American Pharoah Breeder’s Cup Classic 2015
choosing a special handful yearlings of auction each year and then the subsequent development of those youngsters. Arrogate had been a $560,000 purchase from breeder Clearsky Farms at the Keeneland September sale, and a delay to his career could not have been welcome news. But both Baffert and O’Rourke thought there could be better days ahead if they gave him time to mature. “I remember calling Garrett around October (just before American Pharoah’s Breeders’ Cup Classic). I said, ‘Garrett, I think I’ve found one that’s going to pay for all of them.’ I said, ‘I think we’ve stumbled on to a really good horse,’ ” Baffert related. “And he showed run as a two-year-old, (but) he had some shin problems. He was a big, tall horse, so Garrett said, ‘You know what, just give him the time. Don’t worry about it.’ ” Their patience was rewarded, even though Arrogate did not make his first career start - and this puts the Classic into even a sharper perspective - until three weeks after California Chrome had captured this year’s $10 million Dubai World Cup in a performance that catapulted him to the top of the World’s Best Racehorse Rankings. Arrogate’s debut at Los Alamitos Race Course was not sparkling. After breaking slowly, he found himself in tight quarters around the far turn until he produced a rally that came up short. He finished third, a half-length and a neck behind the winner, Westbrook, who has not been able to win again since then. 44
INTERNATIONAL RACEHORSE
However, Arrogate has proved unstoppable after that entrance to racing, and he blitzed through a maiden event at Santa Anita and allowance races at that track and Del Mar prior to Baffert shooting at bigger targets. Despite what happened with American Pharoah at Saratoga in 2015, Baffert sent Arrogate to the Travers for what was his first-ever run in stakes competition. With Preakness winner Exaggerator and Belmont winner Creator in the field of 13, it was a most demanding assignment - at least on paper. Once Arrogate left the starting gate, only stable mate American Freedom and Laoban briefly went ahead of them. Soon, Arrogate was bounding along in front, setting strong fractions but never seeming to take a deep breath. The chart of the Travers includes phrases like “extended his stride” and “widened away,” but those words don’t come close to the power of the performance, which Arrogate accomplished in only 1:59.36 and by 13 ½ lengths. It was the fastest Travers performance in the 147 years the venerated race has been run. “I still can’t believe the way he kept on rolling. It was just incredible,” Baffert said. Defying the conventional path that other trainers might have taken had they possessed a colt like Arrogate and with a target like the Breeders’ Cup Classic, Baffert decided to just train him from the Travers on August 27 to the Classic on