Ruler On Ice takes Belmont Stakes

Nearly 56,000 racing fans and bettors were shocked last Saturday when an underdog won the 143rd running of the Belmont Stakes.

The crowd’s roar was deafening as Ruler On Ice crossed the finish line after a muddy 1.5-mile showdown — a baffling situation for racing experts and bettors who, since the contenders were announced in May, had been predicting a head-to-head race between Animal Kingdom, the winner of the Kentucky Derby, and Shackleford, the Preakness Stakes winner and the fourth-place finisher in the Derby.

Ruler On Ice, a relative no-name and a long shot at 24-1, was ridden by Jose Valdivia Jr. The horse hadn’t raced against many top competitors, didn’t qualify for the Kentucky Derby and didn’t run in the Preakness. He had finished third at the Grade 3 Sunland Derby on March 27 and second at the Federico Tesio on May 7.

Valdivia said that he wasn’t sure whether Ruler On Ice had the speed to win. “At the half-mile pole, I was hearing whips cracking behind me, and I could hear guys chirping to their horses, and all I’m doing is picking up the tempo,” he said. “... With a half-mile remaining, I still felt like I have a lot of horses under me. Turning for home, everything started going in slow motion. At the 16th pole, I thought, This is the true test of the champion. It’s a great feeling.”

Kelly Breen, Ruler On Ice’s trainer, said that after the Tesio, the horse seemed “somewhat lethargic,” but in the two weeks before Belmont his red blood count was up and he was energetic. “It’s like, sometimes the bulb just goes on,” Breen said. “It was a perfect storm of things going right, and that’s how we got here.”

Spectators were riveted as they watched Ruler On Ice move to the front of the 12-horse pack. Animal Kingdom, a 5-2 favorite, stumbled at the beginning of the race, fell back several strides and was dead last for the first half of the race. Graham Motion, Animal Kingdom’s trainer, said that when the horses broke from the gate, they shifted toward Animal Kingdom, causing jockey John Velazquez’s foot to come out of the stirrup and making it difficult for Animal Kingdom to have any chance at winning. But the horse powered through on the backstretch and eventually finished sixth.