 seconds the Pimlico Special record set by Tom Fool in 1953. The Preakness record is Tank’s Prospect’s 1:53 2/5 in 1985.

Bet Twice began to gain on Lost Code on the far turn, with Perret bringing his mount inside the other colt at the top of the stretch. Perret switched to a left-handed whip then, with Day hitting Lost Code on the right side. There was contact three times--at about the eighth pole, near the three-sixteenths pole and at the sixteenth pole.

“I never stopped riding,” Day said. “I can understand the first two contacts, but the last time we got bumped pretty good. The other horse was ducking out from Craig’s stick. He was edging past us by about a neck or a half-length, and that might have had something to do with the way the stewards thought. They might have thought that Bet Twice was going to get by us, anyway.”

Of the three stewards, one--Clinton Pitts--is a holdover from the Codex-Genuine Risk race, which wasn’t settled until after the Maryland Racing Commission took three days to disallow an appeal by the owners of the filly. After Day said he expected a stewards’ inquiry Saturday, he was reminded that the judges didn’t light the “inquiry” sign in 1980, either.

Day smiled. “I’ve got no comment on that,” the jockey said.

Bill Donovan, the good-old-boy trainer for Lost Code, took Saturday’s loss easier than his wife, Donna, did. Donovan said that he wouldn’t want to win a big race on a foul, but shortly after the stewards’ decision, his wife began a tirade of criticism.

“Will you shut up and act like a lady?” Donovan said.

“I’m acting like a lady,” his wife said. “But I’m not going to shut up.”

Understandably, Perret thought that Bet Twice was innocent.

“The other horse (Lost Code) was drifting with me,” the jockey said. “Neither horse was taking advantage of the other. It didn’t cost the other horse an inch. I never made that other horse change his leads (switching one lead foot to the other) and I didn’t make Pat (Day) stop from riding him.”

Alysheba shipped to Baltimore after winning three stakes at Santa Anita, the last two--the Santa Anita and San Bernardino Handicaps--over Ferdinand, the 1987 horse of the year.

Alysheba was third in the early going, behind Lost Code and Little Bold John, moved up to second after three-quarters of a mile and then stopped running.

“He just didn’t fire,” jockey Chris McCarron said. “He warmed up beautifully. He looked like he might have been moving at the half-mile pole, but then he didn’t put in that good, sustained run that he usually does. He had a perfect trip, except for the way he got to the finish line.”

Alysheba is headed back to California for more battles with Ferdinand in the Californian at Hollywood Park on June 12 and the Hollywood Gold Cup on June 26.

Bet Twice and Lost Code apparently are also headed in different directions, Bet Twice staying in the East for a possible grass debut and Lost Code probably heading for Chicago.

It’s not really necessary that they get together right away, anyway. They were close enough through the stretch Saturday to last both horses for some time.

Horse Racing Notes

The Preakness next Saturday is shaping up as a 12- or 13-horse field. Winning Colors, the filly who won the Kentucky Derby, is expected to run as an entry with Tejano. There will be two other entries, Derby runner-up Forty Niner running with Cefis, and Private Terms being coupled with Finder’s Choice, and other probables are Risen Star, Regal Classic, Brian’s Time, Din’s Dancer, Sorry About That and Once Wild. And despite running sixth in an eight-horse field for maidens at Turf Paradise Saturday, Feisty’s Ski is also expected to run in the Preakness. That was Feisty Ski’s first race and Pimlico officials are dismayed by the possibility of his being in the race.