Seabiscuit

Ligaroti’s loss to Seabiscuit did not sit well with Lin Howard, who wanted to step out of his father’s shadow by beating his horse. Ligaroti had been bumped early in the Gold Cup race and never had a chance. Shortly afterward, over dinner with his father and Bing Crosby, Lin proposed a match race between their two horses. Charles Howard brushed it off at first, but Crosby liked the idea. He had invested in a new track near San Diego that could use the publicity, and he knew he could arrange the race there. Eventually, Howard warmed to the idea. Crosby set it up for August 12, with a $25,000 purse. Since the two Howards owned the horses and Smith’s son was Ligaroti’s trainer, the potential for a conflict of interest existed, so the state barred public betting. 

In the race, both horses started fast and stayed together much of the way. Their pace after one mile was two seconds below the track record. Ligaroti was holding his own going in to the homestretch, and his jockey, Spec Richardson, was yelling at Woolf to try to distract him. Then Ligaroti began to give out slightly, leaning toward Seabiscuit and pinning Woolf’s horse on the rail. Richardson knew his horse couldn’t hold out, so he used dirty tricks to keep up. First, he grabbed onto Seabiscuit’s saddlecloth, letting him pull Ligaroti along. Woolf was incredulous and screamed at Richardson while Ligaroti pulled even. Then Richardson let go just long enough to grab Woolf’s whip hand. He followed that by hooking his leg around Woolf’s, an old trick that prevented Seabiscuit from going ahead without dragging Richardson off his mount. As Hillenbrand writes, “The Howards’ sporting gesture had disintegrated into a back-alley brawl” (244). The only thing Woolf could do was try to pull Ligaroti back. He grabbed the horse’s bridle and, just before the wire, pulled up and to the left so that Seabiscuit could poke his nose across first. 

Richardson immediately accused Woolf of fouling him. The stewards on the infield had seen everything and began an inquiry. Woolf admitted what he had done but claimed it was only defensive because of all the fouls Richardson had committed. The ruling came back: Woolf’s foul was disregarded and Seabiscuit was the winner. The next morning, however, the stewards decide to punish both jockeys hard. They suspended each for the rest of the meeting and recommended that the state officials ban them from all races for the rest of the year. However, they refused to discuss it more and would not reveal what prompted their action. Aware of the sport’s not-so-distant scandals, they wanted to quietly move on. The press would have none of it, though, and immediately assumed they were covering something up. 

Soon an anonymously written article appeared, accusing Howard of instructing Woolf to keep the race tight and Richardson of fouling Woolf to make good on a bet he had placed. Both jockeys disavowed the article. Although what it claimed wasn’t actually illegal (as long as Woolf did not intend to throw the race, he could win by as much or as little as he wanted), it threatened to become a scandal. Howard was livid and summoned a group of reporters to read them the riot act. Eventually, the incident was defused when Lin Howard discovered that someone had filmed the race. Believing that his jockey did not do anything to merit a lengthy suspension, he bought the film and invited journalists to come watch it to clear up the matter. To his surprise, it showed just the opposite. The press then began clamoring for Woolf’s suspension to be overturned. Finally, the state officials decided to end the whole affair by not suspending either jockey. With this finally behind him, Howard decided to go east again in search of War Admiral.  

While many had given up on the idea of a race between Seabiscuit and War Admiral, Alfred Vanderbilt had not. He took it upon himself to negotiate a deal between Howard and Riddle one way or another. Pimlico, however, was not a rich track and could only put up a $15,000 purse, so Vanderbilt appealed to the fact that it would be the most popular race possible at that time and fans would know the owners were doing it for sport and bragging rights, not just a windfall. Riddle agreed if Howard would accept certain specific terms, which included starting from a walk-up position, not a gate. Though it would seem to benefit War Admiral, Howard agreed to this and all the demands. Smith added two of his own—that the race begin with a bell, not a flag, and that no assistant handlers be present to quiet the horses at the gate. Riddle had no problems with either, and both owners signed contracts with a $5,000 forfeit fee.

