Flightline runs at Del Mar Saturday. Don't blink.
He's been brilliant in three races, but don't expect a long career.
John Sadler (pictured with jockey Flavian Prat) says he feels like LeBron James’ high school coach when he puts the saddle on Flightline.
The difference is that James kept playing.
Flightline goes to the post for the fifth time in his career at Del Mar Saturday. He runs in the Pacific Classic, at a mile and a quarter. This will be his first Trip Around Two Turns, a legendary fork in the dirt. Since Flightline has won his first three races by a total of 43 lengths, most people don’t foresee a problem.
“The great ones like Flightline and American Pharoah and the others, they take the track with them,” said Bob Baffert, who trains Country Grammer, the second choice.
Country Grammer has a royal resume, too, longer than Flightline’s. He won the Dubai World Cup at a mile and a half, and won the Gold Cup at Santa Anita at the same distance.
But Flightline has posted ungodly Beyer Speed Figures of 105, 114, 118 and 112 in his wins, and in June he showed he could take some dirt in his face at the Met Mile and still win by six.
Unfortunately, Flightline’s story will probably be a novella, or maybe a TikTok video. By the time the general sporting public drags its head out of its fantasy league standings and notices Flightline, he’ll be enjoying the good life in a Kentucky stud barn.
His next race, depending on Saturday, will be in the Breeders Cup Classic. Although the beginning of 2023 brings some high-buck events, that could well be it.
“That’s the reality of the business end of it,” said Gary Stevens, the Hall of Fame jockey, “They’ve done a great job with Flightline. John has spaced out his races very well. They’re careful with him.”
Such realities deprive horse racing of the one method it can use to grab eyeballs: The charisma of a great horse. Although Del Mar is having a prosperous meet with an average of 9.2 horses per field, best in the nation, the industry itself is waving frantically for attention and gulping for oxygen.
Arrogate and Gun Runner were just as capable of seizing imaginations, but they ran after the Triple Crown races, did their thing, and then faded on out. Justify, the most recent Triple Crown winner, ran six times all told.
That makes the story of Cigar, and the times in which he races, so poignant.
Cigar was the last horse before Flightline to go into the Pacific Classic as a 1-to-5 morning line favorite. Preface this by pointing out that Cigar actually lost that day in 1996, to Dare And Go, whose trainer, Richard Mandella, has Extra Hope in this year’s version.
Cigar lured 44,181 to Del mar that day. He had won 16 consecudtive races, tying Citation’s record. When he was flown into Ontario Airport and then driven to Del Mar, the TV stations sent their ‘copters to follow him, like he was in O.J. Simpson’s Bronco. People stood on the overpasses and waved. Really. For a horse.
Cigar retired in November of that year and took a walk down Seventh Avenue in Manhattan, as he visited the National Horse Show. They cleared out the streets to let him prance. Fans who weren’t overly excited about Bill Clinton or Bob Dole waved “Cigar For President” signs.
That’s what happens when the business is lucky enough to find a superstar who is infertile. Cigar won two Horse of the Year awards, was named Horse of the Decade, nearly became the first horse to earn $10 million, and didn’ t hang it up until he was six. He died at 24, in 2014.
Zenyatta had that type of magnetism when she won 19 of 20 races, became the first filly to win the Breeders’ Cup Classic, and also raced until she was six.
Maybe it’s the hunger to find brilliance in the game, but you hear some staggering comparisons when you mention Flightline. Some folks go back to Spectacular Bid in 1980.
Others point to Ghostzapper, another relative comet who won nine of 11 races, including the Breeders Cup Classic at age four in 2004. He might have continued, but broke a sesamoid bone and was retired the next year.
Trainer Bobby Frankel waved a friend over, before that Classic win, and said, “This horse here, he doesn’t breathe the same air as those other horses.”
That is apprxoimately what trainer Mark Glatt said when he watched Flightline take his debut by 13 1/4 lengths.
“I’m not sure ‘superstar’ is the right word,” Glatt said.
“The parallel with Ghostzapper is that you don’t know what the comparable is yet,” Sadler said, grinning. “But when he’s working, he loooks like he’s doing it so effortlessly. He’s still going with great power. A lot of times I’ll look at the watch and be surprised at what he’s done.
“His temperament is good. To train, he’s very aggressive. Early on he’d pull a llittle hard, but he’s matured. They always loved him at the farm level, and that hasn’t changed.’”
Flightline isn’t good by coincidence. His mare is Feathered, whose dad was Indian Charlie, an excellent sire whom Baffert once trained. Breeder Jane Lyon of Summer Wind paid $2.35 million to get Feathered, then bred her to Tapit, whose progeny includes four Belmont Stakes winners and who demands the highest stud fees in racing. Tapit also sired Unique Bella, who set a blistering pace in becoming the champion female sprinter in 2017.
The Feathered-Tapit rendezvous produced Flightline. He was sold for $1 million to a consortium that included Summer Wind, West Point Thoroughbreds, Woodford Racing, Siena Farm and Hronis Racing, which has teamed with Sadler to win three of the past four Pacific Classics, including Tripoli in 2021.
“I love to watch horses like this,” Baffert said. “Even when I didn’t have a horse running against her, I would go watch all of Zenyatta’s races. Del Mar itself can be a gimmicky track. Some horses don’t care for it, like Arrogate. But the really good ones can zip around these turns pretty well. This place can really carry a speed horse.”
Baffert said he enjoyed being a huge favorite “because there’s more margin for error.” He also said he will be far more relaxed with Country Grammer than he was with his sure things. These have been bruising years for Baffert, who has been suspended, had a Kentucky Derby win by Medina Spirit voided, and watched other trainers take his horses to the gate. He said he’ll always be in debt to Country Grammer for winning the Gold Cup in the midst of it all.
“This horse steps up, and he’s given me the biggest thrills,” said Baffert who, after all, has won two Triple Crowns. “Him winning the Gold Cup, that was when I really needed a picker-upper. We’re not just going to go out there to give it to Flightline. But Flightline is the kind of horse this sport needs.”
“I’ve said it before,” Sadler said. “This horse has never hidden his talent.”
Everything gets exposed on Saturday, including the yearning for a galloping plot to thicken.