Up-Front Upset in Gold Cup : Horse racing: Trainer Frankel made no bones about what Marquetry would try to do: steal the lead early and keep it. He did.

Trainer Bobby Frankel’s style has never been guile, and the $1-million Hollywood Gold Cup was no exception. For anyone who was interested, Frankel announced before Saturday’s 52nd running of the race that his horse would go to the lead and hope to last. And that’s exactly what Marquetry did, holding off favored Farma Way by a head before 35,133.

Carrying 110 pounds, the low weight in the field, Marquetry was the seventh betting choice in a nine-horse field and paid $56.80 for a $2 win ticket, the biggest payoff in Gold Cup history. The previous high payoff was $50.20 on Cadiz, a 7-year-old who carried 111 pounds in 1963.

Farma Way, winner of the Pimlico Special and the Santa Anita Handicap this year, went off at 7-5 carrying co-high weight of 122 pounds. The colt tracked Marquetry all the way in the 1 1/4-mile race, pulling to a half-length of Marquetry nearing the quarter pole.

Marquetry opened a 1 1/2-length lead with an eighth of a mile left. Farma Way came on again inside the sixteenth pole, but David Flores hit Marquetry two times right-handed and eight times from the left side and scored the richest victory of his career.

Flores, who had unsuccessfully ridden Marquetry in the Kentucky-bred colt’s first two American starts last year, got the mount from Frankel Saturday because he was able to make the 110 pounds assigned the horse. Alex Solis had been riding Marquetry, winning two allowance races with the son of Conquistador Cielo and Regent’s Walk last winter at Santa Anita, but Frankel said that Solis would have been two or three pounds overweight had he ridden in the Gold Cup.

“I didn’t want to take any extra weight,” Frankel said. “Flores knew the horse and could make the weight. Solis didn’t cry about it.”

Only three horses, Challenge Me with 108 pounds in 1945, Round Table with 109 pounds in 1957 and Dotted Swiss with 107 pounds in 1960, have won the Gold Cup under less weight than Marquetry.

Pat Day, who rode co-high weight Summer Squall, said before the race that he thought the Gold Cup would be a battle between his colt and Farma Way. It was a two-horse race, all right, but Summer Squall finished seventh at 2-1, 16 lengths behind Marquetry.

Summer Squall, last year’s Preakness winner, has had a history of bleeding and was examined after the race and found not to have bled. He came out of the race with another problem, however. He was found to have suffered a crack in his right-front hoof, near the heel. The injury will be patched and is not expected to cost Summer Squall more than two days of training.

Farma Way finished 2 3/4 lengths ahead of Itsallgreektome, who made the switch from grass to dirt for the Gold Cup. The rest of the order of finish was Anshan, Roanoke, Prized, Summer Squall, Music Prospector and Western Playboy.

Marquetry, a 4-year-old, was sold at a yearling auction in Kentucky for $110,000. He had won only three of 10 starts before Saturday and the Gold Cup was only his second race on dirt, the first being a third-place finish behind Roanoke and Anshan in the Californian at Hollywood Park three weeks ago.

“He’s a very relaxed horse,” Frankel said. “He will work a half-mile for you in 50 (seconds) if you want, or he’ll give you 45. When I first got him (after four races in Europe), I wasn’t sure he liked to run on dirt, because he trained better on grass. But dirt fits his running style: He’s a very steady, one-pace horse who doesn’t have the quick acceleration that a good grass horse needs.”

The Gold Cup was worth $550,000 to Marquetry’s owner, Prince Khalid Adbullah of Saudi Arabia, who first ran horses in 1977 in England. He owns several thoroughbred farms, including property in Kentucky. Another of Prince Khalid’s horses, Exbourne, won the Hollywood Turf Handicap for Frankel earlier this season.

After setting modest fractions of 46 4/5 and 1:10 1/5 through the first six furlongs, Marquetry reached the wire in a fast 1:59 2/5.

The Gold Cup was the sixth of 10 races in the American Championship Racing Series, which offers $1.5 million to the owners of the horses with the most points. First place is worth $750,000.

Despite finishing second, Farma Way moved into first place with 32 points. Festin, who beat Farma Way in the Nassau County Handicap at Belmont Park earlier this month, dropped to second with 30 points.

Festin’s trainer, Ron McAnally, skipped the Gold Cup because he said Festin, a late-running horse, would have been compromised by a Hollywood Park surface that favors front-runners such as Marquetry and Farma Way.

The next race in the championship series will be the New England Classic at Rockingham Park on July 20, in which Festin might run. Frankel said Marquetry will stay in California and run in another series race, the $1-million Pacific Classic at Del Mar on Aug. 10.

Before the Gold Cup, the biggest race Flores had ever won was last year’s $322,3300 Cabrillo Handicap at Del Mar, on another Frankel longshot, Miserden at 33-1.

Flores, a Tijuana native who began his race-track career as a hotwalker at Caliente, has been riding since 1984 and joined the Southern California circuit in the summer of 1989.

When Flores returned to the Hollywood Park jockeys’ room after Saturday’s post-race interviews, McCarron came over and shook his hand. “That should pay a few bills,” McCarron said. “Has anybody phoned you from Mexico yet?”

McCarron, who has been second with nine of his 11 Gold Cup mounts, never winning the race, got the mount on Farma Way because of trainer Wayne Lukas’ dissatisfaction with the way Gary Stevens rode the horse in the Nassau County. Stevens rode Anshan Saturday.

“After all that was written about the way Farma Way lost that New York race, I had the feeling that Chris wouldn’t send his horse to the lead in this race,” Frankel said.

Flores’ mounts earned almost $4 million last year. “This is a strong horse,” Flores said of Marquetry. “I just tried to go to the lead and prayed that nobody followed me too hard. I wasn’t worried when Farma Way got close, because I knew I had a lot of horse left.”

Day apparently never had much horse. The Gold Cup was only the second time Summer Squall failed to finish first or second out of 16 starts, and he bled from the lungs the other time.

“At the start of the run down the backside, I thought I was just where I wanted to be,” Day said. “I was behind the winner and inside Farma Way, and my horse was tugging. But then I was struggling just to hold my position, and I couldn’t get my horse back in the bridle. He gave me no response whatsoever. At the five-eighths pole, I knew we were in trouble.”

Horse Racing Notes

There was betting on the Hollywood Gold Cup at several other tracks. Marquetry paid $243.80 at Churchill Downs, $177.40 at Belmont Park, $176 at Calder and $149.60 at Louisiana Downs. A $2 exacta on Marquetry and Farma Way was worth $1,590.20 at Churchill.

Both trainer Wayne Lukas and jockey Chris McCarron pointed to the 12-pound weight difference between Farma Way and Marquetry. “We caught a fresh horse and we gave him 12 pounds,” Lukas said. “When you get beat by only six or eight inches, 12 pounds can make the difference. I thought Chris rode him beautifully. He had him relaxed all the way.”

* SECOND THOUGHTS: Chris McCarron finishes second aboard favorite Farma Way, the ninth time the jockey has been runner-up in the Hollywood Gold Cup. C13