Signal’s Tuckers have a special tie to Justify
Until two weeks ago today, Andy Tucker had never been to a Kentucky Derby despite his Bluegrass cousins — the Walden clan of Midway, Kentucky — having long been major players in the thoroughbred horse industry.
“Just never thought about it,” Tucker said this week. “Don’t really know why.”
But there he and his wife Tara stood at Churchill Downs on the first Saturday in May, guests of cousin Elliott Walden, the president of WinStar Farm, which owns a good portion of the magnificent chestnut colt Justify.
And while you might rightly surmise that nothing could possibly top watching the pre-race favorite cruise past the other 19 3-year-olds in the field to capture the 144th Run for the Roses in a record-setting downpour — as well as somehow avoiding a single drop of rain, because the Signal Mountain couple’s seats were under cover — neither of those were their favorite memory.
For when Andy and Tara looked toward the winner’s circle where Walden, WinStar owner Kenny Trout, trainer Bob Baffert, jockey Mike Smith, NBC’s Bob Costas and Kentucky governor Matt Bevin were all celebrating as a blanket of roses covered Justify’s backside, their eyes were drawn to something else. Something completely unexpected.
Happily dancing in the track’s slop, smiling and laughing and overflowing with unbridled joy were the Tuckers’ 15-year-old daughter Cate and Walden’s 14-year-old daughter Megan.
“That was the best moment,” Andy Tucker said. “Just watching them dance in the mud. It wasn’t choreographed or anything. They were just jumping up and down, so excited and happy.”
And thanks to the foresight and generosity of Trout’s wife Lisa, no shoes were ruined in this slop hop.
“Mrs. Trout had actually bought several pair of rain boots to give to the girls who were with them,” Tucker said. “The Trouts were so thoughtful and generous. They’d thought of everything.”
But can Baffert, Smith, Walden and Co. again think of everything this evening as Justify attempts to secure the second leg of horse racing’s Triple Crown at the Preakness?
Yes, rain is again in the forecast for the mile-andthree-sixteenths race, though it may break by the time Justify and seven others head to post. But not all tracks are created equal. The off-track that Justify handled so well at Churchill may feel less comfortable at Pimlico. Also, for a horse that’s raced only four times in his life — and none before February of this year — returning to the track just two weeks after running a mile-and-a-quarter in the mud could prove troublesome.
“I’ll be pretty nervous,” Cate said. “I’ll have butterflies in my stomach all day.”
She expects those butterflies to be shared with Megan Walden.
“We’ll text,” Cate said. “But I’ve got to do something here on Saturday night, so I’ll probably have to watch the race on my phone.”
Yet no matter what happens today, it would be tough to beat Cate’s first trip to the Derby, which not only included dancing in front of the winner’s circle but also accompanying Justify onto the track prior to the playing of “My Old Kentucky Home.”
“Such a cool experience,” said Cate, who’s wrapping up her freshman year at GPS. “Everybody’s cheering. I’ll never forget that.”
Of course, she also won’t forget the requisite fascinator hat she wore — “blue with little pink feathers” — or her afternoon in the owners’ suites, where the patrons are waited on hand and foot.
Then there was that moment the race concluded, the public-address announcer screaming, “The unofficial winner is Justify,” as Cate looked around to see “everybody start crying.”
The sport might cry different tears if Justify comes up short. Big and strong, fast and handsome, he has spent the past two weeks being compared to the biggest, strongest, fastest and most handsome colt in Derby history — 1973 Triple Crown winner Secretariat.
Win today and those comparisons will only grow in the three weeks between now and the Belmont. Lose and it will be another disappointment in a long, long stretch of them except 2015, when American Pharoah became the first and only Triple Crown winner since Affirmed in 1978.
Yet win or lose the Tuckers always will have their memories.
“More than once that weekend my wife and I would look at each other,” Andy said, “and ask ourselves, ‘What are we doing here?’ It was amazing.”
Then there’s Cate, who not only has become a huge fan of Justify but also is quite a Virginia basketball fan, since her father went there.
In fact, until the Derby, her favorite sports moment ever had come this past December, when she met Cavaliers guard Kyle Guy after a narrow home win over Boston College.
“Unbelievable,” she said of meeting Guy. “But the Derby wouldn’t be below that.”
There’s also this for the Waldens to consider moving forward: Twenty years ago, when Elliott Walden trained Victory Gallop to a Belmont victory over Baffert’s Real Quiet that denied Real Quiet the Triple Crown, Andy Tucker’s cousin and fellow Chattanooga resident Daniel Pettway was in attendance. Now comes the Tuckers’ presence for Justify at the Derby.
“The cousins have a pretty good track record at Triple Crown races,” a chuckling Tucker said Friday. “Just saying.”
If Justify is still undefeated come the Belmont, having a Walden relation from Chattanooga in the house might not be a bad investment. Especially if the weather forecast hints at another opportunity for Cate and Megan to go singin’ and dancin’ in the rain.
Contact Mark Wiedmer at mwiedmer@timesfreepress.com