Raja, Story of a Racehorse

by Anne Hambleton

  Bob just shook his head, amused.

  “They’re going to the post. Look, there they are, there’s Alex and Max.”

  As the horses went to the post, the crowd began to sing. Michelle sang along, “The sun shines bright on my old Kentucky home.”

  We watched as, one by one, they were loaded into the starting gate. It was strange to be watching rather than going into the gate myself, but I felt my heart beat a little faster anyway.

  Come on Max, you can do it!

  And they were off! Max ran fourth for most of the way with Annapurna in second. Rounding the final turn, Max moved up to third, then, in the home stretch, he burst ahead to reach Annapurna, who had taken over the lead. They dueled it out, head to head, going under the wire together. Pedro and the grooms went wild, while Piewacket and Muttley ran around in circles in a barking frenzy. After a few tense minutes, we heard that Annapurna had won in a photo finish.

  Annapurna! Max almost won the Kentucky Derby! I’m faster than Max. I could have been a Derby winner.

  “Max isn’t going to the Preakness. Alex wants to save him for the Belmont Stakes — thinks he’ll do better with the distance. Have to say I agree. Max is a stayer. He’s got one lick and that’s it. The longer distance should suit him,” Bob told the vet a few days later when he came to check on me.

  “Hey, Bob, you see the Preakness?” Pedro called as he walked into the shed row at the farm a few days later. “I didn’t get back early enough from dropping off that broodmare. Dang. I heard it on the radio. I can’t believe Annapurna won again. How’d he go? Good enough to win the Triple Crown? I can’t believe that no one has won it since Affirmed, 30 years ago. Belmont Stakes gon’ be exciting.”

  The day of the Belmont Stakes, Bob pulled the old television out of the office, banging it with his fist. We could see the rain pouring down hard. I knew that Max would do well. The tougher the footing, the tougher he got. What he lacked in a final kick of speed, he made up for in endurance and grit.

  And they were off! Max sat in Annapurna’s pocket just off his hind end and close to the two front runners for most of the race. When they started really running after the final turn, he dug deep, keeping up head to head with Annapurna. It was a long and muddy stretch run. Then he looked Annapurna in the eye, the way I used to do with him. Annapurna began to falter. Max dug deeper. By now, even Bob and Michelle were screaming. And he did! He beat Annapurna by two lengths, denying him a Triple Crown victory.

  “That was the best race ever!” Michelle raved, red in the face, glowing from the excitement. She hugged and kissed Bob, who turned to me and patted me on the neck.

  “Raja, aren’t you proud of Max? You’d have won the whole darn Triple Crown.”

  I AM so proud of Max, but… I could have won the Triple Crown, I know it!

  I fretted all night, crushed that my chance for greatness was gone.

  August, Ocala, Florida

  “Let’s do a little gate schooling,” Bob instructed one day a couple months after the Preakness Stakes. By now, I was back in work, jogging and cantering on the track with Pedro in the steamy Florida mornings. We walked up to the starting gate, but when Pedro urged me in, all I could think of was the Florida Derby. Being trapped when I needed to escape, and the blackness.

  I just can’t go in.

  Pedro and Bob worked patiently with me for two hours. Every day it was the same. They covered my eyes, even tried to lure me with grain, but I just couldn’t go in.

  November, Ocala, Florida

  The energy around the farm seemed off. Bob stayed in his office watching the news on his television, more tense than I had ever seen him.

  “The Sheikh and Princess Ayesha need to go home to their country because there’s political unrest,” Bob told Pedro glumly. “The Sheikh’s keeping the farm for now but scaling down. He’s asked me to start looking for buyers for some of the broodmares and yearlings. We’d love to have you stay on, but you’ll have to work part time.”

  He looked over to my stall. “We have to figure out what to do with Raja. I hate to just turn him out for the rest of his life. What a waste — he’s so talented.”

  Will I be sold? I want to race badly, but I just can’t go into the gate. What future is there for a racehorse that can’t go in the starting gate?

  “Won’t you let me try to make Raja into a jumper?” Michelle responded when Bob told her the news. “If he can’t go to stud and won’t go in the starting gate, what value is he to the Sheikh? He’s still an incredible athlete. I’d give anything for him.”

