All The Pretty Horses

Trainer Nick Zito has five mounts who could win the Derby. If only he didn't have five powerful owners-one named Steinbrenner-who aren't running for second

It's a sweet spring morning at Lexington's Keeneland Race Course, with the scents of hay and bluegrass in the air. But Nick Zito doesn't have time to stop and smell anything. His cell phone is ringing. And ringing. And ringing. So much so that the repetitive, unidentifiable musical tone is piercing the serene green setting. "How do you stop this thing?" Zito asks, his raspy New York voice rising.

When you're on a sizzling run like Zito, a trainer with the chance to saddle five top 3-year-olds in the Kentucky Derby, there's really no stopping it.

These days, the callers are likely to be heavy hitters with hot horses. Like George Steinbrenner, who owns runaway Wood Memorial-winner Bellamy Road and has been known to be a bit hands-on. The Boss, a loser in five previous Derby tries, delivered Bellamy Road to Zito after firing trainer Michael Dickinson during the winter. Pressure? "Hey, George is good," insists Zito, his voice inching up a few octaves. "Anyway, what's he gonna do, yell at me?"

Or maybe it's Campbell Soup heiress Charlotte Weber, who owns Fountain of Youth and Florida Derby champ High Fly. Like Steinbrenner, Weber moved her Derby horse to Zito's barn after one disappointing loss (under trainer Bill White). She also entrusted Zito with her Kentucky Oaks contender, In the Gold. The 3-year-old filly won the Stonerside Beaumont on April 14.

Might be Barnes & Noble chairman and fellow New Yorker Len Riggio, owner of Florida Derby runner-up Noble Causeway, or Rick Pitino's buddy, Robert LaPenta, the CFO of L-3 Communications and owner of Andromeda's Hero, a third-place finisher at the Arkansas Derby despite a terrible trip.

It can't be Tracy Farmer, because the millionaire Kentucky businessman is about 50 feet away. Just five months ago, Farmer's Tampa Bay Derbywinner Sun King was Zito's only Derby hopeful.

As if five potential Derby horses and an Oaks contender weren't enough, Zito is likely to be inducted into the Racing Hall of Fame the week of the race. He knows how good he has it, but he's discovering that there just might be too much of a good thing. "I want to enjoy it," he says, "but it's not that easy to do that right now."

If he's feeling the pressure, it doesn't show. Everywhere Zito goes on the sprawling grounds of the historic Lexington track, he's greeted with a smile by both millionaire owners and the ushers who clean their seats. Longtime railbirds and horse writers kid him, calling him "D. Wayne ZEE to" in slow, Southern drawls. The reference, of course, is to training icon D. Wayne Lukas, who in 1996 became the only man in the Derby's 130-year history to have five horses run for the roses in a single day. In the grandstand, an elderly woman stops the white-haired trainer to get his autograph on her Nick Zito bobblehead doll, a giveaway from nearby Churchill Downs. She puts her hand on his arm and tells him, "I'm rooting for you."

Racing's a small world, and the rarefied air of the Triple Crown has been known to bloat egos, then pop them. But the longshot New York kid, who found the track by tagging along on his dad's trips to Aqueduct, has been around the business long enough to know better. Like the well-worn character from the Sinatra ballad, he's been up and he's been down. At 57, he knows you have to have the horses, literally. He knows you have to have some good racing luck. And he knows it doesn't hurt to have a little help from above.

"God's taking care of me right now," says Zito, who claims he now better understands the wisdom of his mother, Carmella, who sent him to Bible study classes as a child. Yes, the attention can be a hassle, but sitting in a small, cinder-block office in the corner of one of his two Keeneland barns, Zito seems to have a handle on it. "It's like a guy told me the other day," Zito says. "It's better than having a couple of horses at Finger Lakes."

Zito's situation is thrilling, obviously, but precarious, too. After all, there can be only one winner. But publicly at least, the owners don't see any conflict of interest. "Nick treats all the horses the same," says Farmer, who built his fortune buying and selling Kentucky Fried Chicken stock 40 years ago. "I know he can get the horse there [to the Derby]. After that, it's up to the horse."

True, but the wrong trainer can be a detriment to the animal. Zito himself admits he could have done a better job during his first trip to the Derby, with Thirty Six Red in 1990. Thrilled to be there, he reveled in the prerace hoopla, entertaining the media but losing his focus. A tired Thirty Six Red finished ninth. Asked what that first Derby taught him, Zito doesn't blink: "Pay attention."

Lesson learned. Zito made it to the Derby winner's circle the following spring with Strike the Gold. A dream come true, but heartbreak was around the next turn. At the Preakness, the second leg of the Triple Crown, part-owner B. Giles Brophy and jockey Chris Antley pressured Zito into a change of strategy. They wanted Strike the Gold to challenge early in the race rather than hang back as he did in winning the Derby. Zito reluctantly agreed. On race day, the horse didn't respond to the change, finishing sixth. Another hard lesson: "It's not my property. It's important to remember that." At the same time, Zito's marriage to his wife, Jan, was unraveling due to his increasingly hectic schedule, and they divorced later that year.

He won the Derby again in '94 with Go for Gin, becoming just one of 17 trainers to win it more than once. But he hasn't hit the board at the Derby since, and after a Preakness victory with Louis Quatorze in 1996, he fell into a Triple Crown slump.

Rarely away from the track, he was sure he'd never remarry. Then, he started dating Kim Nelson, whom he'd met at a Keeneland horse sale in the mid-'90s. They married in 2000. "I think Kim was a settling influence on Nick," says longtime friend and ESPN analyst Hank Goldberg. "He handles the losses better. He seems to take everything in stride now."

Last summer, the day after his fourth wedding anniversary, Zito leaped back into the national spotlight when 36-1 longshot Birdstone smashed Smarty Jones' Triple Crown hopes in the stretch at Belmont Park. It was the New Yorker's first Belmont win in 12 tries, which included five second-place finishes.

Should have been another great moment. Except that Zito was the villain. He spoiled the party for more than 120,000 fans hoping to see Smarty Jones make history. "Such a strange day," remembers Zito, who decided to enter Birdstone in the Belmont only a week before the race. "I felt like everything was standing still. I couldn't react like I usually do when we win a big race."

This year, Zito hopes to be a hometown hero when he gets back to Belmont. Bellamy Road's 17¤-length win at the Wood sets him up as the likely Derby favorite. The oddsmakers probably won't have any of Zito's other entries far down the list, either.

For now, Zito refuses to be distracted. He remains focused on getting his horses to the post. "If we get them there," he says, "I think we'll be in good shape."

Hang around, persevere, keep showing up at the starting gate, see what happens. Maybe you get lucky. That's the secret to racing. Life, too.

With that, Zito's cell phone starts ringing again. "I've got to take this one," he says.

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