Jockey Calvin Borel after Saturday's (May 1, 2010) Kentucky Derby win: "I'm going to win the Triple Crown this year...I'm going all the way...This is the one (Super Saver)".
"Okay with me," winning trainer Todd Pletcher said, smiling, when asked for a response.
Borel Won The Derby For A Record Third Time In Four Years
Neither Arcaro (five Derby wins), nor Hartack (5), nor Shoemaker (4) won the Kentucky Derby three times in four years.
"Until we win it (the Kentucky Derby), we'll have to answer those questions (concerning his 0 for 24 record in nine Derbys)" were words from Pletcher prior to the 136th Run for the Roses.
Then came Calvin Borel suddenly menacing the field through creamy, watery dirt from sixth position, at the rail, on the second favorite, Pletcher's Super Saver, who splashed and dashed as urged with never a faulty step and never minding the puddles and holes and the brown slop splattering his face, seeming as intent on victory as his rider in this 136th Kentucky Derby.
Pletcher added, "...Obviously, it's a race I dreamed my whole life about winning." But afteward, there still was no definitive answer. "I wish I could tell you exactly what we did to make this happen," Pletcher said, but he couldn't.
Perhaps It Was The Hiring Of Calvin Borel
Pletcher admitted that at Churchill Downs Borel is "five lengths better" than his normally "great" riding self. At Churchill, Borel is an established riding champion.
Last season, Borel copy-catted his 2007 Derby rail trip on Street Sense with the little Birdstone gelding Mine That Bird. Borel is such a phenomenal racing rail bird that he carries the nickname "Bo-rai-el".
"We all know what he's going to do," jockey Robby Albarado said post-race on Saturday. "He just does it anyway."
Borel is going to go to the rail unless that's impossible, and then he's going to find a way to go there anyway, like when he was squeezed almost on top of and beyond the fence while exhorting Mine That Bird. He bounced to the 2009 Derby winner's circle with white paint on his left boot, and a handy explanation: "He's a small horse."
"I was just taught it's the shortest way around," Borel said Saturday. He said studying the track and horses at Churchill Downs "helps me".
Yet for all the recent bravado and emotion -- Borel still tears up when the Churchill crowd breaks into the lyrics of My Old Kentucky Home prior to each Derby, and he throws Roses skyward to his parents after each Derby win -- the jockey remains that humble, down home human from Cajun country.
Trainer Valorie Lund Needed A Jockey For Atta Boy Roy
Twenty-six year-training veteran Valorie Lund didn't have a jockey for her Churchill Downs Stakes entry, five-year-old Atta Boy Roy, until she called the track office and was referred to racing secretary Ben Huffman. He suggested Calvin Borel. Lund was stunned. She knew the name Borel, someone who must be "too big" to be interested in her virtually unknown Atta Boy Roy.
Not so, said Huffman. Borel isn't like that. In the end, Lund asked Borel, who says he is always "grateful" to ride, and he took Atta Boy Roy to the rail in the rain and scored in the $290,000 race before his $2 million Kentucky Derby run.
Borel remarked that he had worked Atta Boy Roy twice and was impressed.
Now Lund is considering entering her no longer invisible Atta Boy Roy in the Breeders' Cup races scheduled this season for Churchill Downs November 5 and 6.
Atta boy, Calvin.
BarbaraAnne Helberg - Barbara Anne Helberg, Supporter of Better Lives for Animals and Clean, Spirited, Competitive Sports
