A Coming Of Age

"Ummpphhhh...."

He didn't alter course, just drifted back and took up the same path he'd been on before the bumping. "He was just a big likable fellow," Turcotte said. Then the colt came out again, sideswiping him a second time—"Ummpphhhh...."

Confidence did not come easily to this young red horse. There was the morning in late February when Laurin boosted Turcotte up on Secretariat for a quarter-mile workout, not an easy gallop but a speed drill, with three other young colts—Gold Bag, Twice Bold and Young Hitter. It was time to teach them how to run, how to level out and reach for ground, something all horses have to learn.

"No race riding, boys!" Lucien called to the four as they walked their horses to the racetrack that morning, through Sunny Fitzsimmons Lane and out the quarter-mile bend under the spanking brightness of the morning. "No race riding! We're schooling them today. Stay head and head." The riders reached the track and circled it, around the turn at a gallop abreast. They headed for the three-eighths pole, then pulled to a stop, lining up still abreast, and walked several yards together. They wanted to start all at once. They clucked to their horses and went into a jog, picking up speed slowly, slowly, slowly....

Nearing the quarter pole, the four riders chirped again, and the horses started leveling and reaching out, bodies lower to the ground. Twice Bold, Gold Bag and Young Hitter accelerated rapidly, gathering up the pace from an easy gallop to a run as they raced past the quarter pole and entered the straight.

Turcotte picked up Secretariat's reins and clucked at him, not yelling, trying to give the horse a feel for the game. He sensed a bewilderment in the colt. He gathered Secretariat together, gave him time to steady himself and get his legs under him. They finally somehow synchronized, but the other three colts had already blown away from him. Turcotte saw the more precocious horses far up the track as Secretariat battled along and started to find himself.

They dusted Secretariat easily that morning, beating him by about 15 lengths and racing the quarter mile down the lane in 23 seconds. Secretariat finished in about 26 seconds. He was no Bold Ruler, and Turcotte recalls the feeling of awkwardness: "He just didn't know what it was all about. I asked him and he was plain confused. Didn't know which leg to put down first."

Periodically, as Secretariat worked out in Florida, Penny Tweedy asked Lucien about the red horse, and he hardly reflected buoyant hope.

"He hasn't shown me much," Lucien would say.

Or, "He's not ready. I have to get the fat off him first."