“I’m in!”
December 5th, 2008By Jude T. Feld
Rush Rush at the 2004 Keeneland September Yearling Sale.
One night, in 1955, my dad is sitting in a bar in Glendale, California, having a post-softball game beer with his teammate, Ed Deter. The subject turned to horseracing, as it most often does when a Feld is present.
Deter said, “Jack, have you ever thought about owning a horse?”
Believe it or not, the thought had never really crossed Dad’s mind. He loved to go to the races, but he also went to the World Series every year, played softball twice a week, was the Boy Scout master at St. Bernard’s Catholic Church and had a day job as a structural steel engineer for United States Steel.
“Sounds interesting,” Dad said. “Tell me more.”
“My aunt is a trainer at Agua Caliente, Deter said. “She bought a two-year-old out of the L.K. Shapiro dispersal. He is three thousand bucks. I really want to buy him but I need a partner. You’re the only guy I know with the money and the love of the game.”
“I’m in,” Dad replied. “I’ll give you a check right now.” (He always kept at least one in his wallet.)
At a later trip to the bar, the men would design their silks – brown jacket (Deter’s favorite color), blue sleeves (Dad’s favorite color) and a white diamond with a blue, stylized, lower-case ” df ” that Dad drew on a cocktail napkin.
The colt, who Shapiro cleverly named Rush Rush (by Count Speed out of Quicklime), raced several times for the partnership, finishing in the money a few times, but never winning.
Around the same time, Dad proposed to Mom, and later on expressed to her his desire to have a large family.
“You can have kids or horses,” Mom told him. “You can’t have both.”
Rush Rush would have to go.
Dad sold his interest to some of trainer Mary G. Ellis’s other clients, who would win with Rush Rush as he matured and the distances increased. The California-bred even set a track record for a mile and nine-sixteenths at old Rillito Park. He wasn’t the greatest horse that ever lived by any stretch of the imagination, but in our family, he was a legend.
We painted pictures of him in school, drew his likeness on my Dad’s birthday cakes, and we bought Dad blue and brown sweaters, blue and brown shirts and blue and brown neckties for Father’s Day and Christmas, all in honor of Rush Rush.
This little known horse, who ended up running in $900 claiming races in New Mexico, spawned three generations of racegoers, with no doubt countless more to come.
Almost half a century later, my brother Bob and I came across a More Than Ready colt at the 2004 Keeneland September Yearling Sale. We both really loved his presence. He had a great walk and was very correct. We were ecstatic when the hammer fell to Bongo Racing Stable at $100,000.
Bob had secretly saved the name Rush Rush with the Jockey Club, waiting for a special horse to honor our father and our family mascot.
“I think we should name the More Than Ready colt Rush Rush,” he said to me during an afternoon phone call. “I got a feeling he’s gonna be a good one.”
I had that feeling too.
One night, when friends Mike and Michelle Penna came out to the farm for dinner, Mike mentioned that he really wanted to buy a piece of a racehorse.
“Look out the back door,” I said. “That’s the horse you should buy. He’s a running son of a gun and handsome sucker to boot. I love him.”
The Pennas went out and spoke to the colt who would become the next Rush Rush and when they came back in, Mike said, “I’m in!”
Five wins and $210,000 in earnings later the current Rush Rush has been a joy to all of his owners, but the Mike Machowsky trainee could step into a different dimension on Saturday, when he takes on some of the best turf marathoners in the country in the Hollywood Turf Cup (G1). It is a tall order, but there is reason for optimism.
“Machowsky says the horse is doing better than ever,” Bob told me. “I think Victor Espinoza really knows how to ride this horse and we were lucky enough to get him. We all thought Rush Rush could have won the Sunset Handicap (G2) with a better trip. This field is a little deeper, but we know he likes the course and can get the distance.”
If Rush Rush wins the Grade 1, it would be a 53-year dream come true for everyone in our family and a very special victory for Bongo Racing Stable.
