Battle of Midway hasn’t missed a beat

Just when there was reason to be discouraged over the looming lack of depth this season among older runners – mourning still the retirements of Accelerate, City of Light, and Justify – along comes last Saturday’s San Pasqual Stakes at Santa Anita to offer a glimmer of promise.

You could not ask for more from either Battle of Midway or McKinzie after slugging it out over a packed wet track for a fast mile and one-eighth. Battle of Midway finished half a length ahead of McKinzie, but it’s only in the placings that anyone can call McKinzie a loser. The son of Street Sense was parked on the flank of pacesetter Great Expectations from the half-mile mark and shadowed on the outside by Battle of Midway nearly every step of the way. Deep in the stretch it was still anybody’s game until, in the final yards, Battle of Midway edged ahead to finish in a smart 1:46.95. Great Expectations was a well-beaten third.

It is tempting to question the San Pasqual results based on track condition, but Battle of Midway and McKinzie already were thoroughly proven dry-track performers over a variety of surfaces. At this point it must be conceded that they are simply two very good older Thoroughbreds who hold high cards for serious races the rest of the season.

At 4, McKinzie is right where he needs to be, fleshing out a career that began as a precocious 2-year-old and was interrupted at 3 by an early-season injury. With only eight races to his name and just one poor effort among them, he should have plenty of mileage left before the stallion farms come calling with irresistible offers.

Battle of Midway is that rare top-class 5-year-old still in the game, but do not give his people all that much credit for keeping the son of Smart Strike in training for the pleasure of the masses. As it turned out, it was kind of his idea.

This time last year, Battle of Midway was preparing for his first season at stud at WinStar Farm, where he was advertised as a classicplaced winner of the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile, at $20,000 for a live foal. To that point, the colt had been a poster boy for the upwardly mobile economic possibilities of the male Thoroughbred. Rick Porter of Songbird fame bought him for $410,000 as a yearling, then leveraged Battle of Midway’s early 3-year-old form into a nice profit by selling him to a partnership of Don Alberto Stable and WinStar Farm.

Not long after his triumph at Del Mar in the Dirt Mile, WinStar president Elliott Walden announced that Battle of Midway would be retired to join a stallion roster that included Tiznow, Pioneerof the Nile, Distorted Humor, and More Than Ready.

“Battle of Midway came out of the race in great shape, and it was a very bittersweet decision to make with our partners Don Alberto to retire this horse to stud,” Walden said. “Ultimately, we both partnered on him in the first place because we thought he could be the last great son of Smart Strike to carry on that line at stud.”

And that was that, until it was discovered that Battle of Midway was getting only a handful of his mares in foal – five out of 60, in fact, according to Walden when he announced the news last April. One month later, after subfertility policies were paid and the horse was repurchased from the insurance company by his owners, Battle of Midway was sent back into training with Jerry Hollendorfer in California.

There is precedent for high-profile horses spending time at stud and then returning to the racetrack. Bertrando, the 1993 older male champion, was put back into training in 1994 after covering a sizeable book of mares, but he was far from infertile. His racing career ended in early 1995, just as 39 foals were hitting the ground.

Battle of Midway can seek inspiration from 1985 sprint champion and Hall of Famer Precisionist, who had the look of a stallion that could pass on the traits that made his one of the most versatile runners of the last half century. His handlers tried hard for two breeding seasons to help him impregnate more than the four mares who ended up producing named Precisionist foals before owner Fred Hooper gave up and sent him back into training with John Russell.

Once back at the track in 1988, the 7-year-old Precisionist won a pair of stakes at Del Mar, set a track record for one mile, and placed in three other graded stakes – including the NYRA Mile – before his second and final retirement.

Precisionist romped in the 1986 San Pasqual when the race was run at a mile and onesixteenth. These days, the race sits where the San Antonio once provided a useful step toward the Santa Anita Handicap on March 9, which could be on the dance card for both Battle of Midway and McKinzie – if a $500,000 purse is enough to keep their people interested.

“We could not have anticipated this kind of success for our horse, but we did retire him sound, so he had every chance to become a racehorse again,” said Fernando Diaz-Valdes, who manages the racing program for Don Alberto. “I think we can really have some fun times with him.”