Milwaukee Brew Cruise

The no-name Santa Anita Handicap now has a name. It is Milwaukee Brew, who hadn’t won a race in more than 19 months before the Frankel Factor kicked in Saturday. Bobby Frankel, saddling Milwaukee Brew for only the second time, watched his 5-year-old find a hole in the stretch as he swept to a four-length win over 13 other horses in search of a reputation.

For a Grade I, $1-million race, this was a field that was hardly distinguished. For one thing, none of them had ever won a Grade I race. It was entirely in the spirit of things that the winner should be the lesser half of the Frankel-trained, Frank Stronach-owned entry. Their other horse, Euchre, who had a string of consistent efforts, finished next to last.

Milwaukee Brew, running 11/4 miles in 2:01 before a crowd of 30,411, paid $11.40 as the entry went off second, behind Futural, in the betting. Milwaukee Brew would have been a longshot had he run uncoupled, as Frankel noted after the race.

“He would have been about 30 or 40 to 1,” Frankel said. “The more I think about it, I should have scratched the other horse and bet on him.”

From coast to coast, Frankel cranked out stakes winners last year, winning 49 top races, totaling $14.7 million in purses and winning his second consecutive Eclipse Award. But like his first Breeders’ Cup win, which didn’t come until last year, he had been blanked in the Santa Anita Handicap before Saturday, saddling 10 starters in the race with only two finishing in the money.

This year is setting out to be another Frankel refrain. A half-hour before the Big ‘Cap, he saddled Decarchy for another shocker, an upset of Val Royal, the Breeders’ Cup Mile winner, in the $300,000 Jimmy Kilroe Mile.

Before he was rubbed by the Frankel touch, Milwaukee Brew had been trained by Joe Orseno, Stronach’s main conditioner on the East Coast, and by Tino Attard in Canada. The son of Wild Again and Ask Anita had lost eight consecutive races, his last win coming in July of 2000 in the Ohio Derby. The Big ‘Cap was only the fifth win in 15 starts for the horse, who was picked out by Andy Stronach, the owner’s son, who also named him after a $300,000 purchase at a yearling auction.

Stronach, whose Magna Entertainment owns Santa Anita, wanted to expand his racing interests in the West and sent Milwaukee Brew to Frankel about three months ago. In his first race in seven months, he ran sixth three weeks ago in the Whirlaway Handicap at the Fair Grounds in New Orleans.

Frankel was going to send Milwaukee Brew back to the Fair Grounds, to run in today’s New Orleans Handicap, but when Mizzen Mast, who would have been the Big ‘Cap favorite, suffered a cracked hoof last weekend, the trainer kept the Stronach runner in California. Going into Saturday, Frankel thought Milwaukee Brew, not Euchre, gave him his best chance.

“He never really ran a jump at the Fair Grounds, and he still only got beat by four lengths,” Frankel said.

Ridden by Mizzen Mast’s regular rider, Kent Desormeaux, who won his first Big ‘Cap with Best Pal in 1992, Milwaukee Brew carried 115 pounds. The 118-pound high weights, Euchre and Futural, who finished 12th, were the lowest for the race in 43 years.

Western Pride, at 19-1 with Pat Valenzuela, led most of the way before Milwaukee Brew overtook him with a sixteenth of a mile left. Western Pride held on for second, a neck better than Kudos, and Giant Gentleman was fourth.

“This is the luck of being with the Frankel barn,” said Desormeaux, who had ridden Milwaukee Brew for the first time in New Orleans. “He’s got a barn of champions and his second string would be the first string for a lot of stables.”

Milwaukee Brew was only the second horse, out of 29 starters, to win the Big ‘Cap from the No. 13 post. His break was clean, with the only horse outside him, Western Pride, angling over to contest the lead. Desormeaux kept his mount to the outside, and after six furlongs they were ahead of only two horses.

With a quarter-mile left, the winner was in eighth place, with six lengths to make up.

“I was trying to pick a spot to run,” Desormeaux said, “and ended up getting fanned, caught up in a slingshot with a horse that was half-length in front of me. But when we turned for home, there seemed to be a pocket, and when I split horses, he just barreled through there with such a powerful run.”

Valenzuela got a chance to ride Western Pride after Garrett Gomez stuck with Euchre. Seventh in the Strub but a winner the race before in the San Fernando, Western Pride was second.

“I thought I could pull a Spend A Buck [in 1985 a rare wire-to-wire Kentucky Derby winner] on them, but I couldn’t do it,” Valenzuela said. “I tried to get everyone behind me tired, but Bobby Frankel’s always got a rocket in there. But he still ran a great race. He was game for second and that’s worth $200,000.”

Milwaukee Brew earned $600,000. Going in, for 14 races, he had earned slightly less than that. Now he has the name to go with the bankroll.

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Big ‘Cap Finish

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