The Legend of Zippy Chippy

by William Thomas

  The trainer, wearing his “Zippy Chippy” hat a little off kilter, looked downright jaunty. High-stepping his way onto the track, Zippy was in fine form, unchar​acter​istic​ally jolly. He didn’t give Felix a hard time when he put the saddle on him, he hadn’t glared at anybody all morning, he didn’t nip the exercise pony who trotted beside him during the track warm-up, and he even went into the padded starting gate willingly, not rearing up in defiance or lashing out at one of the crew whose job it was to muscle him in there. Typically it took four men to get Zippy into the gate, and one of them usually sought alternative employment after the experience. But not today. There was something in the air.

  On this balmy afternoon, Zippy was looking at six short furlongs to dispatch six other maidens, and if you looked closely at the smiling trainer and his eager sprinter, the scene dripped with surprise and possibility.

  As the starting bell rang, a field of six horses verily flew onto the track in a flourish of spraying dirt and booming hooves. They headed for the first turn fast and stormed down the backstretch as one. The crowd had a great view of this streaking posse hammering down the track in a riot of colorful silks, with little men crouched on their backs.

  They had almost as good a view as Zippy, the seventh horse, who could see the race unfolding right in front of him as he stood perfectly still in the starting gate long after the others had left. When the RINGGGGGGGG! had gone off for all to hear, Zippy Chippy had decided he wasn’t coming out to play today. The horse, like many a bloodied and addled heavyweight boxer, had failed to answer the bell. He just stood there as an embarrassed jockey whacked him on the ass with his riding crop and gestured helplessly toward the handlers standing behind the gate.

  It’s fair to say that a rider who is not in motion is not so much a jockey as a hood ornament. Benny Afanador was not amused. He’d had bad trips on Zippy Chippy before, but not one in which the entire field of horses was closing in on the first turn before he could get his unpredictable mount to move. This time Zippy had committed the cardinal sin of horse racing. He had “dwelt.”

  Dwelling is the term for a horse that breaks very, very slowly from the starting gate, giving himself almost no chance of winning. Zippy had added a couple of words to that definition: “slowly or not at all.” Giving your rivals a thirty-length head start is a real bad idea for any horse, particularly one who is not noted for his late speed … or early speed … or, okay, speed. Generally speaking, dwelling is a terrible tactic to employ in sport. It would be like Denver Bronco Peyton Manning taking the snap from a center, then signing the ball for a charity auction before actually putting it in play. Imagine Dale Earnhardt Jr. stepping out of his National Guard Chevrolet Impala SS to personally thank the man waving the green flag at the start of the race.

  Out of the gate, Zippy had delayed before, he had dawdled before, and he had even dilly-dallied before, but he had never dwelt. Racetrack officials take dwelling very seriously. They know their salaries come from the money being pushed under the betting windows, not just at Finger Lakes but at other tracks and off-track shops all over North America. When bettors get nervous about the legitimacy of the races, track stewards get the shakes and the ticket sellers start bringing paperbacks to read at work.

  Oddly, Felix didn’t seem all that upset at his horse’s decision to sit this one out. “He don’t break so good,” he explained. “That’s all.” Perhaps he was just a little bit impressed that Zippy had found a new way to lose. Felix had never before seen his horse not going forward in a race. Even the faithful who followed this horse religiously were disappointed. Zippy could lose, of course, but not this way.

  Having given away an insurmountable lead to six fellow maidens, Zippy lost the race by twenty-six lengths, and Felix had no choice but to enthusiastically follow the instruction of the track stewards: school the horse in the basics of breaking from the gate.

  But that wasn’t the worst of it. Now with eighty-three career losses, Zippy was just two defeats away from what was believed to be the all-time record for the most losses by an American thoroughbred. Two horses had already hit this infamous mark of eighty-five losses in a row. The smart money was betting that Zippy Chippy would make it a three-way tie at the top of that heap … which, when you think about it, is really the bottom of the barrel.

