On Track
BOBBY
They finally wrote a race he couldn’t win.
He tried, and didn’t go down without a fight. As usual.
For roughly 17 years he battled Lymphoma stride for stride without attention, fanfare or concessions--sometimes he’d open up a commanding lead, other times it was neck and neck.
Even in this ‘age of information’ very few people knew he was ill. How could they? During that timeframe he crafted his greatest work, won his biggest races, and cemented his legacy as ‘one of the ones.’
About six months ago, when he no longer could make it to the barn and word spread that he was gravely ill, calls, faxes, e-mails and text messages flooded in from around the world with good wishes. Bobby ignored them. He didn’t want the attention, the fuss, the bull.
In the end it wasn’t a fair fight; the distance and spread in weights were all wrong.
Woody, Charlie, and Bobby all are Hall-of-Famer trainers who don’t need last names. Their mugs ought to be carved into some modern Thoroughbred trainer Mount Rushmore. Go ahead and feel free to add D. Wayne’s countenance if you like.
Everyone in racing will miss Bobby. His passing creates a void we’ll never fill.
What will racing secretaries across the nation do without Bobby bashing their condition books and handicap weights? Who will journalists turn to for sarcastic comments? Where will jockey agents go for a daily dose of humiliation? How will young riders learn their craft without Bobby’s critical but instructive comments? And, most importantly, what will the horses do without him? No other trainer, none, nada, zip, zero, trains a racehorse as well as Bobby did. The tail and mane set would wear black armbands if they could.
For roughly 25 years, I saw or spoke with Bobby nearly every day. His tack room was one of the first stops I would make on my daily rounds as a jockey agent on the SoCal racing circuit. Not that he ever had much use for some of the riders I represented over the years. I usually visited because a person could learn more about racing, politics, sports, religion, current events, pop culture, etc in a half-hour with Bobby than they could by watching CNN, MTV and ESPN simultaneously the rest of the day. With Bobby you didn’t just get the news; you got opinions, angles, and takes you wouldn’t hear anywhere else.
By now, I’m sure you’ve read lots of accolades for Bobby, and the ones I’ve seen are pretty much on the mark. There’s not much else to say except for me to share some of my favorite Bobby moments. If you look beneath the surface, past the f-bombs and right through the biting tone, you’ll learn about racing, life, and Bobby’s unique personality.
- On being a jockey agent: “Don’t ever tell that rider anything about how to ride. Keep your mouth shut and let him ride. What the hell do you know about race-riding anyway?”
- On Thanksgiving: “Where you going?”
“Home, it’s Thanksgiving. I’m going to have dinner with the family.”
“Thanksgiving? What the f--- do you have to be thankful for?”
- Once, when I was in a personal bind and needed $10,000 immediately (actually, like yesterday), I asked Bobby to lend me the money. “Come by this afternoon and I’ll have a check for you.”
A few years later, when I handed him a check to repay the loan, he opened the check, looked at it and said, “This is great. I never dreamt I’d ever see this f---ing money again.”
- When Exbourne, perhaps Bobby’s all-time favorite horse, injured himself, Bobby refused to send the horse anywhere else to recover. Instead, Exbourne remained in a stall under Bobby’s shedrow and was nursed back to health through constant round-the-clock care that lasted for months.
- On why, even though we were friends, Bobby wouldn’t ride some of the jockeys I represented over the years: “You know sports. If one guy’s a .300 hitter and the other guy bats .200, one’s better than the other. Who the f--- you ‘gonna use?”
- When his closest friend and canine companion Tasha died, I called Bobby to deliver my condolences. He was so overcome with uncharacteristic emotion that he wept.
- Often, after pontificating on a specific topic, Bobby would turn to his audience and, in that Brooklyn accent he thankfully ‘nevah’ lost, would ask rhetorically: “Am I right or am I right?”
- On why Bobby would become apoplectic with racing secretaries over a measly pound in a handicap race: “Bobby, a horse weighs over a thousand pounds. You really think a pound is going to make a difference?”
“If I get beat a f----ing nose, a pound less might make the difference.”
- When one of Bobby’s stable crew hit a rough spot and needed help, it wasn’t unusual for him to instruct his bookkeeper to cut an extra check with implicit instructions that it didn’t come from him. After all, it’s difficult to remain an ogre if everyone knows you’ve got a generous heart. That’s one reason many of his help stayed loyal to him for over 30 years.
- For the ’92 Breeders’ Cup at Gulfstream Park, Bobby and I planned to ride together to the track. When he opened his hotel room door he wrinkled his brow at me. “You ain’t going to the races with me dressed like that.”
I looked down at my jacket, shirt, tie and pants, “Why, what’s wrong?”
“You look like sh--.” He threw an olive Armani suit at me, “Try this on.”
I put on the suit and Bobby declared, “Now we can go to the races. In fact, keep the suit. You look better in it than I do.”
- Early on in my racing career, when I was a wet-behind-the-ears member of the Santa Anita publicity staff I took a memorable elevator ride from the press box to the ground floor with Bobby, who had just lost a stakes race by a nose. He was pounding the elevator walls and cursing. I don’t know where I found the courage to speak, but I did. “You’ll get ‘em next time,” I said. Bobby raised his eyebrows and bugged his eyes at me, “Next time?” he yelled. “There may never be a f---ing next time. Today was the day.”
Finally, thirty years later, Bobby’s right again; sadly, there won’t be a next time.
Race On!