If at first you don’t succeed, keep trying. Last year, Lemon Drop Kid and Behrens were one race away from a championship. Close, but no cigar. Now both are back in search of the Eclipse Awards that eluded them in 1999, going 11/4 miles in today’s Grade 2, $500,000 Suburban Handicap at Belmont Park as the co-highweights under 122 pounds.
The last time they faced each other – in the Breeders’ Cup Classic last Nov. 6 at Gulfstream Park – either could have clinched Horse of the Year with a victory.
Behrens, the 2-1 favorite, was seeking to rebound off back-to-back runner-up finishes in the Whitney and Jockey Club Gold Cup after winning four straight graded stakes, including the Suburban.
Lemon Drop Kid had won the Belmont Stakes and Travers, and even a placing in the Classic could have secured the 3-year-old championship.
But both went bust in the Breeders’ Cup, finishing sixth and seventh, respectively. By default, Charismatic was voted Horse of the Year and 3-year-old champ, while Victory Gallop got the nod over Behrens for best older horse.
Jim “007” Bond, who trains the 6-year-old Behrens, summed up today’s confrontation: “I think Lemon Drop Kid is a very nice horse. He’s got a little more to prove to be in Behrens’ stature. He’s the young kid on the block, and he’s going to try to knock off the old man.”
The “old man” has raced just three times this year, finishing third in the Donn Handicap, winning the Gulfstream Park Handicap by five lengths, then finishing second in the Dubai World Cup in March to Sheikh Mohammed’s colt Dubai Millennium, who’s regarded by some as the greatest race horse since Secretariat. Behrens was scheduled to run in the MassCap last month but was scratched after bruising his foot.
“The old man is coming off a layoff,” Bond said. “The injury is no concern at all. He’s doing fabulous.
“But this isn’t his primary goal. His primary goal is to win the Whitney and Breeders’ Cup. Lemon Drop Kid is going to have his best shot to beat us [today].”
The Kid has come back strong as a 4-year-old. He finished first in the Widener but, in a controversial DQ, was set down to fourth. After dead-heating in an allowance race at Aqueduct, he got a new rider, Edgar Prado, to replace Jose Santos, then finished third in the Pimlico Special.
But Lemon Drop Kid’s last race might have been his best yet, as he drew off to win the Brooklyn Handicap at Belmont June 11 by 71/4 lengths.
“It was a big thrill to see him run how I expected him to and not disappoint me,” trainer Scotty Schulhofer said. “He’s better now than he’s ever been. He’s coming up gorgeous and I wouldn’t trade places with anyone.”
Schulhofer, a Hall of Famer, has saddled such champions as Mac Diarmida, Rubiano, Fly So Free and Smile, but said, “Lemon Drop Kid is the best horse I’ve ever trained. I know that says a lot, but I’ve always said that about him.”
Today’s co-feature at Belmont is the Grade 3, $100,000 Poker Handicap at a mile on the Widener turf course, and if Kettle Won flashes the same late kick he did in his last start, the race is his.
In that mile allowance on grass June 10, Kettle Won was dead last in the field of 12 turning at the top of the stretch. At that point, it didn’t look like he’d beat one horse home.
But the son of Colonial Affair swung out to the center of the course and closed like a rocket to be second, beaten just 11/4 lengths. He doesn’t figure to be that far back this go-round and should blow by them all in the lane.