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Excerpt from "Seabiscuit: An American Legend"
The secret workouts had three purposes. First they concealed the horse's superb form from track racing secretaries, who assigned imposts. Second, through an ingenious method designed by Smith, they helped the horse stay in racing trim. Seabiscuit was more prone to weight gain than any horse Smith had ever handled. Because he believed that the quickest way to ruin a horse was to overwork him, Smith resorted to creative solutions to overcome Seabiscuit's weight problem. On mornings when an afternoon workout was planned, he would set the horse's bridle and saddle out where he could see them, withhold breakfast, skip his normal morning workout, and do everything else that was typical of a race day. Seeing the tack and thinking he was racing that day, Seabiscuit would become keyed up, lose interest in eating, and fret weight off. Smith would then take him out to work in the afternoon, just as if he were racing. The method worked, and Seabiscuit kept his weight down.
The final benefit of the secret workouts was sadistic pleasure. Smith took immense satisfaction in making reporters and clockers miserable. The old man had an offbeat sense of humor. He once electrified a park bench with wires and tacks, ran a trigger wire down the shed row, hid himself in a stall, and spent the day shocking the hell out of every weary hotwalker who tried to sit down and rest. Once he became a major subject for the press, nothing was more amusing to him than creating situations that left his pursuers confused and frustrated. They gave him limitless opportunity; Seabiscuit was one of the biggest stories in the country, so they just kept coming back for more punishment. For people trying to make a living covering him, Smith was thoroughly maddening. "Turf writers and clockers swear by Tom Smith," moaned a reporter, "and very often they just swear."
The secret workouts worked for Seabiscuit, but because Smith refused to explain himself to the press, they created a serious misapprehension. The rarity of Seabiscuit's public appearances fueled rumors that the horse was unsound, rumors that were reinforced by the horse's choppy gait. Smith did little to correct them. "That horse of yours can't walk," said one spectator as Seabiscuit bumped past. "Runs, though," Smith replied. Though the horse was dollar sound at this stage of his career, reporters given to hyperbole began regularly referring to him as a "cripple." The stories were accepted as fact, and soon the word attached to Seabiscuit for good. It was a misconception that would create serious headaches for Smith later.
And Smith couldn't fool everyone. Los Angeles Times and San Francisco Chronicle columnist Oscar Otis was one of the few truly acknowledgeable turf scribes and dean of the western racing writers. Almost immediately, Otis was onto Smith. Shortly before the Santa Anita Handicap, Otis discovered Smith working Seabiscuit at three o'clock in the morning. "Seabiscuit and Greta Garbo can be coupled in the betting from now on," he wrote in the Times. "Both want to be let alone." The reporters and clockers now knew Smith was up to something. Most of them didn't like Smith any better than he liked them, and they resolved to catch him in the act. Smith was determined to thwart them. The battle was joined.
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