Racing at Del Mar : Sunday’s Won’t Be Merely Another Derby

If the word derby is the most cherished in thoroughbred racing’s lexicon, it is also the most corrupted.

Most sports fans hear the word and think of roses, Churchill Downs and “My Old Kentucky Home.”

Most racing secretaries, on the other hand, consider the term generic. They slap it on any two-bit event for 3-year-olds and try to pawn it off as something special, hoping that a little bit of the original magic will rub off.

At last count there were nearly 50 derbies on the 1989 North American racing calendar. They ranged from such minor classics as the Santa Anita and Florida versions to such obscure frauds as the Red Earth Derby in Oklahoma, the Crescent City Derby in Louisiana and the Yellowstone Derby in Montana.

Obviously, it takes special circumstances to raise an otherwise ordinary derby out of the crowd. Sunday’s $222,000 Del Mar Derby, at 1 1/8 miles on the grass, might have been so raised. In fact, it should be one of the most interesting 3-year-old races of the summer.

The main ingredients are Music Merci, Hawkster and River Master. Each has something to prove.

Music Merci, the durable gelding owned by Harvey Cohen and Lonnie Pendleton, has earned more than $1.2 million the hard way, crisscrossing the continent for his races. He has won twice this year, most recently on a disqualification in the Illinois Derby May 27, making his last untainted victory the San Rafael Stakes at Santa Anita in February.

But for all his grit and consistency, Music Merci has yet to come close to beating the best of his class. He has lost regularly to Sunday Silence and King Glorious--the best in the West--and in their only meeting he was trounced by Clevor Trevor, who has emerged at the second-best 3-year-old in the East.

To maintain his tenuous position as the best of the rest, Music Merci must win the Del Mar Derby. His only real excuse--other than the usual traffic troubles on the tight Del Mar course--would be his unfamiliarity with grass racing.

In his only previous turf race, Music Merci was upset by former claimer Hollywood Reporter in the Spotlight Handicap at Hollywood Park in early May. Craig Lewis, Music Merci’s trainer, is inclined to disregard the Spotlight, however, and not simply because it was a losing day.

“The turf course at Hollywood Park is vastly different from the one at Del Mar,” Lewis said Friday. “Del Mar’s is more of a European style course, much deeper, and one that tends to favor one-run closers more than speed horses.”

Music Merci, as the record has shown, is a free-running speed horse.

“I know, and that doesn’t help matters,” Lewis said. “But he had a good breeze over the course, and this guy has given us his best race every time we’ve asked. I see no reason it will be different Sunday.”

Hawkster and Music Merci ran against one another four times early in their careers and then went their separate ways, with Music Merci holding a 3-1 edge. While Music Merci was playing off Broadway, Hawkster ran in all three Triple Crown races, finishing fifth each time.

To Hawkster’s credit--and to the credit of trainer Ron McAnally--the temperamental bay survived the ordeal. And to the surprise of many observers, a new and improved Hawkster surfaced in a division of Del Mar’s Oceanside Stakes opening day with a 1 1/2-length victory. The difference?

“It was the grass,” said McAnally. “I had a feeling all along he would like the turf, and not just because of his breeding.”

Hawkster’s sire, Silver Hawk, finished third in the 1982 running of the oldest derby of them all, at Epsom Downs in England. He also finished second that year in the Irish Derby.

None of that hurts, but McAnally attributes Hawkster’s grass revival to pure mechanics.

“He’s got that ‘daisy-cutting’ kind of stride,” McAnally said. “Low and very smooth. His work on the grass the other day was as good a work as I’ve seen by any of our horses down here this year.”

River Master, who is trained by Charlie Whittingham, represents the wild card in the Del Mar Derby mix. The son of His Majesty has run only five times and won his only stakes appearance, the La Jolla Handicap at Del Mar two weeks ago.

Most of the best fillies and mares on the grounds also will be in action this weekend.

Northern California’s Brown Bess will face a Whittingham entry in today’s $270,250 Ramona Handicap at 1 1/8 miles on the turf. Whittingham, who has won the race five times, will leave Claire Marine in the barn and go with Fitzwilliam Place and Galunpe.

The rest of the opposition includes 1988 Del Mar Oaks winner No Review, Santa Ana Handicap winner Maria Jesse, and outsiders Daring Doone and Down Again.

The $82,875 Rancho Bernardo Handicap will be run Sunday at 6 1/2 furlongs on the main track. Usually a quiet little sprint, this year’s edition will mark the return of the Chilean mare, Miss Brio.

Trained by Neil Drysdale, Miss Brio lost the spring and most of the summer because of an unusual hoof injury.

Miss Brio won two stakes earlier this season and remains the only horse to have finished ahead of division leader Bayakoa in 1989.

Del Mar Notes

In what could be a preview of the Sept. 3 Del Mar Debutante, impressive maiden winners Ten K and Rue de Palm will run in today’s third race at 6 furlongs. . . . Ron McAnally is leaning toward running Bayakoa next in the Chula Vista Handicap at Del Mar on Sept. 2.