  “Good idea, I’ll ask the Sheikh. He may even give him to you. He’d get a kick out of it if Raja ends up at the Olympics. You might have to learn Arabic, move to the Middle East and change your nationality if he really is Olympic material,” Bob joked.

  “Hey, guess who’s buying Max — Flash Jackson! He’s sending him to stud.”

  4

  Jumpers

  January, Ocala, Florida

  “He sure is good lookin’, ain’t he?” drawled Speedy, the stable hand, towering over his broom, thin and lanky as a whip. Five Jack Russell terriers sat around him on the perfectly swept, dark green rubber-tiled center aisle of the long barn, watching in anticipation as he slowly put his hand into his pocket and tossed a handful of corn-smelling goodies to them. The dogs excitedly raced after them, gobbled them up, and looked up at him once more, tails wagging. A row of well-groomed horses looked over their stall doors curiously at me as Bob led me into the barn and handed me to Oakley, Michelle’s tanned, fit-looking young assistant. Above the polished brass-and-wood stall fronts, a row of brightly colored shiny strips of cloth, mostly blue and red with gold lettering, fluttered in the breeze that was wafting through the barn.

  “He sure is,” Oakley replied, pushing his blond hair out of his eyes and wiping his hands on his breeches before leading me past a row of neatly arranged tack trunks, past a big wash stall lined with bottles of shampoo, brushes and a tidy stack of folded towels and past the curious horses, to a woodsy-smelling stall filled with shavings. Bob and Speedy followed, with the pack of terriers close on their heels. After he put me in the stall, Oakley stood with Speedy, admiring me.

  “He’s huge. And beautiful! Wow! What a powerful looking hind end. I’ll bet he can jump. That’s an interesting marking on his forehead. Like a scythe. I’ve never seen that before. Those are some impressive scars on his hind leg, too. It must have been some accident.”

  “It was a bad one. He’s had time off. Now he’s ready for a new job.”

  Bob cleared his throat as he gave me a lingering pat. “I guess I’d better get going. Good bye, Raja. I’m gonna miss you.”

  Sticking my head over the outside stall door and chewing on a mouthful of the alfalfa that I found in the corner, I watched the van drive away with a frenzied white-and-brown dust cloud of Jack Russell terriers chasing it away, barking furiously.

  Speedy shook his head. “Dumb dawgs are gon’ get smushed, I’m tellin’ ya.”

  That night after supper, my new neighbor, Holzmann, a small, black, athletic-looking horse, struck up a conversation with me.

  “We heard that one of the Sheikh’s horses almost won the Kentucky Derby. Did you know him?” He seemed to know that I was a racehorse. I nodded.

  Max. He was my best friend.

  “Well, you won’t ever go that fast again,” exclaimed Holzmann, “but those big timed jump-offs can be pretty fun. It’s nice to see another Thoroughbred in here. I was feeling a bit outnumbered by the Warmbloods. I started out racing myself, you know. I’m very well bred, but I never really liked racing all that much. I hated all of that jostling and bumping and mud in your face. It just seemed rough and it wasn’t intellectually challenging. I’m fast, but I just didn’t see the point.” He paused to scratch his nose, rubbing it on the side of the stall door. “On the other hand, I love being a jumper. Michelle got me because she had one of my half-brothers. Turns out my family are all amazing jumpers. Lots o
f Thoroughbreds are, you know.” He rubbed his nose again on the stall door. “We horses figure out pretty quickly whether we want to race or not. No one can force us to run. If we’re too slow or don’t like to race, we usually find other careers like showing, eventing, foxhunting, trail riding, even polo.”

  I had no idea there were so many other careers.

  What about the horses that can’t have other careers, the lame ones?

  Holzmann looked at me sadly. “You don’t want to know. Usually they move farther and farther down the line, often getting abused along the way. The lucky ones get adopted as pets, or companions for other horses or go to special retirement farms. The unlucky ones go to the auction and are sold to the killers for meat.”

  Meat? He can’t possibly be right.

