Seabiscuit: An American Legend

“Right,” said Smith.

Then the Howards had sailed off. They had no idea that a problem had arisen since their departure or that Smith was in a terrible predicament. The reporters pestered the trainer over and over again: Is the horse okay? Seabiscuit, Smith said repeatedly, had “never been better.”

One week before the match, Pollard rode out onto the Belmont course for his final test before the match race. He was aboard Fair Knightess, who was making her first start since she and Pollard went down in the San Carlos three months before. In this, the Handspring Handicap, she was a long shot; no one had thought that Smith could get her back into racing condition after her injuries. Firing her out of the gate, Pollard sent her up alongside the favorite, then drew off to a commanding lead on the backstretch. No one could catch them. Pollard and Fair Knightess, who might have died together on the track at Santa Anita, cantered home easy winners. Pollard was ready to go.

Seabiscuit was not. Smith was shaken. The horse’s speed was gone, and Smith didn’t know why. The issue was being treated as a scandal. The New York Daily Mirror was demanding that racing officials step in and investigate the horse’s condition and either call off the race or assure the alarmed public that Seabiscuit was in good shape.⁹ Even Walter Winchell chimed in, questioning Seabiscuit’s fitness. Smith’s defenses were less and less convincing. Apparently in an effort to mollify the inflamed press, he let photographers back into the barn. If the horse was unsound, he said, he would never let him out of his stall to work out. The reporters wanted to see the horse in the daylight. Smith, his nerves at the breaking point, made an ominous statement implying that there would be no match race, then led the horse out.

Few seemed to have noticed what Smith had, which was that War Admiral looked even worse than Seabiscuit. On May 17, it had taken him a doddering 1:49 to negotiate a mile, a time even slower than Seabiscuit’s. Four days later, it took him 2:08?, trotting horse time, to run the race distance of a mile and a quarter. On May 23 he had seemed so uncharacteristically narcotized in starting-gate drills that a bystander had remarked, “You’d swear he was a dull-witted lead pony instead of the high-strung animal he is.” By many reports, Riddle and Conway were weighing whether or not to scratch their horse from the race, but they were waiting in hopes that Seabiscuit would be withdrawn first, saving them from being blamed for the massive disappointment. Smith was getting conflicting signals. Some people were telling him to stay in the race, that War Admiral was training so badly that Seabiscuit, bad form and all, could lick him. Others warned Smith that War Admiral’s bad works may have been designed to fool Smith about the colt’s condition.¹⁰ He didn’t know what to do, and the reporters wouldn’t stop pressuring him.

Was the horse lame?

“No.”

Was he not in shape?

“If the horse is not in shape, I’ll pull him out of there.”

Was he sick?

“He galloped yesterday. Sick horses don’t gallop. They act sick.”

It was time to make a decision, but the Howards were hundreds of miles away. Smith patched through an emergency call to their cruise ship: Come to Belmont.

The Howards couldn’t believe the state in which they found Belmont. Wild accusations were flying around, including one published charge that Smith was deliberately working the horse slowly in order to get long odds in the race. Everyone wanted to know if the horse would run. Howard was privately distressed but publicly reassuring and confident. To quiet the doubters, he gave his word that the public would be able to see Seabiscuit work a full ten furlongs—the race distance—at three-thirty on the afternoon of May 24.

On the morning of the appointed day, Smith took Seabiscuit to the track for a short morning gallop, in preparation for the afternoon’s public workout. He studied his horse’s action. His eyes fixed on the horse’s knees.

There it was: a faint whisper of soreness. It was subtle, but it was there.

Howard had a terrible decision to make. Seabiscuit probably could run in the race. At best, he would probably lose. At worst, he could be injured. Howard’s inclination was to scratch him, but the potential consequences were daunting.

Belmont officials, anticipating the largest crowd ever to attend a horse race in America, had worked themselves to exhaustion and spent $30,000 to publicize the race and prepare the track. In the Belmont grandstand, which, if stood on end, would nearly equal the height of the new Empire State Building, every seat was booked. Millions had been wagered. Silversmiths had already cast an elaborate trophy. Press coverage was at saturation levels. The buildup to the Memorial Day Indy 500, normally a huge sporting event, was all but squeezed out of the nation’s press; in the San Francisco Chronicle, coverage of the auto race was buried, alongside an interpretation of the tides. The horses were on the cover of Newsweek as well as the ubiquitous Radio Guide, which showed War Admiral galloping, Seabiscuit yawning. Billboards advertising the event rimmed every major road on Long Island. CBS Radio had taken out full-page ads to promote its international broadcast of the race. Several “Seabiscuit Limited” trains, packed to the doors, were already en route from the West Coast. Other chartered trains were coming from Kentucky, Chicago, Boston, and Philadelphia. Bing Crosby had booked a plane east with a huge party of his friends. Swope, Widener, and Whitney had gone out on a narrow limb to give Howard what he had demanded, putting up an enormous purse and postponing the Suburban Handicap, a fixture of the biggest racing day of the spring, to accommodate the race. There was even talk of shipping old Man o’ War all the way from Kentucky to accompany his son and grandson to the post. The world awaited the race with rapt attention.

And should Howard decide to scratch the horse, he knew that it would only confirm the long-standing belief that his horse was a “cripple.” “Now the one time out of so many times that the critics appear to be right,” Howard said bitterly, “has to come just before a race like this.”¹¹

Hours before Seabiscuit was to undertake his public workout, Howard and Smith retreated to the cottage by the barn. Nearby, the grooms stood with the horse they called “Old Pop,” grim-faced, watching the door and saying nothing. Seabiscuit, oblivious, rooted around in his hay.

A passerby finally broke the silence.

“He