  That “something in the air” on that day when Zippy came in last for the umpteenth time? Surprise had disappeared around the first turn with the rest of the pack, and optimism was overcome by the strong smell of horse manure. There’s an awful lot of that at the track. You have to wonder if there wasn’t a little shed row sabotage involved here. I mean, the farrier wasn’t happy driving a brand-new dented truck, and he was the last man to work on Zippy’s shoes, and we all know how that goes …

  For the want of a nail the shoe was lost.

  For the want of a shoe the horse was lost.

  For the want of a horse the rider was lost.

  For the want of a rider the battle was lost.

  For the want of a battle the kingdom was lost.

  And all for the want of a horseshoe nail.

  Benjamin Franklin

  GEORGE CHUVALO, THE FIGHTER

  WHO ALWAYS ANSWERED THE BELL

  I once interviewed Canadian George Chuvalo, one of the toughest stand-up boxers in the history of the sport. Inducted into the World Boxing Hall of Fame in Los Angeles, Chuvalo fought the legends – Joe Frazier, George Foreman, Floyd Patterson, and Muhammad Ali (twice) – without ever getting knocked off his feet.

  Built like a brick outhouse, bloodied but never addled, Chuvalo could take a ton of punishment before launching his own damaging blows. In front of a live audience, I opened with the following question: “Your critics have described you as more of a defensive fighter than …” I didn’t get to finish.

  “My critics should talk to those seventy-four guys I put in the hospital,” replied Chuvalo rather calmly, which got an admiring laugh from the crowd. After ninety-three grueling professional fights over a twenty-year career, the man was not exaggerating.

  “The night I fought Muhammad Ali in Toronto, he went to the hospital and I went dancing with my wife.”

  Unlike many punch-drunk boxers who slur their words, Chuvalo is not only mentally sharp, but he can also remember every detail of every one of his bouts. Not exactly the Artful Dodger, he figures he took 9,000 hits to the head in his career. I asked him how he could possibly have not received a concussion?

  “No neck,” he said. “I don’t have a neck.” Just a hunch, but he’s probably right. In order to concuss, the brain needs to swing like a pendulum and bang off the walls of the cranium. Having a short neck means there is not much of a swinging motion and therefore no damage done when you get hit.

  I couldn’t wait to ask him about Henry Cooper. Way back in the seventies, I found myself in the Henry Cooper Pub in London, England, staring at a wall of photos of every great fighter who ever lived, including Jack Dempsey, Joe Louis, Rocky Marciano, and the original Sugar Ray, Sugar Ray Robinson.

  Cooper was a small heavyweight but a quick puncher with a deadly left hook, a pugilist who outboxed and outfoxed his opponents instead of steadily pummeling them into a purple pulp, as Chuvalo did. Cooper, who once knocked down a young Muhammad Ali, was the British, European, and Commonwealth heavyweight champion. Canada being part of the Commonwealth meant that Chuvalo, the longest-reigning Canadian champion, had a legitimate chance to challenge Cooper for that coveted crown. Except Cooper knew what every fan of boxing at the time could tell you: trying to dance around George Chuvalo would have been like throwing himself in front of a big red double-decker London bus. So Cooper artfully dodged Chuvalo, wisely fighting less dangerous opponents.

  One day, Chuvalo was training in a London gym when he spotted Cooper’s manager, Jim Wicks. “Boom Boom,” as George was known, ambled over to Wicks and, after a bit of small talk, put it to the manager bluntly.

  “So when are me and your boy going to meet i
n the ring?” asked Chuvalo.

  At this point in the telling, Chuvalo invokes a very good, very clipped English accent.

  “Mr. Chuvalo,” replied Cooper’s manager, clearing his throat, “he doesn’t even want to meet you socially!”

  A high compliment, that – when one of the best in the business avoids you in order to preserve his record as well as the shape of his head. Hardly Zippy Chippy’s problem, given that every horse that had a saddle wanted to race against him. And yet, both stalwarts of their sports, with all those opponents in all those battles, neither Chuvalo nor Zippy ever got knocked off his feet.

  TEN

  I have nothing against underdogs personally.

  It’s just that I wouldn’t want one to bury my sister.

  Anonymous

  Oh, sorry – that should have read “undertakers.”

