California Chrome visits gate, hams it up for the cameras

California Chrome has proven quite photogenic (Jamie Newell/Horsephotos.com) The morning-line favorite for the Kentucky Derby, Steve Coburn and Perry Martin’s California Chrome, went trackside Thursday morning at 6:55 a.m. (EDT) as hundreds of cameras clicked and video rolled. The handsome chestnut colt stopped and took it all in, then did the same several times more as he backtracked his way to the frontside and under the iconic Twin Spires at Churchill Downs, before heading up the tunnel way to the paddock to “school,” just as he had the day before. Following his paddock tour, exercise rider Willy Delgado took the colt to the starting gate for a nice stand. “Willy told me he did fine in the gate,” trainer Art Sherman said afterward. The 77-year-old conditioner had watched his charge go about his morning business from the second floor of the old clocker’s stand on the backstretch near the five-furlong gap. “He’s usually fine in there, but sometimes he hesitates going in. He was fine today.” Following the gate education, Delgado put the California-bred in gear and had him gallop approximately 1 1/2 miles around the oval. California Chrome went through his exercise with vigor, pulling strongly on the rider’s reins. “He looked good out there,” Sherman noted. “He’s feeling good and he’s doing good. He’s coming up to this race right.”

California Chrome, who has shown he has front-running speed in his bag of
tools, drew post five in the 20-horse Derby field.

There are several other “speed” type horse drawn among the first 10 gate
positions and Sherman was asked if he was concerned about his horse possibly
getting caught up in a sapping speed battle early on.

“No, not really,” he replied. “My horse has speed; he’s really fast. And if
(jockey) Victor (Espinoza) wants to use it, he can. I’m not going to give him
any instructions. That’s not my way. I know how that works (Sherman rode for
more than 20 years). Victor knows him; he has confidence in him, and I’ve got
confidence in Victor. He’s won four stakes on my horse and he’s won the Kentucky
Derby.

“The key in a race like this with 20 horses in the field is the first 70
yards. You want to get out and get yourself some position. You don’t want to get
bumped or knocked off stride. You don’t want to get the wind knocked out of
them. If that happens, then they can’t get into that rhythm; they can’t get
rolling properly.”

Sherman, who has been a man in demand since arriving in Kentucky Monday,
spend a quite night Wednesday by having dinner at his hotel (The Brown) with his
wife and two nieces who had come in from California and Oregon.

“Back in the room and headed to bed by quarter to 10,” he said.

Following training this morning, he was planning on getting to the Kentucky
Derby Museum to see it and its famous Derby film, as well as visiting the grave
of 1955 Derby winner Swaps.

Sherman was the exercise rider for that horse, called by many the best
California-bred of all time. He is buried in The Garden behind the Derby Museum
along with four other Derby winners.

The trainer said he plans to gallop California Chrome at 6 a.m. Friday
morning given the early (8 a.m.) track closing on Oaks Day. He also will hold an
impromptu press conference at his Barn 20 at 7:30 a.m.

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