Many people will walk in and out of your life,
But only true friends will leave footprints in your heart – Eleanor Roosevelt
We all have a seminal catastrophic moment imprinted somewhere in our memory. For some it’s JFK’s assassination, Lady Diana’s car crash, or those planes hitting the twin towers. The sights, sounds and feelings of that exact moment are somehow etched indelibly somewhere deep inside and will travel with us for the rest of our lives.
In the same way I carry an image with me – it’s burnt through, right down to cellular level, and sits somewhere alongside my twisted strands of DNA. I know it will never leave me and will haunt my dreams and spring to mind unbidden when I least expect it. In it stands a big black horse, so covered in grit that she’s nearly grey. Her lovely long mare ears (stuffed with cotton wool) are pricked, but there are beads of sweat running down her body, her nostrils are flared and she’s obviously blowing hard. In the saddle sits her rider, cap in hand, eyes lifted to heaven in supplication and forcibly choking back emotion. Not merely defeated, but beaten in every sense of the word.
I may head into my dotage and lose my teeth, my eyesight and my memory, but I will never forget the feel of the laminate flooring under my bare feet that Sunday morning, standing by the computer in my pajamas, tears streaming down my face. Zenyatta had lost.
I stared at that image for the longest time, simply feeling numb. Finally, struggling to breathe over the lump in my throat, I clicked the video link, my composure eroding with each stride as that big brave horse ran her guts out for a lousy second place.
There was shock, there was outrage, there was disbelief and finally, a simple and profound silence that reverberated around the world.
Henry Ward Beecher wrote, “It is defeat that turns bone to flint; it is defeat that turns gristle to muscle; it is defeat that makes men invincible.” Whatever Trevor. This wasn’t FAIR !! She lost by a nose ! How can there be any justice in the world when the greatest horse in it loses by a nose?! How can anything ever be the same again ?
Someone mocked up a Youtube clip of the film Downfall, changing it to depict Hitler’s reaction to the race. His emotional tirade probably best expresses my feelings – ‘How could she have lost ???? 19 races and she’s never lost ! He doesn’t understand. None of them can possibly understand. She was MY horse ! When she did her little dance in the paddock, and posed during the post parade, it made all of our hearts melt. Not just mine, but EVERYONE’S ! I keep telling myself that 19-1 is nothing to be ashamed of. But it’s just not the same as being undefeated. It just isn’t.’
I don’t know why and I don’t know how, but this spectacular horse affected people the world over. Watching her run somehow lit you up inside and the world felt like a better place simply knowing she was in it. Poetry in motion doesn’t come close. She was sublime. When she ran she brought joy, she brought hope and, for a small, bright moment, a belief that there was perfection in the world.
Although she will not retire undefeated, Zenyatta proved that greatness is not measured in numbers, and perhaps like Man O’War and Native Dancer, her single, dramatic defeat will be the event that cements her status as a racing legend once and for all.
Candy Jones, from Lexington, Kentucky said ‘No one really understands what makes her so special. Everyone knows she can race, but it’s something in her heart, some kind of special light that she emits, and the world just hangs on her like a huge star.”
When you read reports about her, there is repeated reference to the energy she emits and it seems to have touched and inspired everyone who saw her. John Shirreffs tells of a school teacher from Santa Barbara who was wheelchair bound the first time she visited Zenyatta at his barn. Before they left for Kentucky she paid them another visit – this time she was carrying three cameras and walking. People suffering personal tragedy and terminal illness state Zenyatta as their inspiration for defying the odds. Most touching is the story of another teacher from Quebec named Marjorie Gawley. She had loved dancing and derived much joy in her final days from a video of Zenyatta’s trademark ‘dance.’ When she passed on, the English-teaching community in Quebec asked if there was any way Zenyatta could run the Classic in Marjorie’s name and when she went to the post at Churchill Downs, she did so with Marjorie’s name in her browband.
Trainer Steve Penrod, whose barn Zenyatta graced for her Breeders Cup stay, had never seen anything like it. People travelled across the country, across the world, content simply to stand and watch her graze and soak up her presence. “It was like a Hollywood movie production,” he said. “And the most impressive thing was seeing all the cars stopped on Longfield Avenue, as people got out to watch Zenyatta graze through the fence. She’s the biggest draw since Secretariat.”
Again, on her farewell appearance at Keeneland last week, over 1,000 fans turned up simply for a glimpse of their hero. They braved snow, freezing temperatures and a 2 hour delay for a 20 minute audience with ‘The Queen’. In her usual style, Zenyatta did not disappoint, doing her trademark dance for her fans one last time. Her groom, Mario Espinoza led her around the ring, stopping occasionally to allow a lucky few to reach out and touch that famous mahogany coat. The Daily Racing Form tells of one young woman marveling “I actually touched her!” as her friends stopped to put their hands in hers, laughing, as if wanting to pick up whatever it is that made Zenyatta special.
In what must be a bit of a culture shock after the mild Californian weather, Zenyatta has now retired to Lane’s End Farm to start her stud career and there is much speculation as to who will be selected as her first mate. With the Horse of The Year honours due to be awarded in January, there is enormous pressure from the public for it to go to Zenyatta, but to be honest, an award (or lack of one) will really not change the way people feel about her one jot.
I have not been able to write about Zenyatta before now. The feelings have been too sharp and too close to the surface. However, like poking around at a pulled tooth, the wound is still raw, but the edges are starting to heal over now.
We all dream of owning a ‘big’ horse, knowing we would be lucky simply to witness such a horse once in a lifetime, nevermind owning one. But in the end it doesn’t really matter – through their kindness, the Mosses and Shirreffs have shared Zenyatta with all of us. And somehow, simply by watching her run and loving this great horse, I too have become a small part of her story. And I humbly take my place next to all the other crazies by feeling that in some way, there is a tiny part of her that will always be mine.
But now it is over and all we have are treasured memories. But then that’s always been the way with horses. They compel you to love them, and then break your heart in pieces. And there’s not a damn thing you can do about it.
Cindy Adams said ‘There are friends and faces that may be forgotten, but there are horses that never will be’. I can’t explain it or make sense of it rationally, but when this big black mare galloped into my life she left her big, heavy hoof prints all over my heart. And despite my swollen eyes and aching throat, I wouldn’t have it any other way.
In the words of Stephanie Lambert – ‘God smiled one day and created Zenyatta’
