AP News, May 2nd, 2007
It was love at first sight for trainer Barclay Tagg. He was in Florida about 16 months ago checking a 2-year-old bay colt he would be training for owner Elizabeth Valando.
"He jogged out on the track and breaks into a gallop and looks like Nureyev," Tagg recalled this week at Belmont Park. "He was absolutely gorgeous."
Tagg called Valando on his cell phone.
"I'm here looking at your horse and he's the most magnificent horse anybody could ever lay eyes on," he told her. "If this isn't a Triple Crown candidate, they've never made one."
Now, Nobiz Like Shobiz has grown into an imposing 3-year-old and Wednesday was made the 8-1 co-third choice for the Kentucky Derby, behind 7-2 favorite Curlin and 4-1 second choice Street Sense.
"He hasn't shown yet what he's capable of," Tagg's assistant trainer and partner Robin Smullen said. "We're hoping he shows it Saturday."
Nobiz Like Shobiz has been a star in the making, winning the Wood Memorial at Aqueduct by a half-length over Sightseeing in his final Derby prep. The stellar resume includes four wins in six starts, the two defeats by a combined 1 1/4 lengths and both against Scat Daddy, also among the Derby favorites.
Bred by Valando, the son of Albert the Great put in a final tuneup for the 1 1/4-mile Derby on Sunday.
"A perfect work," Tagg called the five-furlong breeze over Belmont's main track. "Everything went well."
The same can be said for Tagg the past five years. After 31 years as a trainer, he finally made it to his first Derby in 2003 _ and won with Funny Cide, a New York-bred gelding a bunch of middle-aged high school pals bought for the bargain price of $75,000.
Last year, he returned to Churchill Downs with unbeaten but lightly raced Showing Up, who finished sixth behind Barbaro. Both horses were owned by Gretchen and Roy Jackson.
This time, the former steeplechase rider, who turns 70 in December, is back with a horse with a show-stopping name. Valando chose Nobiz Like Shobiz in honor of her late husband, Tommy Valando, a music publisher who backed such Broadway shows as "Cabaret" and "Fiddler on the Roof."
Valando was saving the name for a horse she hoped could become a champion. When the usually pessimistic Tagg called her that winter day last year, she was thrilled.
"Barclay is usually understated," Valando said. "A friend of Barclay's was with him later in the day and when he walked into her office he said, 'I've just seen my next Derby horse.'"
While Tagg's sometimes cranky comments are contrary to the upbeat feel of his horse's name, the trainer and horse have become a good match. Tagg is less contentious these days, and even confides that he's always felt confident he would end up with topflight horses.
"You see all these good things happen to some of the other fellows," Tagg said. "And after years and years of grubbing in the pits you think, 'Why can't it happen to me, too? I'm never a very optimistic person, but I always thought that someday I'd get some good horses. Now I'm getting them, so it's pretty nice."
Tagg, who grew up in Lancaster, Pa., also is thankful Nobiz has been a dream to handle, at least compared to Funny Cide.
"Funny Cide was a taut bow string," Tagg said. "This horse is very laid back and it makes your job a little easier. Funny Cide was an explosive horse; this horse is really easy going, so easy to train."
Funny Cide went on to win the Preakness before his Triple Crown bid fell short in the Belmont Stakes. As the pressure built in the three weeks between the Preakness and Belmont, Tagg was at wit's end trying to keep crowds from his high-strung horse stabled at Belmont Park.
To make matters worse, the owners often chimed in with comments about Tagg's training decisions. Before the Derby, Tagg even sounded reluctant to go to Churchill Downs. To this day, he still believes the commotion around his barn leading to the Belmont was a factor in Funny Cide's defeat.
"I felt like Funny Cide was a Derby prospect from day one, but I had so many people telling me that I was crazy, that he wasn't a Derby type, that he wasn't bred to be a mile-and-a-quarter horse," Tagg said. "You just get to hearing that stuff day in and day out _ that's why it seemed like I was reluctant with the media."
He said he worried incessantly about Funny Cide "quirks," among them a breathing problem. Nobiz Like Shobiz developed a quirk of his own in the Fountain of Youth at Gulfstream Park on March 3, a month before the Wood. On the turn for home, it looked as if jockey Cornelio Velasquez had Nobiz in position to take the lead but the colt failed to finish strong and ended up third, a half-length behind Scat Daddy and Stormello.
Tagg chalked it up to immaturity, and began trying different things. Nobiz worked out twice at Gulfstream with the now 7-year-old Funny Cide to get used to being challenged. Then, with the Wood a few weeks away, Tagg equipped Nobiz with blinkers to keep him focused and stuffed cotton in his ears to block crowd noise.
The move worked, and Nobiz is on his way to the Derby _ as a late arrival. A week on the backside of Churchill Downs, where media swarms move from barn to barn and racing fans are allowed on the premises, is not Tagg's idea of a perfect setting.
"I think it's very hard on a horse to be down there with all that commotion all the time," he said. "It's easier for me to stay here and train my horses and take them in at the last minute and run 'em."
Smullen said Tagg chooses to avoid interviews for as long as possible, although he certainly enjoys the publicity when he wins.
"That's why he chose to train horses, because you can talk to animals a lot easier than you can talk to people," Smullen said.
A win on Saturday, and Tagg will talk. He might smile, too.
