Before Secretariat’s jockey, Ron Turcotte had ridden Secretariat to win the Kentucky Derby, Preakness Stakes and Belmont Stakes, one young man by chance, saw a first glimpse of horse racing history. His life was changed forever.

We had no idea that the Hopeful Stakes at Saratoga race track was the premier race for two-years-olds in the country, or that it’s name was derived from owners hoping their two-year-olds would challenge in the Triple Crown Classics the following spring.
We were just four friends with nothing to do on a Saturday afternoon on the weekend before our classes started at Albany State University in 1972.
One of us, Mike, had a car. And somebody said, “Let’s go to Saratoga.”
I had never been to a thoroughbred racetrack, though I’d been schooled on harness racing at Monticello Raceway near my home in Liberty, N.Y., the heart of the Catskills featuring famed Grossinger’s Hotel.
My three friends were all from Long Island. I think Mike had been to Belmont Park or Aqueduct. I’m not sure about Howie. And I don’t think Owen had ever gone to the races.
So we crammed into Mike’s car and headed up the Northway to Saratoga Springs. None of us had ever been there.
About to begin our sophomore years in college, we were clever enough to find our way to the racetrack without asking anyone for directions. But why, we wondered, was the parking lot completely empty on a Saturday? Earlier that day, in a brief moment of intelligence, one of us had actually purchased an Albany newspaper to make sure Saratoga was open.
We stood outside the car and puzzled it out.
“Well, there can’t be two racetracks in the same city,” one of us, I’m afraid it might have been me, said.
After a couple minutes we deduced that there must be two racetracks.
We, of course, had driven to Saratoga Harness, not Saratoga Race Course.
Saratoga Race Course in 1972 was not as popular as present-day Saratoga, but there was a pretty good-sized crowd when we located the right racetrack, which is literally across the street from Saratoga Harness.
I don’t remember what race we got there for, but I sure remember that it was well before the feature race that afternoon, a stakes called the Hopeful for two-year-old colts.
There was a big favorite named Secretariat. I didn’t bet the race, but Howie and Mike each put up $1 to bet a 99-1 shot to show who didn’t quite get there.
I will never forget watching the Hopeful from the track apron. Even without binoculars or a jumbo video screen, it was easy to see that Secretariat had gotten away last.
He then engulfed the entire field of horses in front of him racing maybe five wide on the turn and won easily.
I was hooked for life. Howie, who now lives in Maryland, was, too. Every spring, my son and I go to visit him and enjoy Preakness weekend at Pimlico; every August, he comes back to upstate New York for the Travers Stakes.
Thanks to a man who quickly became a good friend, Secretariat’s former jockey, Ron Turcotte, I got another look at the 1972 Hopeful in Ronnie’s den while I was working on Ronnie’s biography, “The Will To Win.” The race was as spectacular as I had remembered. Getting to watch it in slow motion with Ronnie was an added delight.
Ronnie, of course, had ridden Secretariat to win the Kentucky Derby, Preakness Stakes and Belmont Stakes in 1973, making Secretariat the first Triple Crown winner in 25 years.
The three races were spectacular. In the Derby, Secretariat rallied from last to first, posting the fastest Derby ever by running each quarter mile in the mile and a quarter Classic progressively faster. Horses just don’t to that. They get tired during a race.
Secretariat’s Preakness may have been Ronnie’s greatest ride. Sensing a developing slow pace, Ronnie shot Secretariat to the lead with a sudden whoosh on the first turn, going from last to first in the blink of an eye, then holding that lead safe to again beat his rival Sham, who had also finished second in the Kentucky Derby.
In the week leading up to the Belmont Stakes, Secretariat posted another triple, gracing the covers of Time, Newsweek and Sports Illustrated in the same week. Then Secretariat delivered the most dominant performance in Triple Crown history, not only winning the Belmont Stakes to become the first Triple Crown winner since Citation in 1948, but winning by 31 lengths and setting a world record of 2:24 for the mile and a half.
In the 133 runnings of the Belmont Stakes before and after Secretariat, the closest any winner has come to 2:24 was 2:26 posted by Easy Goer in 1989 and A.P. Indy in 1992. In horse racing, a fifth of a second is equivalent to one length. Easy Goer, who won his Belmont Stakes by eight lengths, and A.P. Indy, who won his by just three-quarters of a length, would have finished 10 lengths behind Secretariat.
The Hopeful had been a glimpse of future greatness. To this day, I still can’t believe how lucky I was to go to Saratoga that August afternoon with nothing to do.
Bill Heller