RON MCANALLY & MURRAY FRIEDLANDER
Murray Friedlander and Ron McAnally in 2016
Yet there sits McAnally, joined when conditions permit by his friend and associate of half a century, Murray Friedlander, who, at 92, makes McAnally seem like he still qualifies for a kid’s menu. An Irishman and a Jew, joined at the hip. Call them the Sunshine Boys. Difference is, unlike Neil Simon’s Al Lewis and Willie Clark – a once successful vaudevillian comedy duo known as The Sunshine Boys who, as animosity grew and income turned penurious late in their 43year run, ceased to speak with each other – McAnally and Friedlander never have a row. Even now, with the vestiges of youth but a memory and Father Time counting to 10, they soldier on gracefully. Friedlander calls McAnally “a dear and loyal friend, an excellent professional. He’s in the Hall of Fame, which is well deserved.” “We’ve been friends for 45 years,” allowed McAnally, a member of the hallowed Hall since 1990. “Murray is very intelligent, been all over the world, to all countries, and when we look for horses, he knows which ones fit in the United States, horses with good conformation, good feet, good bones.” One such animal was Northern Spur,
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Murray is very intelligent, been all over the world, to all countries, and when we look for horses, he knows which ones fit in the United States
Ron McAnally
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champion turf horse of 1995. Little wonder Friedlander has played Gabby Hayes to McAnally’s Roy Rogers lo these many years. “We managed to buy Northern Spur, winner of the $2 million Breeders’ Cup Turf at Belmont Park in 1995, for owner Charles Cella. Cella and Ted Bassett were good friends back then and still are today,” McAnally said. “Bassett was scheduled to present a trophy to the winning connections in another race that day but instead he presented it to Cella because of their friendship.
“They both stood in the winner’s circle in tears. Murray was there, too.” But their greatest coup came in the spring of 1992 with Dr Devious, a three-year-old colt trained by McAnally. Sid Craig received the horse as a 60th birthday present from his wife, diet system founder Jenny, who bought Dr Devious for $2.5 million. Hopes were high for the Irish-bred to win the Kentucky Derby, but he could only finish seventh. “Sid called me at a hotel in Louisville after the Kentucky Derby and said, ‘What do you think about him?’” McAnally said. “I told him Dr Devious was a grass horse and we should take him back to England, which we did.” Returned to the stable of his British trainer Peter Chapple-Hyam, he won the Epsom Derby by two lengths. Dr Devious finished first or second in all of his eight starts in Britain through that race. Next out, he was second in the Irish Derby and was found afterwards to be sick. Friedlander was introduced to McAnally by jockey agent Ralph Theroux at a Coney Island restaurant called Lundy’s. Born in Baltimore on July 19, 1924, ISSUE 43 TRAINERMAGAZINE.COM
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