Career Earnings: $9,351,100

It’s “Stormy’s” Day

By- Hannibal

There are few accomplishments left to achieve when you are a seven-year-old taking aim at the ten million dollar mark in career earnings. When you have won the most important race of the year for older horses, the Grade I Breeder’s Bowl Classic in a romp, what can keep you striving to improve further? How much better can you get when you’ve made twenty-seven starts since your graded stakes debut in just start number five, and have never run in anything other than Grade I and Grade II events since?

How about being crowned the 2001 Older Champion Male?

After capturing the victory in the Breeder’s Bowl Classic in 2000, Stormy Prospector made a strong case for an Eclipse Award. Unfortunately, he was competing with a strong class of older colts and horses that year and the title, with controversy, was awarded to One The Naked, a Grade I winner of only the Out Of The City ‘Cap, The Jockey Guild Gold Cup, and the Equinics’ Hades Handicap.

And while Stormy Prospector owned only one Grade I victory that season, it was the most impressive performance of his year in the most important race of the year. He had two Grade II victories, including a victory in the Bluegrass Cup Turf at a mile and a half, making him a graded stakes winner on both surfaces.

By virtue of his consistency and unwavering resolve, coupled with a sensational training job, he managed to earn over four million dollars despite winning only six races, one a maiden special event, and two others being small purse listed stakes events. He closed his 2000 season as the number eight ranked member of the older horse division, but also as an older five-year-old horse about turn a year older.

Would he hold his form for another year? Could he possible get better at age six?

Things began on an auspicious note when the narrow son of Storm Bird out of a Proud Truth mare made his six-year-old debut in the two mile A.S.R Cup, a distance that was new to him, culminating in a well-beaten sixth. He returned at a more comfortable mile and a quarter distance in the Grade I California Cup four weeks later and finished a respectable third after enduring a quarter mile of traffic trouble entering the final turn.

The running line for that race didn’t pay him many compliments as he was well beaten, perhaps explaining why the public allowed him to go off at 11-1 in the world’s richest race, the Grade I Sand Castle Classic. With a solid foundation into him after a freshening following his Breeder’s Bowl victory the prior season, Stormy Prospector ran the race of his life, inhaling the classy field on the turn and running away to a four and a quarter length victory.

Suddenly the bandwagon was running at maximum occupancy when he again displayed his class and versatility by romping in the Grade I San Francisco Capitan Handicap at a mile and a half on turf as the sixty cents to the dollar favorite. He returned to the dirt for his next, the Grade I Maryland Special ‘Cap, and this time the public wouldn’t be burned.

Or would they?

At 3-1, he sat in a comfortable position, advanced entering the final turn and began picking off rivals at will. But when the favorite turned for home, the tank was empty and he could do no better than a fourth place finish, beaten fourteen and half lengths.

Still, he continued his campaign, intent upon defending his Breeder’s Bowl crown. But something wasn’t right. After a lethargic sixth in the Grade I Michael Strike Stakes at 9-2, people began to talk about the trip to Dubai. Yes, he won in his return race in the United States following the huge victory in the Sand Castle Classic, but what did he beat? Since overmatching that field of inferior foes, he had lost two in a row at short odds and hadn’t resembled the powerful force in Dubai.

When he again finished mid-pack, beaten double digit lengths in the Movieland Shiny Cup, he was being written off. An old timer past his prime suffering the stress of a taxing voyage to the desert where he ran the biggest race of his career. He had peaked. Now he was on the downward slide. Critics and pundits alike wrote about his travails, offering their 20/20 insight into how Stormy Prospector should have been handled. Most of these same folks were in concurrence with the decision to run him in the Grade I Royally Modest Cup at eleven panels on the turf as the clear class of the group next time. They had little to say when he was beaten over thirty lengths and finished in front of just three of his thirteen rivals.

So they just seemed to ignore him for the next few starts.

When he was badly beaten in the Upstate Breeder’s Bowl Stakes, his first foray in Grade II company in a long time after nothing but Grade I starts, they shrugged it off with an “I told you so” attitude. When he bounced right back to win the Grade II Bluegrass Cup Turf for the second consecutive year, the explanations became “yeah, but it wasn’t a great field” and “he seems to just like this turf more than others”.

When he made his next start in the Grade II Longchamp Marathon at two miles on turf, a distance that he clearly wasn’t fond of, handicappers were befuddled after he had finally showed some life in his prior start. Still, even after being cautioned by the connections that Stormy Prospector was using the race only as a prep for the Breeder’s Bowl Classic, the public hammered him and he went off at even money. Unexpectedly to the public, but expectedly to Stormy Prospector’s camp, he ran evenly and finished fourth, well beaten but fit and trim for an important engagement in New York three weeks later.

With the Breeder’s Bowl on the minds of all racing fans and the media focused intently on every aspect of the big day, Stormy Prospector again found himself in the spotlight. There were stories about his attempt to repeat in the Classic. There were stories about his last minute entry into the Classic over the Turf Classic, despite winning two of his last four turf starts and only one of his last six dirt starts, the Sand Castle Classic. But sadly, many of the stories viewed him as a sentimental pick, a horse with amazing ability but too many questions to take seriously. He was shown gloriously winning in Dubai for a frame, then repeatedly portrayed as a tarnished champ as he lost subsequent race after subsequent race.

