Page 94 - July 2022

the race, as is required by rule in case of an electronic timer malfunction.
Dawson recalls, “Leonard and I both knew we’d seen something extraordinary. We looked at each other and then looked at our stopwatches. Leonard said, ‘Oh hell, I missed him. I got him in :20.9!’ Well, I thought I had caught him perfectly, both at the start and at the finish.
I told Leonard--don’t feel bad—I got him in :21.03!” Dawson continued, “The stewards checked everything possible to verify the time and they found nothing wrong.”
When Lovell galloped the horse back to the winner’s circle, he could hardly bring him to
a halt. Owner/trainer Gordon Howell trained the horse like a Thoroughbred, and I have no doubt he could have set all New Track Records for Ruidoso Downs that day up to about a mile. The horse and his entourage were just leaving the winner’s circle when the stewards posted the
official electronic time on the tote board and the crowd erupted - :21.02! The fastest quarter mile ever run. Truckle Feature had just cut nearly half a second off the previous record—something
it had taken the legends of the breed 33 years to do. And he had done it from an inside post position on the deeper part of the track, where Thoroughbreds had dug up the surface all day. I was waiting at the paddock gap as the
riders came back to the jockey’s room. Several looked at me and just shook their heads in disbelief. When Willie Lovell finally arrived, I congratulated him and said, “Well, he left there for you today, didn’t he, Willie!”
He gave me a quick sideways glance and said, “He was one second from going through the rafters! He was swelled up and getting madder and madder. He was just about to explode. We were damned lucky those gates opened when they did.”
Above: Truckle Feature winning the 1973 World’s Championship Quarter Horse Classic in :21.02, record breaking time.
Left: Truckle Feature is joined in the winner’s circle by owner Gordon B. Howell, trainer Perry A. Walker and jockey Willie Lovell.
I wasn’t there the night when Dash For Cash shattered the Los Alamitos track record with his :21.17 in the 1976 Champion of Champions. I’ve seen the video and Jerry Nicodemus described the experience to me firsthand. In short, it was his greatest thrill in a career of riding great horses. And taking into account
the scientists’ calculations for sea level versus altitude, that time would put Dash For Cash very close to Truckle Feature’s :21.02. In the ensuing decades, there have been a handful of horses break the 21-second barrier and even the 20-second barrier under a variety of conditions, some of them questionable because they were clearly wind-aided. I can’t comment on those performances because I didn’t witness them, and the clock never tells the whole story. Who you beat and how you beat them is still a primary measurement of greatness. And to this point in time, I have never seen a horse I think could
“He was one second from going through the rafters! He was swelled up and getting madder and madder. He was just about to explode. We were damned lucky those gates opened when they did.” - Willie Lovell
92 SPEEDHORSE July 2022
©Speedhorse Archives
©Speedhorse Archives