Secretariat owns the fastest time in every Triple Crown race after a review of the 1973 Preakness Stakes.
Secretariat is one of 11 thoroughbreds to win the Kentucky Derby, Preakness and Belmont Stakes in the same year.
The Preakness was the only race in which Secretariat didn’t set a record. The Maryland Racing Commission said Tuesday it voted unanimously to change Secretariat’s official winning time in the Preakness to 1 minute, 53 seconds, two seconds faster than the original recorded clocking at Baltimore’s Pimlico Race Course 39 years ago.
“Justice was served,” Maryland Jockey Club President Thomas Chuckas said. “The Secretariat team made a compelling case that he ran the race in 1:53 flat and added the Preakness record to his resume.”
The Maryland Racing Commission said last week it would investigate the official timing of the race at the request of Secretariat’s owner, Penny Chenery, and Chuckas.
“I didn’t know if it was appropriate to cheer, but I couldn’t help myself,” Chenery said. “This is a big day.”
The seven-member review panel used technology including “layered-on timing devices” and digital replays of the race, Michael Hopkins, the racing commission’s executive director, said in a telephone interview.
The previous Preakness record had been 1:53 2/5, set by Tank’s Prospect in 1985 and matched by Louis Quatorze in 1997 and Curlin in 2007.
The electronic timer used in 1973 recorded Secretariat’s win in 1:55, while two independent clockers from the Daily Racing Form each hand-timed the race at 1:53 2/5, which would have broken Canonero II’s then-record of 1:54 at the 1971 Preakness. The official time was later changed to 1:54 2/5, the time reported by Pimlico’s official hand clocker, because of “extenuating circumstances” with the electronic timer’s recording.
“It is wonderful for the sport to remove an asterisk and wonderful for the legacy of Secretariat and his fans, who believed he set the record in all three Triple Crown races,” Leonard Lusky, who represented Chenery at the hearing, said in a statement.
Secretariat won the Kentucky Derby in 1:59 2/5, setting a track record for the 1 1/4-mile distance at Churchill Downs in Louisville, Kentucky, and is one of only two horses to win the race in less than two minutes. He won the 1 1/2-mile Belmont Stakes at Belmont Park in Elmont, New York, by 31 lengths in 2:24, both records that still stand.
Horse racing hasn’t had a Triple Crown winner since 1978, when Affirmed won all three races. I’ll Have Another won the Kentucky Derby and Preakness this year before being pulled out of the Belmont the day before the June 9 race because of tendinitis in his left front leg.
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