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Horse racing is fun to write about, but books about horse racing are generally of two kinds: Either the scrappy trainer, owner, horse or jockey succeeds in winning the big race (à la Seabiscuit), in which case hard work and authenticity are rewarded, or the scrappy trainer, owner, horse and jockey do not succeed, in which case horse racing turns out to be a mugg's game after all (but colorful all the same). When McGinniss showed up at Saratoga last July, he didn't know which kind of book he was going to be writing, but he managed to double his bet by tangentially including Barclay Tagg, P.G. Johnson's friend and the trainer of Funny Cide, the New York-bred gelding who won the 2003 Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes. Both Johnson and Tagg were looking for big wins at Saratoga, to vindicate their horses' victories in big races and, perhaps, to vindicate their own methods and horsemanship.
If there is a track that redeems the long shady enterprise of horseracing in America, for McGinniss it is Saratoga, located not far from Albany in Saratoga Springs, "a peaceful old town of twenty-five thousand." Racing is popular at Saratoga. By contrast, elsewhere in the United States, "from Aqueduct to Hollywood Park, from Arlington to the Fair Grounds in New Orleans, people were staying away from racetracks in droves." McGinniss rented a house for the season for $8,000 and started hanging around the track in the mornings, but it was not fun. It rained and it rained, and it rained some more.
P.G. Johnson, Barclay Tagg and their other friend, Allen Jerkens, quickly acquired an antagonist, Bobby Frankel, the hugely successful stakes-winning trainer -- a onetime New Yorker but now a Californian -- who brought some good horses to Saratoga to run against the hometown talent. As soon as he introduces Frankel, McGinniss recycles rumors about him: that he originally left New York pursued by rumors (rumors about rumors being especially damning) and that his horses do suspicious things (like speed up suddenly in the last eighth of a mile). Since he needs this antagonist to add life to his book, McGinniss doesn't bother to note that in spite of all the talk, and a dour personality, Frankel has as many supporters as detractors in the racing world, who attribute his skill to talent and good horses, not to anything underhanded.
McGinniss made a better authorial choice in interspersing his narrative with Johnson's, which is also told in the first person. Johnson is, by his own testimony, too crusty and outspoken for his own good. His racing stable is full of cheap horses because he doesn't flatter owners or court them -- he prefers them to stay home and keep out of his way. (Barclay Tagg, too, is evidently discommoded by his riotous crew, the famous group of former high-school friends known as Sackatoga Stable, who brought a carnival atmosphere to Funny Cide's bid for immortality in 2003.) Johnson's chapters are a bit short, and it takes a while for him to get rolling, but as the book and the season progress, it becomes evident that he does have lots of stories to tell, and the only pity is that, owing to a throat condition, it is so difficult for him to tell them. Johnson is actually quite funny, but his delivery is dry and cranky. By the end of the book, he has become (God forbid) as appealing to McGinniss, and to the reader, as he is to his close-knit family.
Unfortunately for Johnson and Tagg, The Big Horse turns out to be the second kind of racing book. Neither Funny Cide nor Volponi lived up to his promise. Even Frankel did not have a very good year. As for McGinniss, his six rainy weeks at Saratoga were followed by an alternative hell -- heat, glare and despair -- in southern California. McGinniss mentions several times that he is 60 now, and so The Big Horse is really a meditation about aging and decline. Not only are McGinniss and Johnson older, sadder and more cynical than they were in the great days of the '70s; not only is Santa Anita, the site of the Breeder's Cup race where Volponi and Funny Cide ran last and second to last in the Classic, surrounded by fires (the worst in decades, according to McGinniss): Horse racing itself isn't what it was. The horses are more fragile, and racing is less fun, corrupted by corporate-style trainers and sacrificed for the sake of big sales at the yearling auctions by the breeders. The fans are, literally, a dying breed.
Well, yes. And no. The Big Horse is a pretty standard horse racing book, moody and detailed, hastily done and not very original. In spite of himself, McGinniss shows that the world of horse racing is still rich in material, much the same as it has been for hundreds of years now, a gathering place for eccentrics and misanthropes and wishful thinkers that turns out characters by the carload.
Copyright 2004, The Washington Post Co. All Rights Reserved.
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Book Description Paperback. Condition: new. Paperback. "The big horse," in racing vernacular, is the animal that brings fame and fortune to a stable. He's the heavyweight champion, the All-American quarterback, the four-legged Michael Jordan of the barn. Seabiscuit was once Tom Smith's "big horse." A generation ago, Secretariat was Lucien Lauren's. In 2003, Funny Cide was Barclay Tagg's. In sixty years as a trainer, P. G. Johnson had never had one -- until Volponi. P. G. Johnson was a blue-collar wizard, a hardscrabble tough guy who had come east from Chicago, determined to make his mark on New York. And he did. He became leading trainer at all three New York tracks -- Saratoga, Belmont, and Aqueduct -- as well as at Florida's Tropical Park. And he did it without ever winning a Triple Crown or Breeders' Cup event, or having "the big horse." "I never knew how to kiss rich people's asses, and I got too old to learn. If no owner was going to give me a big horse, I figured I'd have to find one myself," he said. He did that, in his seventies, buying a mare for $8,000, breeding her to a $20,000 stallion, and in 1998 producing Volponi, the horse that would change his life. In October 2002, weakened by surgery and radiation treatment for cancer, P. G. watched Volponi -- the longest shot in the field at 43 to 1 -- bring home more than $2 million by winning the Breeders' Cup Classic, the richest race in America. The following summer at Saratoga, McGinniss -- journalist, investigative reporter, and horse racing obsessive -- began showing up, more Tuesdays with Morrie than Guys and Dolls, at P. G.'s barn in the predawn hours to listen to the inside racing stories and lore P. G. had gathered. McGinniss came to appreciate that Johnson was not only a stellar horseman but an American original whose wit and wisdom carried far beyond the confines of the racetrack. As for Volponi, the big horse had given P. G. the perfect Disney ending with the Breeders' Cup victory, and, indeed, Disney soon bought film rights to P. G.'s life story. "He'll be even better next year," P. G. had said, but by the time McGinniss got to Saratoga, Volponi had not won a race in nine months. His faith undiminished, P. G. continued to race Volponi against the best, at Saratoga and beyond, until in the end it came down to the 2003 Breeders' Cup Classic in Santa Anita, a race only one horse in history had ever won twice. As fires burned in the Southern California hills, Volponi -- with Funny Cide's jockey, Jose Santos, in the saddle -- ran the last race of his life. This book is about what happened that day, about what came after, and about much of what had come before. It's the most exciting, rewarding, and heartwarming story about the world of horse racing that you'll ever read, by one of America's finest writers, at the top of his form. Synopsis coming soon. This item is printed on demand. Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability. Seller Inventory # 9780743261142
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