  Two weeks later, on July 6, 1998, it was the same place, same track, same thing. The bell rang, the gates clanged open, and the pack burst forth without Zippy Chippy. With six horses in front of him enjoying a fifteen-length lead, Benny Afanador, using a lot of guts and guile, managed to move his horse up briskly into the stretch, taking him from seventh to fifth in a rush to the wire. Rallying rather well, Zippy surprisingly came in fifth by passing two exhausted horses in the stretch and finishing eleven lengths behind Bangzoomtothemoon. Although somebody swears they heard Felix turn to his horse and say, “One of these days, Alice,” nothing can be confirmed.

  While not last, he still finished twenty-one lengths behind the winner, Can’t Stop Now, proving yet again that he, Zippy Chippy, could stop anywhere and anytime he wanted. But in the starting gate? This dwelling was a horrible habit that, if not broken, would be a certain career-crusher. The claiming price to purchase Zippy was $13,000 – which, when you think about it, should have come with a mental health background check for any prospective buyer.

  “Disbelievable,” said Felix. At the track steward’s behest, he had worked Zippy in front of them that very morning, demonstrating how well his horse was doing getting out of the gate. Time after time, the bell went off and so did Zippy Chippy. New trick, same act. Like Lucy holding the football for Charlie Brown to kick, Zippy had promised to do it right this time, and Felix had landed flat on his ass. Apparently, the Zipster had just been messing with them.

  With this, his second dwell in a row, Zippy was put on forced vacation. “For the protection of the public,” read the track’s official statement, “we’ve recommended that the horse take some time off.” Not really an outright ban, but nothing you want to see on your year-end job review. “We just want him to take some time off now, and if he shows he can break, then he can run again,” said a steward.

  The sixty-day temporary ban went into effect immediately after his eighty-fourth loss, and the “three-strikes-and-you’re-out” rule was implied but not stated. Nobody was counting on a win from this horse, but there were some expectations that he would at least run. A second or even a third once in a while would keep bettors happy and the stewards at bay. It’s pretty much a given at every racetrack – if you can’t get out of the starting gate, then leave the barn by the back door and don’t bother coming back. Once somebody suggests attaching one of those backing-up beepers to your bum, you’re in serious trouble.

  Felix lamely defended his stop-and-go gelding. “He just want to see the other horses out in front of him before he run.” Absolutely. At eleven lengths behind the pack at the first turn, he had a very clear picture of the task at hand.

  This strategy of sizing up your opponents ahead of time often works in short-track cycling or long-distance running. But on a track, you’re not likely to see Usain Bolt hanging back in the starting block after the gun goes off in order to identify which sprinter he has to run to ground in order to win the one hundred meters. Sorry, but even on The Biggest Loser you won’t see a contestant sitting around scarfing Twinkies in order to give the others a bit of an edge.

  “Then, after he wait, Zippy tries to catch up to them,” added Felix, who by this point had personally trained his mount to a total of sixty-four losses, twelve in the last year alone.

  Although Finger Lakes officials were not backing off their temporary suspension, they were rather impressed by Zippy’s many fans and frequent bettors, who were illogically putting their money on him to win, thereby reducing what should have been very long odds. Despite having lost by a total of fifty-five lengths in his previous three races, Zippy still went off at 2–1 instead of a realistic 35–1. A storm of protest erupted in the press when Zippy was suspended, prompting one steward to suggest, “Maybe he’s reached cult status.”

  Consequently, Zippy was placed in temporary retirement at a nearby boarding farm where the owners were quite taken by the fun-loving delinquent and especially by his spreading fame. Fans were soon knocking on the barn door for an impromptu meet ’n’ greet with the Zipster.

  “People like to see him run,” said Felix, still not grasping the seriousness of the situation. “The old-timers who come to the track, they ask about him every day.”

  It wasn’t just the old boys in the clubhouse who were enamored with Zippy Chippy. Families came to watch their lovable underachiever, bringing kids wearing Zippy Chippy hats who couldn’t yet see over the trackside fence. The jaded backstretch workers rarely left the barns to watch a race, but they did come to the frontside to see Zippy run, curious as to what calamity he might cause.

