An obscure colt upsets a famed favorite in the Belmont
One gray, rainy dawn last week, a virtually unknown colt named Summing started the slow walk from the barn on the backstretch at New York's Belmont Park. Ominous clouds were lowering as Summing jogged onto the training track. Then an exercise rider set him down on the rail, and Summing began to run. Railbirds could not believe their eyes, and the track's dockers stared at their watches in amazement. The bay colt pounded through the mist at a sizzling pace, and when he flashed past the mile pole Summing had set a new training track record, 1 min. 374/5 sec. Four days later, Summing proved that his startling workout was no fluke. He won the Belmont Stakes in convincing style to crush the Triple Crown hopes of Kentucky Derby and Preakness Winner Pleasant Colony, who finished third. Instead of becoming the twelfth Triple Crown champion, Pleasant Colony is now the tenth horse to win the first two legs of the Crown only to be beaten in the Belmont.
Summing's mere presence in the race was almost as surprising as his victory. His early-winter performances this racing season had been so unimpressive that at one point, he was dropped from stakes competition and entered in a simple allowance race. Then it was discovered that Summing was suffering from a blood infection, and he was forced to skip the Derby and the Preakness. Two weeks before the Belmont, he traveled to Keystone Race Track near Philadelphia for the Pennsylvania Derby. A solid win there convinced Trainer
Luis Barrera to try for the Belmont.
Though no one doubted Summing's speed, the colt benefited most from an unusually slow pace during the early stages of the race. Jockeys, fearful of spending their horses too early over the grueling 1½ mile distance ambled through the first three-quarters of a mile in a somnolent 1 min. 141/5 sec. By that time, Jockey George Martens, 22, had Summing snugged into the rail, running easily on the lead under a tight rein. Martens, content to rock along, peered over his shoulder repeatedly, looking for a challenge from Pleasant Colony. Finally, as the horses headed into the home stretch, Summing would wait no longer. He burst into a four-length lead. Said Martens: "He just dragged me out front." When Pleasant Colony finally made his move, it was too little, too late. Highland Blade closed to finish second by a neck, and Pleasant Colony was fading as he came to the wire 1½ lengths behind the leader. Summing, who paid $17.80 to win, finished in 2 min. 29 sec., one of the slower times in the 113-year history of the Belmont.
Owner Charles T. Wilson Jr., a Mexico City businessman, did not know that his colt would even be entered in the Belmont until Barrera told him of his plans after the Pennsylvania Derby. Said Wilson: "I've been in racing long enough to try to be dumb about these things. An owner's principal function is to pay his bills." With a fat Belmont purse of $170,580 safely tucked away, paying the bills will be no problem.