Racing at Hollywood Park : Great Communicator Wins by Much More Than a Blink of an Eye

Using the theory that Great Communicator couldn’t beat what he couldn’t see, trainer Thad Ackel opened up the 5-year-old gelding’s blinker cups before he ran in the Breeders’ Cup last month.

Great Communicator had three horses to eyeball at the top of the stretch that day at Churchill Downs, and after they passed him, he rallied to win the $2-million Turf Stakes by a half-length over Sunshine Forever.

The new-look blinkers were a factor again Saturday in the $500,000 Hollywood Turf Cup. “Swarm” is the word that Ackel uses to describe the opposition when the real running starts, and in the rain and muck at Hollywood Park, there was Nasr El Arab, the favorite, trying to overtake Great Communicator on the inside and Putting, the 21-1 shot, trying to rally on the outside with an eighth of a mile to go.

Once again, the swarmers were no match for the swarmee. Great Communicator spotted the enemy and reached back for more. At the wire, he was a 1 3/4-length winner over Putting in what might be called one of his easiest victories of the year.

Great Communicator seldom wins by much. There was the nod over Sunshine Forever in the Breeders’ Cup, and earlier he won stakes by 2 heads and a neck. He slipped in another win by 1 3/4 lengths.

“The blinkers have made the big difference,” said Ray Sibille, whose career had almost vanished before he started riding Great Communicator a year ago. “I told Thad before the Breeders’ Cup that opening up the cups would help.

“We came awful close to taking them off completely, but you wouldn’t want to make that big of a change before such a big race.”

Great Communicator’s $275,000 win--his third major victory of the year--might normally have helped his cause in the voting for the Eclipse Award for best male turf horse. But the election deadline of Jan. 3 and the Turf Cup are ill-timed and it is likely that most of the 200 voters have already cast their ballots for Sunshine Forever, who quit running after the Breeders’ Cup.

“If my horse isn’t the best turf horse in the country, my name isn’t Ackel,” Great Communicator’s trainer said Saturday. “You’ve got to appreciate this horse. He is some competitor, a good solid competitor. He is the epitome of courage. This wasn’t his favorite course, so I think we were at a little disadvantage going in.

“The top grass horses in the country take turns beating each other, but my horse is a step above them. He gives you that little extra.”

Ackel refers to Great Communicator as “the Rocky Marciano of racing. He’s a slugger. He’s not flashy, but he loves the competition.”

Nasr El Arab, who had beaten Great Communicator the last time they met, finished third, 3 lengths behind the winner, who ran the 1 1/2 miles on the mushy grass course in 2:34 2/5.

Great Communicator, who had been 1 for 9 at Hollywood Park and 0 for 6 there in stakes, has been the favorite in only one of his wins this year. Saturday he went off as the second choice in a crowd of 20,522 and paid $7.80, $4.60 and $3. Putting, 2 for 13 this year and winless in 9 races dating back to March, paid $17.20 and $7.40. Nasr el Arab paid $2.80.

Great Communicator won wire to wire in the Breeders’ Cup and has been on the front end in most of his races, but Saturday he was in fourth place after a half-mile and didn’t take the lead until the field came out of the far turn. Wait Till Monday and Skip Out Front, who set the early pace, wound up at the back of the 10-horse pack, with Wait Till Monday being eased by jockey Rick Domiguez after five-eighths of a mile.

“We’ve never needed to go to the lead,” Sibille said. “The only reason we went to the lead in those other races was because nobody else wanted the lead.”

Fernando Toro, who rode Putting said: “When we made our move, I thought we were going to win, but the other horse was just too much.”

As the 34-day Hollywood Park meeting ended, Gary Stevens easily won the jockey title, with 47 wins to 30 for apprentice Fernando Valenzuela, the runner-up, but Stevens, riding Nasr El Arab, was unable to register his sixth stakes win of the season.

“When I started riding (at the top of the stretch), my horse just kind of fell apart,” Stevens said. “I had to gather him back up the last eighth of a mile just to hold him together.”

Great Communicator, a son of Key to the Kingdom and Blaheen, is owned by Ackel and Rosalie and Paul Dufrene of Cutoff, La. Ackel picked out Great Communicator at a Kentucky yearling sale and paid $42,000 for him. The horse has now earned $2.4 million, about $2 million of it this year.

The next objective for Great Communicator is the April 23 San Juan Capistrano at Santa Anita, a race the horse won this year. Ackel would like to run Great Communicator only 9 times next year, compared to 11 in 1988, as a concession to age and tender legs. The opposition is all in favor of that.

Horse Racing Notes

Wayne Lukas won the training title with 13 wins, 1 more than Sandy Shulman. . . . Hollywood Park averaged 15,774 in on-track attendance and $3.9 million in handle, which are respective drops of 16.7% and 11.5% from a year ago. The totals, including eight off-track betting sites, were 21,421 and $5 million, which represent declines of 9.1% and 4.6%. This year, Hollywood Park was not open for the Breeders’ Cup weekend, which accounted for overall crowds of 95,000 and betting of $21.2 million in 1987.

No bettor picked all 9 winners in the Pick Nine for the entire meeting. A payoff was mandatory Saturday with the close of the meeting, and 3 tickets, each with 8 winners, paid $344,666 apiece. . . . The jockeys approved the grass course for safety before the running of the Turf Cup. . . . Eddie Delahoussaye was ill and missed the last 2 days of the meeting. . . . Santa Anita’s opener Monday features the $100,000 Malibu Stakes, with Mi Preferido and Speedratic favored in a field of 14.

Precisionist was in third place after a half-mile, then faded to last in a 12-horse field Saturday in the 7-furlong Sunny Isle Handicap at Calder. . . . At Laurel, Kent Desormeaux, who leads the country in wins, rode 5 winners to boost his total to 475. . . . Jose Santos, who leads Chris McCarron by about $70,000 in the national money race, was supposed to start a 10-day suspension on Monday, but he’ll continue to ride while he appeals the stewards’ ruling at Aqueduct.