  “And don’t get me started on Warmbloods.” He rolled his eyes. “They act so superior. Sport horses, they’re called. I have to admit — they’re good jumpers.” Holzmann stopped to yawn, sighed a deep, rumbling sigh, and continued,“I’ve been to all of the big international shows: Aachen, Dublin, Hickstead, the World Championships and the Olympics. Michelle and I won the silver medal, second best in the world. I like the concentration and the precision of show jumping. It’s a thinking-horse’s sport. Now I’m retired and I teach Michelle’s better students.”

  “Don’t let him fool you,” chimed in a grey almost white, pony in the next stall, “He just likes to show off for the crowd. Give him an audience and he’ll go like a champ. At home, with no one watching, he acts like a two-year old. I’ve seen him buck off more than one of those kids he claims to be ‘teaching.’”

  “Speak for yourself, Shorty,” Holzmann retorted. “You’re vainer than everyone.”

  The pony laughed good-naturedly.

  “I’m Farnley Prism. I take kids to big horse shows and win blue ribbons for them. Short stirrup, pony hunter, equitation, you name it. I’m famous. Everyone knows me. I teach kids about winning and I give them confidence. If they can halfway ride, they’ll win with me. And if they can’t ride, I’ll take care of them and teach them. Michelle doesn’t usually coach pony hunter riders, but her niece, Grace, is riding me now.”

  Prism giggled mischievously, as though she enjoyed stirring things up, then winked at me with her white eyelashes and big eyes. “Unlike Lord Holzmann, who finds it amusing to buck off anyone who gets on him, I was taught that the mark of a well-bred horse is kindness and patience. After all, I’m a Farnley pony, one of the best Welsh pony families.”

  Holzmann rolled his eyes again. “See what I have to put up with? Over there is L’Etoile du Nord — “Toile” for short. She’s a Selle Français and used to be owned by someone on the French Olympic team. Michelle has some rich owners who want her to win the gold medal so they buy her nice horses. Toile doesn’t say much, but she’s a very good jumper and she adores Michelle.”

  The big chestnut mare looked over at me with a guarded look and nodded slightly. I felt a twinge of jealousy.

  Minty-smelling, tingly, warm baths, every day.

  Oh, how I love them!

  Michelle tried on several of the strange big saddles to make sure that one fit my back perfectly. And the fussing! It made me feel like I was really special. At least

  30 minutes a day grooming, boots on for turn-out to protect my legs, and the massage lady once a week to keep my muscles loose. I usually fell asleep when she came.

  Speedy sang along with the radio as he flicked the two dandy brushes in a rhythmic motion across my back.

  I relaxed, enjoying his singing and the scratchy sensation of the brushes and smelling the delicious salty corn chips he always carried. I reached around and stuck my nose in his pocket looking for them. Speedy just laughed. “You sly dawg. OK, here’s a treat.”

  Thick saddle pad and saddle on. Hoof polish, mane brushed down with water, a wipe with a soft rub rag, a final squirt of fly spray and it was time to train.

  “I told you that he’d be good. He’s so smart and athletic,” Michelle told Oakley as he watched her ride me. The springy sand underfoot, mixed with bits of rubber, made me want to show off my fancy walk and trot as Michelle rode me around the big arena, stopping to show me brightly colored wooden jumps and trot me over the row of poles on the ground. Next, she headed me to two rails crossed in an X. I jumped it.

  Fun!

  Another X, then a single rail, then two together, like a game. I gave a playful buck.

  “Look how balanced he is. How he measures the jump as he approaches it, adjusts himself and uses his back. He’s a natural jumper and has tons of scope. Can you please set that oxer up one more hole? Thank you.”

  Sitting lightly and perfectly balanced, she told me things with the way she sat and used her weight and reins and legs. Stretch my neck and back, bend and straighten my body, change my balance and speed, it was a new language. At first I didn’t understand, but she kept asking and asking and when I did it right, she rewarded me with a big pat.

  “Good boy! You’re a smart one.” She turned to Oakley. “The most important thing we can do is to give Raja a good foundation on the flat. Dressage is a jumper’s secret weapon. He needs to be working in the right balance and tuned to our aids: seat, hands, legs, voice. Then his natural athleticism can take him where it will, maybe even the Olympics.”