Smith was confident now that he had trained Seabiscuit to start faster. Woolf consulted with Pollard for how to approach the race. Pollard first assured him that if he pushed Seabiscuit early on, he would beat War Admiral off the start. Second, once Seabiscuit got a lead, he recommended pulling him up a little. The reason was that when the horse was out front, he could get lazy thinking he had the race won, but if he saw his competitor close behind, he would run harder and win a test of wills with any horse.

Smith started training his horse at Pimlico. The first thing he did was listen to the starter’s bell. It sounded to him like an alarm clock, so to train Seabiscuit he rigged up a wooden box with an alarm clock attached to a button that triggered it. As the horses trained over the next month, Hillenbrand writes, “America hung in midair” (258). The press debated who would win the race, and the public talked constantly about it. Both teams were tense with expectation. When it came time to draw the starting positions, War Admiral drew the rail, giving him yet another apparent advantage. The Riddle barn was confident. They knew Smith was working on Seabiscuit to improve his starts, but no horse broke from the start faster than War Admiral.

The night before the race, Woolf went out on the track alone with a flashlight to test the conditions. It was still a bit damp from rains earlier that week, and he knew Seabiscuit ran best on a dry, hard track. As he walked, he felt a small track that felt firmer than the rest. It was a path made from the wheel of a tractor that had pulled equipment to treat the track. It went all the way around, a few feet from the rail. Woolf memorized its location and planned to guide Seabiscuit into it the next day.

Vanderbilt had scheduled race day for November 1, a Tuesday, hoping a weekday would limit the spectators since Pimlico’s stands held only 16,000. But on race day, the crowds kept coming: the grandstand and clubhouse held 30,000 people while the infield held 10,000 more. Another 10,000 gathered outside the track, climbing onto anything that would give them a glimpse. In addition, 40 million people nationwide listened to the radio broadcast, including President Roosevelt. 

At mid-afternoon, the horses arrived to get saddled up. Everyone was tense except Woolf, who stayed true to his nickname, the Iceman. He tried to tweak War Admiral’s famously high-strung nature by taking Seabiscuit on an extended warm-up run. The starter tried to call him back, but Woolf ignored him. Finally ready, he returned to the starting line. When the bell went off, the horses surged at the same time. War Admiral gave his all, but Seabiscuit stayed with him, even taking a small lead at the 16th of a mile mark, which soon turned into two lengths. Woolf then found the path from the tractor wheel and got Seabiscuit on it. Charley Kurtsinger, War Admiral’s jockey, wasn’t worried; he was on the Triple Crown winner and they had worked on building the horse’s stamina. At this pace, he figured, Seabiscuit would tire.

At the first turn, Woolf reined Seabiscuit in slightly, following Pollard’s advice, and War Admiral moved a bit to the outside to make his move. In the backstretch, Kurtsinger drew him up until the two horses were even. War Admiral was going all out, both horses eyeing each other, and then nudged ahead of Seabiscuit. Woolf asked Seabiscuit for more, and the horse gave it. The horses stayed together briefly before War Admiral started falling behind. Seabiscuit extended his lead and won by four lengths. Woolf would later say he felt bad for War Admiral: he had seen that the horse was indeed game, fighting all the way. He told a reporter, “Horses, mister, can have crushed hearts just like humans” (274).

Crowds mobbed the track, and it took a police cordon to get Seabiscuit and his team to the winner’s circle. Seabiscuit had set a track record for the distance run. After a wreath of flowers was placed on the horse’s neck, Smith—uncharacteristically jubilant—removed it and threw it into the crowd. Howard was beside himself with joy, but he had more to accomplish. Though Seabiscuit would soon turn six, a bit old for racehorses, Howard still had his sights on winning the Santa Anita Handicap. Up in Boston, Pollard was thrilled with the victory. He told a friend that Seabiscuit had “made a Rear Admiral out of War Admiral” (277).