The media was fooled and they had themselves fooled the public, as Stormy Prospector, the defending Breeder’s Bowl Classic Champ and winner of the world’s riches race, was sent to the gate at 16-1. The energy of the crowd, the bright colors, the cameramen, the attention; Stormy Prospector danced from the paddock to the gate on that Saturday in New York, alert and excited by the familiar sensory input. He loaded willingly and professionally, sprung from the gate intently and meandered from his outside post into a ground saving position while the bulk of the field accelerated past him.

Laying about ten lengths off the pace on the backstretch while sitting in ninth place, several of the pace prompters began to back up, while others began to quicken from mid-pack. Shifting from the fence to the three-path, Stormy Prospector advanced steadily on the final turn, passing several rivals, but still well held until they straightened for the stretch run. Like a shot, he propelled past half the field by the eighth pole and made a convincing bid for the lead, but had to split rivals at the sixteenth pole, slowing him momentarily. With his head low and a thunderous stride, the champ made a last desperate attempt at retaining what he believed was rightfully his.

He fell short. A length short.

But when he galloped back to the finish line alongside the winner, there was a stunning and refreshing mixture of chaos and silence. Despite losing, thousands of racing fans greeted the former champ with a chorus of applause and love, thanking the six-year-old for yet another unforgettable performance.

The silence? There were a lot of boisterous types attempting to tie their shoes while reaching inside their mouths.

Stormy Prospector had simultaneously quelled the masses which so eagerly spoke and invigorated a group that had expected so little.

Ironically, for the first time, the Eclipse Award winners were selected by the racing public. Once limited to the written media, the vote was opened to anyone who enjoys racing and has an opinion. A loser in 2000 under the former system, Stormy Prospector ends 2001 as the Older Male Champion under the new system.

Because he is the people’s Champ.

Race ID	Trk	RST	S	D	Race	Time	SP#	#	PP	C1	C2	C3	FIN	Jockey	Odds
1250.5415	A2	6yo+	D	14	Oldtimer Cup -G1	3:00 3/5	107	12	6	2 2	2 2-1/4	1 1-1/2	2 5-1/4	S Smelt	2.30
1222.5004	JP	3yo+	T	12	Japan Classic -G1		101	14	12	12 7-1/4	12 11-1/2	9 13-3/4	9 17	R Lott	5.50
1194.0415	NY	3yo+	D	10	Breeders Bowl Classic -G1	2:01 1/5	114	14	9	9 6-1/2	9 9-1/2	7 5-1/2	2 1-1/4	S Steele	15.90
1173.3512	E3	3yo+	T	16	Longchamp Marathon -G2	3:29 1/5	98	10	1	4 7	4 11-1/4	2 15-1/4	4 18-1/2	J Cuervo	1.10
1159.0313	KY	3yo+	T	12	Bluegrass Cup Turf -G2	2:30 2/5	111	11	9	6 4-1/2	5 5-1/2	2 2	1 1-3/4	R Ellison	6.00
1138.0414	NY	3yo+	D	10	Upstate BB Stakes -G2	2:00 4/5	99	14	14	9 7-1/2	9 12-1/4	10 16-1/4	11 19	B Williams	8.80
1103.3315	E1	3yo+	T	11	Royally Modest Cup -G1	2:15 4/5	84	14	5	13 8-1/2	12 14-1/4	12 22-3/4	11 31-3/4	B Seifert	3.90
1089.0115	CA	3yo+	D	10	Movieland Shiny Cup -G1	2:01	103	14	3	8 7	8 10-3/4	7 11-3/4	7 13	Y Bower	5.90
1061.0315	KY	3yo+	D	9	Michael-Strike Stakes -G1	1:47 2/5	98	11	1	10 6-1/2	10 10-1/4	9 13-3/4	6 18	D Sherman	4.50
1026.0815	MD	3yo+	D	9.5	Maryland Special Handicap -G1	1:53 3/5	106	12	6	10 5-3/4	10 8-1/2	7 7-1/4	4 14-1/2	T Johnson	3.00
1005.0113	CA	4yo+	T	12	San Francisco Capitan Handicap -G1	2:30 3/5	109	6	2	3 2-3/4	3 3-3/4	2 1/2	1 5-3/4	Y Bower	.60
977.5114	DB	4yo+	D	10	Sand Castle Classic -G1	2:00 1/5	123	14	2	8 5-3/4	7 7-3/4	1 1/4	1 4-1/4	G Harmon	11.30
956.0115	CA	4yo+	D	10	California Handicap -G1	2:00 3/5	107	14	12	10 9	9 14	5 14-3/4	3 11-1/2	Y Bower	6.90
928.0314	KY	4yo+	D	16	-G1	3:30 3/5	91	12	3	9 5-3/4	8 9	7 10-1/2	6 16	L Goodburn	2.80