Zito eyes upset
SARATOGA SPRINGS — HallofFame trainer Nick Zito remembers the 2000 Travers Stakes, when his colt Albert the Great was beaten a nose by Unshaded, like it was yesterday.
“That was the longest race of my career,” Zito told The Post yesterday morning outside his barn at Saratoga. “He was in front just about every step. He looked like he was going to win the race. From the top of the stretch home, he was a winner every step until the final jump.”
Zito’s recollection is relevant for two reasons. First, in his prep for the Travers, the Jim Dandy at Saratoga, Albert the Great was all but eased, finishing last of seven. Two starts before that, he won the Dwyer.
Second, in this Saturday’s $1 million “Midsummer Derby,” Zito will saddle Fast Falcon, who also finished seventh in the Jim Dandy — “beaten eight lengths, not 18,” as Zito is fond of saying. Two starts back, Fast Falcon lost the Dwyer by a neck.
Albert the Great was hardly the only horse that bounced back bigtime for Zito after a bad race. Louis Quatorze went from nowhere in the Kentucky Derby to winning the Preakness. Birdstone, up the track in the Derby, came back to upset Smarty Jones in the Belmont Stakes. There have been many others.
“We’ve done this a lot,” said Zito.
What makes him think Fast Falcon can join them with a rebound in the 143rd Travers?
“The Chief [legendary horse man Allen Jerkens] is so smart,” Zito said. “A lot of time he’ll say horses come up here and they don’t even like it, and this is the greatest environment in the world. They’ll run bad if they don’t have a race over the track, and you can’t figure it out.
“You go back to the barn, you watch the horse graze, you watch him eat, you watch him walk, you watch him train, and the horse is unreal. Sometimes you just have to draw a line through the race. In the slop [in the Jim Dandy], he never got a chance to prove how good we think he is.
“I don’t want to jinx ourselves, but he’s doing great. So that’s how you’ve got to do it. You know what the good thing is? We’re a long shot. I love that.’’