Ruffian, The Greatest Filly of all Time

Ruffian--the talk of 1974 and 1975. Surprisingly, she was a filly. She was a horse that no one could beat.

She was born in 1972. Her sire was Reviewer, and through him she was connected to the mighty Bold Ruler, who sired the great Secretariat. Through her dam, Shenanigans, she was connected to Native Dancer, whom is claimed to be the reason for many racehorses so suddenly breaking their leg on the track.

She was black, but was rated as a "dark bay." She had a white star on her forehead in the shape of a diamond, and a stocking on her left rear leg.

In 1974, she was taken to Frank Whitely Jr. to be trained. She was owned and bred by Mr. and Mrs. Stuart Janney. She was tall; about seventeen hands high. An average Thoroughbred stands about sixteen hands high.

She began training, and her jockey was Jacinto Vasquez. Jacinto also rode Foolish Pleasure, who was to become Ruffian's rival.

The filly won many awards her first year, 1974. In her first race, she broke the track record and won by thirteen lengths. She was never headed in the race, which means that from the beginning of the race until the end, no horse got a nose in front. She stayed in the lead the whole way through.

In all the other races in her two-year-old season, she won and was never headed in any. In the beginning of a race, she didn't have a pony to accompany her like all the other racehorses. Late in the year, she fractured a bone, and she quit racing to recuperate for awhile. By then, however, she was named Queen of the Fillies and had won the U.S. Champion Two-Year-Old Filly Award.

In 1975, Ruffian was back. Everyone looked on in anxiety as the champion filly entered the starting gates of her first race of the year: the six furlong Calthea Purse at Aqueduct on April 14. Was she still the filly they had known? Could she still beat the lights out of all horses? Only a few minutes and they would know.

The bells went off, and the horses shot forward, with Ruffian in the lead She was still leading when they came to the homestretch, and she crossed under the finish line by four-and-one-half lengths. The win answered all questions: Yes, she was still the horse she was. She hadn't changed a bit.

Ruffian won another race by 7 3/4 lengths; then, she entered the Acorn Stakes, the first jewel of the Filly Triple Crown. It would be like the Kentucky Derby in the Colt Triple Crown.

Ruffian won the race.

She entered the second race, the Mother Goose Stakes. She won that, too, and then she won the Coaching Club American Oaks race, capturing the Filly Triple Crown in a few leaps.

Ruffian had proved herself against the fillies. There was absolutely no filly that could've beat her. She won the Filly Triple Crown, several grand races, and had won the U.S. Champion Three-Year-Old and Two-Year-Old Filly. Now, people were talking about putting her to the ultimate test. Could she beat a colt? Foolish Pleasure was the talk of the town, and Ruffian wasn't forgotten. Soon, a match race was organized between the two. Jacinto Vasquez, Ruffian's jockey, had the choice of either riding Ruffian or Foolish Pleasure. (Remember, Jacinto had ridden Foolish Pleasure in many of his races). Jacinto chose Ruffian.

The trainer of Foolish Pleasure trained him to break from the gate as fast as lightening. He was probably hoping that he could get a nose in front and baffle Ruffian, so that she would give up hope of winning the race and lose.

The race was soon underway. Everyone was excited. Who would be the winner of this race? Female or male? The race is often called, "The Battle of the Sexes."

The two broke, and Foolish Pleasure got a nose in front. That didn't baffle Ruffian. She courageously moved up, and when they were coming on the first turn, Ruffian was in the lead. For the first quarter mile this went on, Ruffian staying in the lead by an average half a length. Then suddenly, both her sesamoid bones in her right foreleg snapped, and the race was over.

Jacinto had a hard time pulling the filly up. She wanted to run her race to the finish, broken leg or not. A lot of times racehorses don't realize that they are hurt; racing means to much to them. Veterinarians rushed out onto the track, and she was loaded in an equine ambulance and quickly taken to the hospital.

Four vets tried hard to save her, and she was coming along fine during the surgery. Everything was going as it should be. Finally, they were done, and the filly woke from her anesthesia. She began pawing and kicking and thrashing around. They tried their best to hold her down, but it was no use. The filly broke her other foreleg and further injured her already broken one. It was decided right then and there, and the great champion was put to sleep. She was buried at Belmont Park, with her nose pointed toward the finish line. She was the first racehorse to be buried whole. A flag waves over her grave, and if you ever watch the Belmont Stakes race, watch for it. You will see a tall flagpole with an American flag waving brilliantly on it, a sign that the greatest champion was buried there. I believe she would've beat Foolish Pleasure. I believe she could've beat all horses except for Man O' War and perhaps Secretariat. Even so, she is rated in the Blood Horse Magazine of the Top 100 Horses as 35. And if you ever happen on a young child who never heard of Ruffian, you can now tell him of the greatest filly that ever set foot on a track.

So was the story of Ruffian.