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Thursday, April 19, 2001
Frozen Moment: Leap of Fear
By Chris Corbellini
ABC Sports Online
NEW YORK -- Just five strides after being denied the Triple Crown aboard Charismatic, jockey Chris Antley's mind quickly went from disappointment, to shock, to fear.
Then, he jumped off his mount and called for help. Charismatic was in trouble.
|  | | Charismatic is examined after pulling up after the 131st
Belmont Stakes at Belmont Park in Elmont, New York. Charismatic placed 3rd. |
The jockey felt something unusual in Charismatic the moment they crossed the wire: the horse gave up underneath him. In both the Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes, the horse always had something extra, proving its staying power, even after the wire. Five strides after losing the Triple Crown and a $5 million dollar bonus, Charismatic went from a gallop to a walk.
With the shock of losing the Triple Crown -- which is something he desperately wanted to give to everyone -- lingering only moments before, Antley jumped off his beloved mount, fell to a crouch, then got up and called for help immediately when he realized something was amiss.
"He broke just after the wire," Antley recalled in the jockey's room well after the race, on his way to see the ailing Charismatic at D. Wayne Lukas' Barn 10. "I didn't feel anything during the race, I really couldn't tell you when it happened.
"I just let him run his race; he was there when I called him. He just broke."
Bob Lewis and D. Wayne Lukas shook their heads, shook hands and were about to walk back to the barn when they saw Antley jump and point to the upper left hoof of Charismatic. The big payday, and horse racing immortality was gone. Now their horse may be in trouble, too. When jockeys jump off their mounts that quickly, it causes the same amount of concern as when lifeguards leap off their chairs and race to the water. You know something is wrong here, but you can't see what it is yet.
"We are feeling pretty low right now," Charismatic owner Bob Lewis said after the race. "Our primary concern is the horse. We didn't see it (Charismatic after the wire) clearly. We are devastated with the thought that anything can be wrong with Charismatic."
Antley is one of the most positive-thinking figures in sports, some say annoyingly so. When his Triple Crown dream, his fantasyland as he called it, fell by the wayside the moment he leapt from Charismatic, that facade broke down. Though, his moist eyes were not the product of the crushing loss, but rather out of concern for his animal. When they took the horse away, no one at Belmont Park knew what would happen to the third-place finisher.
As it turns out, Charismatic's fractured left leg was not a life threatening injury, although Antley's jump off the mount was certainly valid. Injuries happened all the time, albeit rarely on such a national stage with so much at stake. The horse was given a soft cast moments after Antley called for help, and x-rays were taken within a half-hour.
"It's sad that this had to happen," Antley said. "He gave us a lot."
In veterinarian's terms, the horse suffered what is known as a lateral condylar fracture. In laymen's term's, it is like rolling one of your ankles badly while running. ABC Sports' Dr. Larry Bramlage believes Charismatic fractured his leg just before the finish, when he faded to third behind champion Lemon Drop Kid and Vision and Verse.
"In this case, the horse was his own enemy," Dr. Bramlage said. "He kept on running after the injury, making it worse."
Charismatic's gutsiness will keep him off the track for the rest of his career. Antley guessed as much when their run for the Triple Crown came to a literal abrupt end. Yet the jockey, dressed in a silver double-breasted suit and slicked back hair after a post-race shower, seemed at peace after what happened and not nearly as frantic as after the race.
"This kind of thing happens," Antley said. "He was an athlete and ran hard through the pain. Hopefully, if he can't come back to race, he can make a lot of babies we could enjoy later on.
Perhaps that will be Charismatic's legacy. He may have faltered triumphantly at the finish of the Belmont, but over time may sire a thoroughbred that can finish the Triple Crown job. Or maybe the lasting image of Charismatic will be created by his heartbroken jockey, who bounded off of him, causing a wave of concern among horse racing fans everywhere.
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