Gary West 9y

Shaping up to be a Classic

Horse Racing

Shared Belief, it says here, is the 7-5 favorite to be Horse of the Year. And when the morning line comes out Monday for the 13-race, $26 million Breeders' Cup World Championships, he'll probably be the 8-5 favorite to win America's richest race.

Shared Belief isn't the richest, or best known or most popular horse in the country, but he soon could be all those things. He's applying for the role of superstar. For the moment, though, he's the headliner among the 201 pre-entries, a Breeders' Cup record, announced Wednesday for the two-day extravaganza at Santa Anita. Also included in the pre-entries for the $5 million Classic, run on Nov. 1 as the event's culmination, are Kentucky Derby and Preakness winner California Chrome, Belmont Stakes winner Tonalist and Pennsylvania Derby winner Bayern. That's why it all could come down to the Classic.

So rarely does anything happen as it rightly should in horse racing (or anything else, for that matter) that when it does there's an urge to run through the streets yelling the news. And so here: The richest race in America will confer the sport's highest honor.

Horse of the Year is on the line," said Art Sherman, the trainer of California Chrome, about the Classic, and it is. Four of the top six horses in the most recent National Thoroughbred Racing Association Horse of the Year poll are pre-entered in the Classic, and with a victory at Santa Anita any of them could claim the honor. (One of the others in the top six, Main Sequence, is pre-entered in the Turf; and, of course, Wise Dan is out with an injury.)

But even among such a formidable quartet of Classic favorites, Shared Belief is conspicuous. Owned by a partnership that includes the enormously popular syndicated radio host Jim Rome, the champion 2-year-old of 2013 missed the Triple Crown series because of a minor foot problem. But since returning to competition in late May, Shared Belief has won his four races by a total of 11-1/2 lengths.

He easily defeated older horses in the Pacific Classic, and then he won the Awesome Again Stakes despite being forced to race extremely wide around both turns, losing more than seven lengths to the runner-up, Fed Biz. Unbeaten in seven races, Shared Belief has won while on the early lead, he has rallied to win, he has won on a variety of surfaces, from three-quarters of a mile to a mile-and-a-quarter, and, most important, he has overcome trouble to win. His talent and determination have simply overwhelmed rivals.

That's why Shared Belief stands out even in such a talented group. California Chrome enters the Classic after a dull effort in the Pennsylvania Derby, where being pinned on the rail compromised his chances. But will he have a pleasure cruise in the Classic? Tonalist has won four races in his career, three of them on Belmont's 1-1/2-mile oval and the other on Gulfstream's 1 1/8-mile track. He's good, exceptional even, but like Sir Francis Drake, Tonalist will discover a new world when he gets to the West Coast. And Bayern's most important victories have come on speed-favoring surfaces when he was able to control the pace. But will he be allowed to cruise in the Classic?

And so Shared Belief stands out not just as the favorite but as the only contender whose races haven't exposed a weakness, a tender heel or a chink in the armor. Jon White, the Santa Anita oddsmaker, said he's planning to make Shared Belief the 8-5 favorite in the morning line for the Classic. That, of course, could change with the drawing of post positions, but the prospective odds confirm this: He's also the favorite to be Horse of the Year.

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