(6 of 7)
Slowdown. The clock that keeps running in Arcaro's head really rang the bell four years ago in the Manhattan Handicap. Arcaro was on Devil Diver, a speed horse. Everybody, including the other jockeys, expected him to set a fast pace, and then collapse long before the mile and a half had been run. Arcaro knew how slow he was going; the others didn't and hung back too. The time for the first mile was incredibly slow. When Arcaro finally let Devil Diver run, he outsprinted the others, winning by 1½ lengths.
Two years ago he stole another long race—the two-mile Jockey Club Gold Cup —exactly the same way. But he isn't always the best rider on every horse. One very good one that he can't ride is Stymie, greatest of the money-earners (with $823,560). He once rode Stymie, whom he says he doesn't "fit," admitted that he must have looked like Ned the Coachman coming down the stretch.
Arcaro's biggest failing used to be his temper. When he got mad during a race, he crashed flagrantly into other horses. He won a reputation as the roughest rider in the business.
One day in 1942, another rider rammed him right after the start of the Cowdin Stakes at Aqueduct. Arcaro saw red. He wheeled his horse out, cracked him with the whip and went after the offender. "I must have done that next eighth in 10 flat," he says. He caught up with the other jockey, Vincent Nodarse, and al most put him over the fence. The stewards called Arcaro up to the stand, asked him if he had done it on purpose, and expected the usual denial. Instead Arcaro blurted: "I'd of killed the son of a bitch if I could." He was suspended for a whole year, and decided to be a good boy. "You know," he says, "I don't even break my golf sticks on the golf course any more."
From Maine to Spain. In the past five years, there has been a marked change from the old roughrider days of Shilling (who used to grab hold of other horses' bridles) and the jockeys who were experts at leg-locking.* It was the moving picture camera that did it. At Jamaica six cameras now record every foot of every race. "It's foolish to try any rough stuff now," says Arcaro. He also gives a large share of credit to gentlemanly Jockey Ted Atkinson, who helped raise the standard of sportsmanship on New York tracks. "Guys will shut him off, but when he gets them in a bad spot later he never takes advantage of it. He kinda set a style."
One man who knows from experience how rough Eddie used to be is Ben-Jones, a pretty rough guy himself. Arcaro, riding for someone else, sometimes crashed horses that Jones was training. Says Eddie: "He's known from Maine to Spain as a tough man. He'd get mad, but he'd cool out." In 16 years, between feuds, Arcaro has ridden just three horses for Ben.