I grew up across town from Belmont race track, and my dad was one of countless auxiliary policemen who directed traffic on Plainfield Avenue in Floral Park on the day of the Belmont stakes. I was too young to remember the day Secretariat won the Belmont and the Triple Crown, but that race footage never ceases to make me cry. I don't know why. I watch the race and I get choked up. There's a moment when the jockey looks back over his shoulder at the incredible distance between Big Red and the next closest horse, and my throat tightens and tears burn in my eyes. It is the most moving image for me - the horse, just surging ahead, running, no one even close. Many years later, I did some volunteer work with a Thoroughbred rescue organization and attended a Board meeting at Belmont. I got to walk among the barns and the back stretch and that was a thrill, too.To honor the sport of kings, I've begun a series of articles on Breyer Thoroughbred race horse models - Secretariat, Breyer horse model of the great Big Red, and Zenyatta, in both horse model and Christmas ornament form. Learn more about them here. Click the links below. As always, please feel free to share these links with others, but please don't reprint the articles verbatin.
Thank you to Kollean Gouyton for the photos and to Breyer Animal Creations for the Zenyatta photos.
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