  Felix had a way of taking the sting out of a painful predicament with unexpected humor. When track officials and media asked him about Zippy’s erratic behavior, he said, pushing his blue Zippy Chippy cap to the back of his head, “I dunno. Every time, I ask him what the problem is, but he don’t answer me.”

  When pressed about his lopsided devotion to this particular horse when he had a stable full of racers he was training back in Clifton Springs, Felix scratched the scar on his back and reached into his bag of favorite parables, but he … he missed by two lengths. “Say you have three horses, and two are in university and they do well, but the other one …” Either that was a slip of the tongue or the entrance-level qualifications for universities in New York State have fallen lower than those of Mississippi.

  If Zippy could not see the ghosts of bridesmaids past down the track, Felix surely could. Gussie Mae and Really a Tenor were taunting Zippy Chippy just around the next bend of the next race. With eighty-five straight losses each, these two hapless non-winners made up the kind of club that if they’re willing to accept you as a member, you don’t wanna join. With eighty-four losses, Zippy seemed to be knocking on their clubhouse door.

  And his losing streak had become contagious, spreading to Felix’s other twenty-seven horses. The previous year, Felix’s horses had gone winless in eighty-eight starts. When asked if he was embarrassed by the poor performance of his four-footed friend, Felix became defensive: “No, no. Maidens, if they don’t win, trainers dump them fast. Zippy, he’s happy when he runs, and that’s all I want. A horse that loses like that, you think maybe he stop eating or he lay down in his stall, but … but he don’t do that stuff. He’s a happy horse, and healthy too.”

  Although Zippy was attracting a wider circle of fans, jockey Benny Afanador was suddenly not one of them. The rider was furious at having been stranded in the starting gate for a second time, like he was riding a coin-operated children’s pony down at the mall. With his newfound fondness for hanging out in the starting gate, this horse had managed to piss off his most faithful jockey, the one who’d been in his saddle for eleven almost consecutive rides. “This horse is making me look bad. I will never ride him again,” said Afanador. One of the few jockeys at Finger Lakes willing to mount the horse was good to his word – he never rode Zippy Chippy again. While jockey Victor Espinoza likely earned ten percent, or $300,000, for American Pharoah’s Triple Crown romp, Afanador, after eleven trips around the track with Zippy Chippy, was still waiting for his first winner’s share of the purse.

  Deeply hurt
by this parting of ways (Felix and Benny had come to America together), the trainer’s outward response was a shrug and then a visit to the jockeys’ room.

  Although he loved Benny like a brother, he knew that for the “jock mount” of $75, at this level of racing, it would not be difficult to find Zippy’s next silken-clad victim.

  Team Zippy may have lost its favorite rider, but never its loyal captain.

  TEAM LOYALTY: US AGAINST THE WORLD

  AND BARNYARD ANIMALS

  That’s what they all had – Felix and Zippy, Penn and Teller, Minnie and Mickey, Mickey and Billy – togetherness and team loyalty.

  New York Yankees legends Mickey Mantle and Billy Martin, with twelve World Series rings between them, were best friends as well as hunting buddies. After his playing days were over, Martin did such a good job of managing the Texas Rangers that they nicknamed the team the “Turn Around Gang” and presented him with a very expensive hunting rifle, which he was dying to use. By way of explaining the devotion players had for their manager, Mantle tells his favorite story on a YouTube video by claiming that if Martin told his players to jump off a roof, they would because “they knew Billy would jump off with them.” (This is also the reason that NASA scientists and neurosurgeons at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore do not fear losing their jobs to professional baseball players.)

  Warning: This story may be apocryphal, which means it could have been concocted by these two gentlemen in the back seat of a hired car as they drank beer from a cooler and took turns knocking the driver’s hat off. As the story goes, Mantle had a friend who owned a hunting ranch near San Antonio, Texas, and off they went. The former doctor and rancher was only too happy to see the great Mickey Mantle at his door (Martin waited in the car) and told him they could shoot all the deer they wanted, but … he had a favor to ask. Very reluctantly, Mickey agreed to put the doctor’s twenty-year-old mule – a decrepit animal they had seen standing in the barnyard as they’d driven up to the house – out of its misery.