Shane Sellers’ voice is unmistakably all Louisiana, but he refers to himself as “the local boy.”
On Sunday, the local boy again made good at Arlington International Racecourse. Sellers, who holds the track’s single-season riding record, won his biggest purse when he scored a front-running victory aboard 10-1 shot Explosive Red in the $300,000, Grade II American Derby, middle leg of Arlington’s Mid-America Triple Crown.
“A lot of good things have happened to me here, but this is the biggest one,” said Sellers, who came home a comfortable five lengths ahead of Earl of Barking.
The victory culminated a week in which, after a slow start, just about everything went right for Sellers.
Last Sunday, he began a five-day suspension for careless riding the previous Friday.
While Sellers relaxed unhappily, his agent, former jockey Ron Ebanks, tried in vain to get Sellers aboard Lykatill Hil for the American Derby. When that didn’t work out, he was happy to settle for Canadian-bred Explosive Red.
The logical choice to ride Explosive Red was Arlington mainstay Earlie Fires, who the previous week won the Modesty Stakes aboard Hero’s Love, who’s trained by Explosive Red’s trainer, Daniel Vella. But Fires had a commitment aboard Pride Prevails.
Neither Lykatill Hil nor Pride Prevails were anywhere near Explosive Red at the finish Sunday.
Sellers, a free man again, warmed up Saturday in Kentucky with a victory aboard Jeano in the Ellis Park Budweiser Breeders’ Cup.
The good fortune continued: The overnight rains softened Arlington’s turf course for the Derby. “Just fine for us,” Vella’s assistant, Ken Barber, said.
The soft course also resulted in the scratching of two dangerous horses, Arlington Classic winner Boundlessly and Belmont Stakes runner-up Kissin’ Kris.
Then came Sunday’s race, which, Sellers said, “set up perfectly.”
Explosive Red, breaking from the No. 7 post position, was able to clear the field and reach the rail well before the horses entered the clubhouse turn. He maintained a comfortable margin throughout the backstretch, but midway on the final turn, it looked like some of the headline names might make it a race.
It didn’t happen.
“The rest of them just never came to him,” Sellers said. “I kept looking for them, waiting for them, but they never came.”
“When I saw he went 49 (for a half-mile) and 1:13 (for six furlongs), I knew we were home free and (I) cooled out,” Barber said.
Earl of Barking, the West Coast star, looked menacing at the top of the stretch but flattened out and was a well-beaten second.
Mike Smith, rider of East Coast star Llandaff, the 2.20-1 favorite, said his horse “just never fired” en route to an eighth-place finish. Steve Morguelan, trainer of Snake Eyes, a winner of two straight stakes at Arlington, blamed the lack of pace for his horse’s non-threatening, fourth-place finish.
So the intersectional battle fell to a Canadian-bred, Explosive Red, to pick up the $180,000 first-place check for Frank Stronach, one of Canada’s top thoroughbred owners.
The scratching of Boundlessly meant that there again would be no sweep of Arlington’s Mid-America Triple Crown-the Arlington Classic, American Derby and Secretariat (Aug. 29).
![Today is Thursday, May 2, the 123rd day of 2024. There are 243 days left in the year. Today’s Highlight in History: On May 2, 1994, Nelson Mandela claimed victory in the wake of South Africa’s first democratic elections; President F.W. de Klerk acknowledged defeat. On this date: In 1863, during the Civil War, Confederate Gen. Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson was accidentally wounded by his own men at Chancellorsville, Virginia; he died eight days later. In 1890, the Oklahoma Territory was organized. In 1927, the U.S. Supreme Court, in Buck v. Bell, upheld 8-1 a Virginia law allowing the forced sterilization […]](https://www.chicagotribune.com/wp-content/uploads/migration/2020/12/05/XO3UVTRKQFHOTGDHZPM5HOATZQ.jpg?w=535 "Today is Thursday, May 2, the 123rd day of 2024. There are 243 days left in the year. Today’s Highlight in History: On May 2, 1994, Nelson Mandela claimed victory in the wake of South Africa’s first democratic elections; President F.W. de Klerk acknowledged defeat. On this date: In 1863, during the Civil War, Confederate Gen. Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson was accidentally wounded by his own men at Chancellorsville, Virginia; he died eight days later. In 1890, the Oklahoma Territory was organized. In 1927, the U.S. Supreme Court, in Buck v. Bell, upheld 8-1 a Virginia law allowing the forced sterilization […]")
