The Legend of Zippy Chippy (19 page)

One person not lining up to buy a copy was the tireless trainer who loved the sport and the excitement it brought to his otherwise quiet existence. Having guided Carrie's Turn to eight victories in a short period of time, including the Finger Lakes Stakes, Felix had been to the winner's circle, even if Zippy had not. Yet when the yelling stopped and things calmed down, it was clear that Felix had more fun losing with Zippy Chippy than he had ever had winning with Carrie's Turn.

Naturally, Felix was impressed and inspired by Zippy's valiant performance. “I'm proud that he gave me a good race today. Second is good,” he said, beaming. It still wasn't champagne, but those first cold beers tasted especially good to the two of them that day.

It was becoming increasingly clear that as a trainer, Felix Monserrate's level of excellence was definitely not that of a New York Yankees manager or even the assistant manager of a Jiffy Lube, but he and Zippy were in the thick of it again, and the world of horse racing was watching. Scrappers both, they had gone to war many times – sixty-seven times as a team – and they had come out the other end, alive and ready to re-enlist. After the Black Rifle brawl, the dream of winning had been reignited in the mind of the owner and in the hearts of tens of thousands of the horse's fans. Knock, knock, knockin' on the door of victory were horse and owner together.

Nipped at the wire and with a third-place finish before that, Zippy was on a roll again. After his best effort ever, he had this blissful faraway look in his eyes, a kind of dazed gaze of disbelief. Excited but confused, he seemed to be asking those around him in Barn M,
Where am I and what just happened?
Zippy had that once-in-a-lifetime look – the “Bronko Look.”

If a man does not keep pace with his companions,

perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer.

Let him step to the music which he hears …

Henry David Thoreau

On September 16, 2000, one year after Black Rifle ruined everybody's day, Zippy Chippy went off at the Northampton Fair as the 2–1 favorite. His longtime fans were now pinching themselves and thinking,
Good lord, this horse just might win a race!
Having seen it all before, Juan Rohena was not so quick to jump on that bandwagon.

From the number eight post, farthest from the rail, Zippy broke best and shot to the lead. He led the six-and-a-half-furlong race at the three-quarter pole by a head over Sadler's Critic. At the half pole he surrendered to Sadler's Critic by two lengths but roared back strong as the two leaders entered the stretch. Neck and neck, stride for stride, they battled for home. As Zippy moved up to recover the lead, Sadler's Critic made a bold move to go inside, allowing Miner's Claim to come up suddenly and fast on the outside of both of them. Sadler's Critic pulled slightly ahead as Samjackie confronted Zippy for second place. Zippy typically chose to go wide where there was less traffic, but of course this meant more ground to cover. Tired, he faded as his
two challengers drove hard to hit the finish line, coming in third behind them. Zippy had again been beaten by two horses who themselves had never known victory.

Yet a second-place finish followed by a third was nothing short of a vast improvement for a horse that used to mistake the starting gate for a Comfort Inn. The Zipster was making people forget all about those record-setting losers Gussie Mae and Really a Tenor. Zero for eighty-eight starts, he alone was daring to go new distances, while others had fallen by the wayside.

There was a weird kind of upside-down, favorable rating index happening here. Although Zippy was still losing, finishing two for two in the money was quite remarkable, as attested by the large crowds and increased press coverage. It was like when Toronto mayor Rob Ford admitted smoking crack and binge drinking: after his confession, his popularity rating shot up six points in the polls. If your support base is enamored by you and also somewhat loony, then anything is possible.

Doing a victory jig for his adoring followers, Zippy was on a holy tear, which brought a proud smile to Felix's face and prompted him to pay his big four-footed friend the highest of compliments: “He been losin' real close lately.”

With his fate sealed at eighty-eight starts and his record losing streak confirmed by
Guinness World Records
, Zippy had earned a nice and comfortable retirement, and now was probably the time. With winter approaching and Zippy coming up to his tenth birthday in the spring, Felix shut him down.

After all, he wasn't the losingest horse in the whole world. An English steeplechaser by the name of Quixall Crossett had, at this point, lost 98 races in a row and would go on to lose 103 races in an eleven-year career. And here's the kicker: Quixall Crossett was a jump horse. On most jump courses, horses have to clear twenty
low, hedged fences. Neither Deep Blue, once the world's most powerful computer, nor the fanciful mind of Felix Monserrate could ever imagine Zippy Chippy racing on a track where hedges are used as hurdles. In no time at all, Zippy's jockeys would be known as “hedge hogs.” That would be just cruel. Quixall Crossett once lost a three-and-one-eighth-mile race by an astonishing one hundred lengths, something Zippy Chippy could never manage … mainly because American tracks are so much shorter.

