30 Years of Maryland Million: 1989

Pimlico, September 10, 1989—Fourth Maryland Million confirms idea’s success

Owners were now targeting the Maryland Million for their eligible runners years in advance. Charles G. Middleton III, a Louisville attorney, had attended the first Maryland Million in 1986 on an invitation by David Reynolds. He and his family had such a fabulous time that he said, “I made up my mind I would someday run a horse in it.”

By luck, he had yearling filly by Dancing Count, and when he returned home he nominated her immediately. Named Countus In, she was unraced at 2, not quite a stakes filly at 3, and tried the turf at 4. Sent out in the $150,000 First National Bank of Maryland Ladies at a mile and a sixteenth on the turf, she shocked favorite Betty Lobelia to win her first stakes and nearly double her lifetime earnings. She paid $73 to lucky backers, a Maryland Million Day record.

Countus In went on to win three consecutive runnings of the Maryland Million Ladies, giving jockey Julie Krone three of her eight Maryland Million wins.

• Safely Kept, another future three-time Maryland Million winner, recorded the first in the State of Maryland Distaff Handicap. Fresh off a score in the Grade 1 Test at Saratoga, it was Safely Kept’s eighth straight victory – a streak launched after the previous year’s Maryland Million Lassie in which she finished third. Ridden by Craig Perret, the daughter of Horatius returned $2.20, the shortest-priced winner in the Maryland Million to date.

Horatius, standing at Thornmar Farm in Chestertown, counted among his offspring 1989 Eclipse Award-winning Safely Kept.

• Quality fillies filled the card, and Jim Ryan’s Ryehill Farm homebred Beware of the Cat shipped from Laz Barrera’s barn in California specifically for her chance to take home a Waterford Crystal bowl. Sent out in the Kennard Warfield Jr. Group Maryland Oaks, she broke awkwardly and was steered to the outside by jockey Eddie Maple (mainly because she only had one eye after injuring her right eye in a stall accident at 2). Flying down the center of the track, the Caveat filly defeated Under Oath by a length. It was the first, and only, stakes win for Beware of the Cat and the first Maryland Million win for Ryehill Farm and Ryan’s classic winner Caveat. But much more was in store for Beware of the Cat. She went on to become a tremendous producer, her offspring including Belmont Stakes-G1 winner Editor’s Note, European champion 2-year-old colt Hold That Tiger and additional stakes winners Catnip and Catfriend plus stakes-placed Forty Nine Hearts and Oneofacat from 10 foals to race.
• Anderson Fowler’s homebred Master Speaker become the first two-time Maryland Million winner, showing his versatility by following up his victory in the previous year’s Ryehill-Windfields Maryland Turf by taking the featured $200,000 Budweiser Maryland Classic. The 4-year-old defeated two battle-wise veterans, Due North (making his 84th start) and the previous year’s Classic winner Little Bold John (making his 80th). Trained by Virgil “Buddy” Raines and ridden by Julie Krone, Master Speaker was a son of former Windfields Farm stallion Master Willie (GB).
• Nine stallions sired the nine winners on the program, six getting their first – Caveat, Dancing Count, Deputy Minister, Hasty Spring, Horatius and Island Champ. The latter’s daughter She’s a Champ, the first runner from his first crop, won the USF&G Maryland Lassie. John Heil not only bred the filly, but also her sire.

• The first Maryland Million disqualification came in the Crown Central Petroleum Handicap when Spendmore Stable’s Dacquare Dancer, who crossed the wire a neck in front of Big Upheavel, was dropped to second. It was the first stakes victory for Big Upheavel’s owner Michael Flynn in 12 years in the business. Big Upheavel (by Hasty Spring), ridden by Kent Desormeaux, gave trainer King T. Leatherbury his third Maryland Million victory.