JONES GIVES JOCK GOMEZ 'HARD' TIME
June 11, 2007 -- COWBOY Larry Jones came out with both barrels blazing yesterday against the "nonsensical" ride top jockey Garrett Gomez gave his horse Hard Spun in the Belmont Stakes.
As he grazed his Triple Crown warrior outside the barn, Jones said up front, "This is probably not a good time to ask me a lot of questions about the Belmont."
Then, for the next 15 minutes he fumed, "I'm really starting to wonder whether any jockey has a clock in his head anymore. You could tell the old time jocks how fast to go and if they were off even a fifth of-a-second, they'd be upset with themselves. I really don't know whether these (modern) jocks have a clue as to how fast they're going."
What set Jones off was the incomprehensible tactical decision by Gomez to wrangle a free-running horse like Hard Spun back behind two leaders, C P West and Slew's Tizzy, who were running one of the slowest-run Belmonts in history.
You have to go all the way back to 1969 to find a Belmont run in such snail fractions as Saturday's crawl. That year, Arts and Letters won after going 6f in 1.16.1 and the mile in 1.40.1 on a fast track. Saturday, C P West led the field through six furlongs in 1.15.3 and the mile in 1.40.2 on a fast track.
Larry Jones could not believe his eyes as he saw the fractions posted on the infield board and saw his horse being strangled back in third place behind the leaders. What made him even madder was the memory that Hard Spun helped lose the Preakness for the exact opposite reason - he was burning the track with blistering fractions, flying through six furlongs in 1.09 and change.
Just about everybody, including Jones, expected Hard Spun to be the Belmont pacemaker.
"I tried to explain to Gomez to slow the pace down, but I told him that if this horse could get the 6f. in 1.13 or 1.14, we'd be home free," Jones said. "I never dreamed we would be going in nearly 1.16 and not be on the lead."
As this was going on, Jones complained, "Gomez kept reaching to get a bigger hold" on Hard Spun. He said after the start, Gomez dropped Hard Spun to the rail, then on the turn, swung him out wide, a tactic that clearly mystified Jones.
