Favorite Trick

Thoroughbred racehorse infobox
horsename = Favorite Trick


caption =
sire = Phone Trick
grandsire = Clever Trick
dam = Evil Elaine
damsire = Medieval Man
sex = Stallion
foaled = 1995
country = United States flagicon|USA
colour = Dark Bay
breeder = Max and Sylvia Wood
owner = Joseph LaCombe
trainer = Patrick B. Byrne
William I. Mott (at age 3)
record = 16: 12-0-1
earnings = $1,726,793
race = Hopeful Stakes (1997)
Kentucky Breeders' Cup Stakes (1997)
Bashford Manor Stakes (1997)
Saratoga Special Stakes (1997)
Breeders' Futurity Stakes (1997)
Swale Stakes (1998)
Long Branch Breeders' Cup Stakes (1998)
Jim Dandy Stakes (1998)
Keeneland Breeders' Cup Mile Stakes (1998)

Breeders' Cup wins:
Breeders' Cup Juvenile (1997)
awards= U.S. Champion 2-Yr-Old Colt (1997)
United States Horse of the Year (1997)
honours =
updated= June 12, 2007

Favorite Trick (April 20, 1995 - June 6, 2006) was an American Thoroughbred racehorse who in 1997 became the first 2-year-old in twenty-five years to be voted United States Horse of the Year.

Bred at Wintergreen Farm in Midway, Kentucky by Max Wood and his wife, Sylvia, Favorite Trick was out of the mare Evil Elaine. His sire was the successful sprint horse, Phone Trick, who retired with a record of nine wins and a second in ten career starts. A descendant of the great Nearco through both his sire and mare, Favorite trick was selected by trainer Patrick B. Byrne at an auction in February 1997 who purchased him for Joseph LaCombe.

Undefeated Horse of the Year

For Joseph Lacombe, who previously had owned several horses in partnership with others, the colt would provide him with an amazing year of racing in 1997. Trained by Byrne and ridden by Pat Day in all his races, at age two Favorite Trick went undefeated in eight starts. He scored victories in major races such as the Hopeful Stakes and Breeders Futurity. He then capped off his year with a convincing win in the Breeders' Cup Juvenile after avoiding a near-collision on the first turn. He ran away from the field to win by a five increasing lengths while setting a new Breeders' Cup Juvenile record of 1:41.47.

Favorite Trick's performances in 1997 earned him the Eclipse Award for Outstanding 2-Year-Old Male Horse and he became the first two-year-old since Secretariat in 1972 to be voted the Eclipse Award for Horse of the Year. Going into the 1998 racing season, comparisons were regularly being between the two horses and like Secretariat, Favorite Trick was the winterbook favorite for May's Kentucky Derby. However, there were some turf writers and other racing people who noted that Favorite Trick had not clocked any remarkably fast times and that six of his wins had been at distances between five and seven furlongs with both the Breeders Futurity and the Breeders' Cup Juvenile at 1 ¹/16 miles. As a son of a sprint horse, some believed that it remained to be seen if Favorite Trick could compete at the longer distances of the American Classic Races.

Three-Year-Old racing season

For 1998, Favorite Trick's conditioning was taken over by Bill Mott after Patrick Byrne accepted an offer to take over the stable of the prominent Canadian horseman, Frank Stronach. Under Mott, Favorite Trick opened his 3-year-old season with a win in the 7-furlong Swale Stakes at Florida's Gulfstream Park but in the Arkansas Derby, his first attempt at 1⅛ miles (9 furlongs), he tired near the end and suffered his first defeat, winding up third behind winner, Victory Gallop.

By the time parimutuel betting closed for the May 2, 1998 Kentucky Derby, Favorite Trick was the second choice to the John R. Gaines colt, Indian Charlie and only slightly favored over third choice, Overbrook Farm's Florida Derby winner, Cape Town. Starting from post position seven in the Derby, Favorite Trick moved up to fourth by the half mile pole but fell back to wind up eighth in the fifteen horse field behind the winning 8:1 outsider, Real Quiet.

Not raced in the Preakness or Belmont Stakes, Favorite Trick did not go back to the track until July 19th when he won the 8.5 furlong Long Branch Breeders' Cup Stakes at Monmouth Park. He followed up with an August 9th win in the 9 furlong Jim Dandy Stakes at Saratoga Race Course then after a disappointing fifth place on the same track in the Grade II King's Bishop Stakes, he was sent to Keeneland where in October he won the important Keeneland Breeders' Cup Mile Stakes. Favorite Trick's strong performance led to him being made the betting favorite in November's Breeders' Cup Mile at Churchill Downs but he finished eight in a field of fourteen to winner, Da Hoss.

Career as a sire

Following his Breeders' Cup loss, Favorite Trick was retired to stud duty at Walmac International near Lexington, Kentucky. He would later stand at Cloverleaf Farms II in Ocala, Florida and finally at JEH Stallion Station near Hondo, New Mexico where he and five other horses died in a barn fire on June 6, 2006. A modestly successful sire of both Thoroughbreds and American Quarter Horses, Favorite Trick sired 16 stakes winners.

References

* [http://www.pedigreequery.com/favorite+trick Favorite Trick's pedigree and partial racing stats]
* [http://news.bloodhorse.com/viewstory.asp?id=33898 June 7, 2006 Bloodhorse.com article titled "Favorite Trick, Saratoga Six Die in Barn Fire"]