  I wasn’t sure what the Olympics were, but I knew they were big.

  “I went to zee last Olympics with l’équipe du France,” Toile told me one night when I asked her about them. “Eet ees un grande show. Only four ’orses from each country. Zee best in zee world.”

  “The Olympics are overrated if you ask me,” Holzmann snorted, “but I’ll admit that it feels good to know that you are the best in the world. I still get little girls at horse shows wanting to pat me. That’s the best part, being a show-jumping legend.”

  “Oh, great Holzmann, you’re a legend all right,” Prism giggled. Holzmann pinned his ears and snapped at her, swishing his tail.

  “Who’s the one with the silver medal, Shorty?”

  Prism could barely contain herself, she was laughing so hard. “You, Lord Holzmann, how can we ever forget?”

  The best in the world. A gold medal! Those sounds perfect.

  A group of Michelle’s students sat in the shade of a big moss-covered live oak on the long wooden bench in the corner of the arena, watching her teach Oakley on me. Piewacket and Muttley lay contentedly at her feet.

  “Now that he’s warmed up, let’s start with the red vertical rails to the brush box. Try it in five strides. As my old coach, Colonel Nicolai Belanov, one of the greatest horsemen of our era, used to say: your horse must come to the obstacle in the right direction, speed, balance and impulsion. So…your job is to get him to the fence in the right canter and stay out of his way. His job is to jump the jump. Wait…wait…good, nicely done. Sit quietly…good…again. Now do the in-and-out.”

  I bucked after the in-and-out.

  “I think he’s enjoying himself,” Oakley laughed as Michelle taught him on me.

  “Now, do it again. It has to be perfect. That’s what Colonel Belanov drilled into me and I’m going to drill into you. He used to say, ‘There are no shortcuts in horse training. It’s like watching grass grow, but in the end you have a beautiful lawn.’” She paused to raise the jump a hole. “He was the real deal, a genius, an old school riding master at the Russian Imperial School in St. Petersburg, who came to this country during the war and coached the United States Equestrian Team for years. I was very lucky to be taught by him.”

  Oakley circled me around yet again, sitting up to adjust my balance as we headed toward the in-and-out in a light, springy yet powerful, canter.

  “That was good. That’s enough for today. Good boy, Raja. Give him a pat.”

  March, Ocala, Florida

  “The official show time is nine o’clock.”

  A loudspeaker! We can’t possibly be racing. I’m not in shape!

  I started pawing the trailer floor i
mpatiently and tossing my head.

  “Relax,” reassured Prism, along to keep me company for my first show. “It’s really easy. All you do is go around an arena and jump. Try not to knock down the rails. You get jumping faults for that and for refusing.” She continued, “The worst part is the warm-up area with all of the riders careening around and not looking where they are going. You’re going to hate it.”

  Whoa! What are those horses doing?

  I spooked across the arena as three horses came at me. Horses and ponies were everywhere, warming up and jumping in the three arenas, each filled with brightly painted jumps and decorated with flowers. A small dog held by someone driving a golf cart yapped at me as I stared at a horse with his mane tied up in little knots — braids, Prism called them — while a groom carrying a rub rag and fly spray trotted after him.

  “More leg, eyes up,” the instructors shouted to their students.

  “Heads up, vertical,” the riders called out to the other riders, heading to a jump.

  We were on deck, then it was time to go.

  An audience!

  I tried harder, showing off my “floaty trot” and “springy canter,” knowing they were all watching me. Michelle sat up taller, also basking in the audience attention.

  Interesting — I didn’t know she was such a showman.

  We were alike, Michelle and I. Winning was everything. But winning in style in front of a crowd was best of all.

  Let’s go! Let’s go!

  “Easy, love,” I felt Michelle’s weight suddenly get heavier. “Whoa,” she said without words, doing a strong half-halt as I galloped in the arena, on the muscle. Six fences, then across the arena diagonally. Two more, an in-and-out and, finally, four more jumps the other direction.

  Easy peasy!

  “Good. We’ve qualified for the jump off.” Michelle told Grace, who had come to help out, “I think I’ll let him roll on a bit, see how he likes it. I hope I have brakes! He’s still pretty green. This might be interesting.”