Black Gold, Whirlaway represented in Fair Grounds Legends
Race
The 1924 Louisiana Derby and Kentucky Derby winner Black Gold, dual classic
winner Risen Star and 1941 Triple Crown winner Whirlaway head a list of 12
racing immortals to be represented in the November 26 Fair Grounds Legends
Purse, a race featuring contemporary horses competing in the historically
accurate “throwback” colors of the most popular runners in the history of the
country’s third-oldest racetrack.
The “field” for the Legends Purse will also include (in alphabetical order):
filly Blushing K.D., the 1997 Fair Grounds Oaks and Kentucky Oaks heroine;
Cabildo, a six-time Fair Grounds stakes winner in the late 1960s; Grindstone,
the 1996 Louisiana Derby and Kentucky Derby winner; Lecomte and Lexington, whose
match races in the antebellum South at Metairie Race Course are the stuff of
American racing legend; Master Derby, the first Louisiana Derby winner to take
the Preakness and the first to win the New Orleans Handicap the following
season; filly Pan Zareta, a 76-time winner from 1912 to 1917, buried in the Fair
Grounds infield; Tenacious, winner of 11 Fair Grounds stakes in the 1950s; and
filly Tiffany Lass, undefeated as a three-year-old, including victories in the
Fair Grounds Oaks and the Kentucky Oaks.
Three of the Legends — Black Gold, Pan Zareta and Whirlaway — are enshrined
in the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame in Saratoga Springs, New York.
The Fair Grounds Legends Purse will be a two-turn, main track event run on
the first Saturday of the 140th Thoroughbred racing season as part of a card
that also includes the $75,000 Pago Hop Stakes for three-year-old fillies.
Track announcer John G. Dooley will call the names of the legends as if
competing against one another in a fantasy race. The Fair Grounds Legends Purse
will be a standard pari-mutuel contest, with the only deviations from normal
procedure being the silks and the race call from Dooley.
The contemporary horses will be assigned their “throwback” colors according
to their morning-line odds, a process to be headed by oddsmaker Mike Diliberto.
The morning-line favorite among the contemporary horses will bear the colors of
the foremost legend in Diliberto’s estimation, and so on.
The Legends Purse will be drawn with the rest of entries on Wednesday. The
November 26 on-track program will include a centerfold insert depicting the
silks of the Legends, along with their biographies and photos.