At fifty-seven years of age and battered by setbacks, Felix was getting tired. He and his horse were starting to feel their ages. Yeah, he should probably put his buddy out to pasture at the farm. Still, there were all those adoring fans, thousands and thousands of them.

Then, at the end of 2000, just as Felix was warming up to the idea of retirement,
People
magazine did a follow-up article on Zippy, reporting that his “perfect track record remains unblemished.” Zippy didn't quite make it onto that issue's list of the twenty-five most intriguing people of the year, which included Michael J. Fox, Hillary Clinton, George W. Bush, Tiger Woods, and The Rock, he of the overarching eyebrow. Fittingly, Zippy came well back in the field of celebrities, a place where he was quite comfortable.

Having just signed a contract with the Texas Rangers that would assure him $25 million a year for ten years, Alex Rodriguez was a featured celebrity that year. Home from the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia, with five gold medals around her neck, Marion Jones was covered in the same issue. Am I the only one who sees the inquiry sign flashing with great urgency here? Imagine a celebrity match in which both “A-Rod” and Jones, subsequently disgraced for using performance-enhancing drugs, fade in the stretch as Zippy Chippy, the honest warrior, rushes up
between the two cheaters to win the Trustworthy Stakes and the top spot on the cover of
People
magazine. Ah, life: so unfair and yet … yeah, so unfair.

The magazine people showed up at the family farm with a huge tortoise for the highly hokey photo shoot. “That thing was huge,” Marisa said later. “You could almost ride it!” Under a photo of Zippy nudging the terrified turtle, the caption read, “On his home turf, Zippy Chippy noses out the competition.” In the photo, the turtle looks like he's about to abandon his shell and make a run for it. Zippy looks like he's been tricked.
How can I eat this thing with all that armor?

The article made reference to a previous edition of
People
that had tagged Zippy as “the losingest horse in racing history.” Felix shrugged it off. “Every time he runs, he comes back happy. I don't get disappointed, no matter what.” Emily, who loves horses more than humans, locked herself in the house for the afternoon of the shoot. Forced to pose next to a stupid, land-dwelling reptile, Zippy wished he was with her. And yet, for the growing legions of people who related to Zippy on a very basic level – you lose, we lose, life is tough, and you do not suffer alone in this world – the magazine had nailed it. One fascinating personality was he, the Zipster.

He had been singled out by
People
magazine for his one undeniable gift: consistency. From paddock to gate, gate to wire, and finish line to backside, Zippy's behavior was solid. Before every race he would fidget nervously and bob his head vigorously in the paddock as Felix gave him instructions for the impending test. He would neigh and nod as if he knew exactly what was expected of him. And he did know, because despite all their squabbles and disappointments, these two guys understood each other.
I get it, Felix. Start strong, keep pace, drive hard for home
. Then the bugle
would sound, but Zippy wouldn't hear it because from another area of the barn, from another part of the brain, he would hear Frank Sinatra singing, “I did it my way.”

So it wasn't Zippy's fault, it was Frank Sinatra's fault. No, it was Henry David Thoreau's fault for telling everybody they should listen to some far-off drummer instead of the manager, and that it was okay for everybody to pass you by like they were on a subway train and you were taking a leak up against a building, which they used to do in New York City before the Big Cleanup. Thoreau encouraged everybody to go sit quietly by a pond for hours at a time and gaze at their navels, which is really, really difficult to do if you're a horse.

By the time Zippy reached the track, all his brain power had been reduced to a really shrill Steven Tyler scream, and he was trying to remember whether Felix had locked the barn door before or after he got out, and … then he'd say to himself,
Just stop. Right now. Focus
. And then that goddamn bell would go off, and Zippy would stay calm by staying put in order to assess the situation, which cost him a lot of time and earned him a lifetime ban from most American racetracks. So, you see, this horse just could not win for trying.

It was not easy for Marisa to watch her father throwing his hands up at the finish line, cursing under his breath and watching the pride of his stable galloping down the dirt track, struggling to find another way to lose.

Felix had spent too many afternoons watching the horse he loved like family not keeping pace with his companions, time after time after time. But Felix could always find goodness in a failed performance by Zippy, and after he had bandaged his routine bite marks, he would tell the horse that everything was okay, that there was always next year, that eighty-nine would be the
charm, even though everybody knows eighty-nine is a number just itching to turn ninety.