Speed, Stamina Make for a Smooth 'Drive'
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Friday, May 30, 2008
TOKYO, May 29 -- Perched on a white loveseat in his semi-celestial penthouse office in central Tokyo, the Japanese slot machine mogul turned horseman is happy.
"I really enjoy every day of my life right now," said Hidetoshi Yamamoto, who began buying thoroughbreds just four years ago.
The horse racing world is atwitter over one of his colts, a 3-year-old named Casino Drive. Can he win the Belmont Stakes? Can he steal the final jewel of the Triple Crown away from Big Brown, a dominating winner at the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness?
The questions tantalize because they are laced with mystery.
Casino Drive, Kentucky-bred but trained in Japan, has raced just twice. He won easily in Kyoto in late February and again in the Peter Pan Stakes at Belmont in early May.
But the horse's dark-star status as a spoiler derives less from his race history than from his bloodline.
His mother, the mare Better Than Honour, gave birth to the last two winners of the Belmont Stakes.
Casino Drive, too, could possess the rare blend of speed and stamina that it takes to grind out a win over the punishing 1 1/2 miles of a race that is called "The Test of the Champion."
Yamamoto, 52, remembers last year's Belmont winner with incendiary clarity.
From a paddock outside of Tokyo, he was watching on television by tape delay, owing to the 13-hour time difference.
The favorite in the race was Curlin, winner of the Preakness in 2007. But a filly named Rags to Riches, who happens to be the older half-sister of Casino Drive, surged to the lead and won the race by a head.
As Yamamoto soon learned, only two fillies in 139 years had won the Belmont Stakes and the last filly did it in 1905.
