That’s Eddie D.
January 9th, 2003by Jude T. Feld
I opened an e-mail from jockey agent Vince DeGregory on Tuesday morning. It said, “Eddie has officially retired today. You are the first to know.”
Eddie D. Pilots Bronze Parade To The Author’s First Lifetime Training Victory
A flood of memories filled my head. This was the man that put my silks in the winner’s circle for the first time, got mad at his agent when he didn’t ride a winner that I saddled, won my first $100,000 race and graded stakes and was a good friend as well.
It was 1978 when I first met Eddie Delahoussaye. He flew in to Ellis Park to ride A Letter To Harry in the $25,000-added Governor’s Cup. Trainer Doug Udouj and I picked him up at the airport. I kidded with him on the way to the track, as he was sitting on the bench seat of a dirty pickup truck, jammed between two, sweaty 250-pounders, holding his jock’s bag with the whip sticking out one end.
“The jocks in California would have gotten an air conditioned limo,” I said. “You look a slice of ham on a French roll.”
“Those guys got it made,” he replied. “I’m just a Louisiana boy. This is fine with me.”
That’s Eddie D.
Always satisfied to be participating…never feeling that he needs special treatment…even now that he is in the Hall of Fame.
He and A Letter To Harry won the Governor’s Cup that day. I still have the original chart and trackman Jack Valentine’s footnotes that we made for the Daily Racing Form. I only kept two others during my stint at the Form. They belong to Spectacular Bid.
October 23, 1980 was a banner day for me. My one-horse stable, Bronze Parade, was entered in the first race at Santa Anita with Eddie up. The gelding was training great and I was cautiously optimistic that I would break my maiden as a trainer.
The picture of that race is still perfectly clear in my head, as Bronze Parade raced in the garden spot behind two pace-setters. Eddie cut him loose at the quarter pole and the thrill of seeing my green, orange and gold colors far out in front has lasted for 22 years.
“Congratulations,” Eddie said when he returned to the winners’ circle. “If they all run like that, we’re gonna have a lot of fun together.”
At the prodding of my brother Bob, I claimed a horse named Pewter Grey for $20,000 in 1982. He was a regally-bred son of Grey Dawn II, out of the Hawaii mare Young Libby. A tough horse to be around, he bit several people, but he seemed to tolerate Bob, who became his groom.
He worked his way up the ladder for us, but on February 19, 1983, he became one of the greatest claims in Santa Anita history.
The Grade 3 Sierra Nevada Handicap was a race for four-year-olds going a mile and one-quarter on the hillside turf course. It was the turf version of the Grade 1 Strub Stakes. We entered Pewter Grey with Bill Shoemaker, who had ridden him to a second-place finish in his last start. Shoe was on one for Charlie Whittingham, so I named Eddie instead.
Pewter Grey, who had finally learned to come from off the pace, went right to the front coming down the hill, cruised around the track in front all the way and posted an easy victory, my first ever hundred grander.
“When did you know we had it won?” Eddie asked grinning when he rode up to me. “I bet you were cussin’ me like a dog when I went to the lead. To tell you the truth, I was cussin’ myself.”
That’s Eddie D.
Never one to pay too much attention to my instructions, Eddie even got me fired one time when he went to the lead and won by eight after I had told him not to get to the front too soon. He listened to me once, however.
In 1985 Tim Conway wanted to film a race for his movie The Longshot. He called and asked if I was running any winners during the week. I told him that Carrizzo was in at Hollywood Park on July 10 and that he was a cinch.
“Great,” Tim said. “He’s a big closer. It will make for an exciting finish.”
The film crew was in place in the grandstand when I went down to the paddock to saddle. Eddie walks out in the red, white and blue colors of Elizabeth and Jerry Vallone, smiling as usual.
“Listen to me,” I said. “Conway is filming this race for a movie, so when you go to make your move, be sure you are on the outside so they can get a good shot of you flying down the stretch.”
“You’re bleaping nuts!” he said laughing. “All right, we’ll do it your way. I just hope they don’t yell cut at the eighth pole.”
True to his word, Eddie let Carrizzo settle into his usual spot in last place, began his run turning for home and motored past the field on the outside, in typical Delahoussaye fashion, to win easily.
“I really thought you were joking,” Eddie confided weighing out. “But I saw all those cameras in the post parade and I knew you were serious. I got a little nervous. I didn’t want to screw it up!”
That’s Eddie D.
A cool head in a jock’s room full of hotheads. A smiling face in the paddock for the nightcap, whether he’d won four on the card or was drawing a blank. Encouraging words after a loser. Unafraid to say he road a bad race. Modest about praise when he rode a great one. An ambassador for the sport wherever he went. There is nobody on earth who appreciates our game more than Eddie D.
The only thing dearer to Eddie than racing is his family. His wife Juanita, his daughter Mandy, his son Loren and his sister Rose mean more to him than all the Derbies, Classics and Grade 1 races he ever won. He rode every winner for them. Truly, a very special man.
That’s Eddie D.
