The story of Budroyale
By PERRY LEFKO -- Toronto Sun
Jeff Sengara, a British Columbia lumber businessman who followed his father into the racing game as an owner, had been looking to break into the southern California circuit in 1997 and wanted Ted West Sr. to be his trainer.
Sengara's father told his son some 15 years before he would never go wrong in the horse racing business with a trainer such as West. At that time, West had been training for some 20 years and had been doing well with a horse called Interco, who had reeled off a series of stakes wins.
West learned from his father, who trained for 50 years, and developed a successful career out of taking other people's horses via the claiming route and succeeding. Ted Jr. joined his father's operation in the mid-90s and they became a true tandem. In fact, the elder West started making his son the trainer of record as a means to increase his public profile.
Sengara had never forgotten his father's sage remark about the elder West, so he went to California on the day of the 1997 California Cup, a kind of Breeders' Cup at Santa Anita, in late October/early November. It took Sengara almost 45 minutes to introduce himself to West because he felt intimidated, but the trainer had been apprised by a track official that Sengara had been coming to see him. West immediately put Sengara at ease when they met.
The first two horses the Wests claimed for Sengara won at first asking. The ambitious, young owner decided to shell out $50,000 for his next claim, more than doubling the purchase price of each of the first two claims. Sengara and Ted West Sr. picked out a race on Feb. 15, 1998, in which they planned to make their next claim and identified three possible choices. Sengara settled on the hard-knocking Budroyale, whom West also fancied. Budroyale won the race, increasing his career record at that point to nine wins, three seconds and one third in 25 starts.
West and Sengara decided to run him in an $80,000 optional claimer and Budroyale won, after which the decision was made to try him in a stakes. In his second start for West, Budroyale won the San Bernardino Stakes by five lengths, stamping himself as a legitimate stakes horse, and continued to improve. He finished off the year by winning the California Cup Classic, an irony of sorts given it was a year ago on the same day that Sengara first met Ted West.
"I never thought it could get much better, then '99 came around and it was like a fairytale," Sengara recalled.
In 1999 at the ripe age of six, Budroyale really rose to prominence, winning four of 11 races, finishing second five times and third in the other two, banking in excess of $1.7 million. It was an incredible journey, one that took him all the way to the Breeders' Cup.
Budroyale failed to win in his first three starts of the season, though he posted two seconds and a third. He ran last in a field of four by 18 lengths in the San Diego Handicap, but rebounded to win the Longacres Handicap. The Breeders' Cup was about nine weeks away and Sengara and the Wests started thinking about running in the Classic. Sengara had followed the Breeders' Cup since its outset in 1984 but never imagined he'd have a horse in it.
Much to his surprise, the horse had been nominated to the Breeders'. Sengara said to Ted West Sr. that if Budroyale hit the board in the Breeders' Cup he'd buy him a brand new Mercedes. But first Budroyale had to prove himself in the Goodwood Handicap Stakes three weeks before racing's championship day. He faced five other challengers, including star three-year-olds General Challenge and Old Trieste. Budroyale showed an amazing display of courage and talent to win by a neck over General Challenge and earned a trip to the Cup to run in the $4-million Classic at Gulfstream Park.
West had been in the Breeders' Cup only once before, 11 years previously, to saddle Stocks Up in the Juvenile Fillies. She was one of the longer shots in the field and ran ninth by 6 1/2 lengths. He didn't know if he'd ever be back again.
"Most of our business is claiming," he said. "It's not often you'll claim a horse that goes on to the Breeders' Cup. The Breeders' Cup seems like a long ways away."
Budroyale blossomed when shipped from California to Florida and gave his owner tremendous confidence. Sengara, who came with family and friends, was already going through an "out-of-body experience" being in the Breeders'
"We were just awestruck, and the day of the race the fairytale got even more magical," he said.
Ted West Sr. figured his horse could run third or fourth and couldn't believe it when the public dismissed him at more than 26-1 odds while giving more respect to General Challenge, whom he had just beaten fair and square. Budroyale, ridden by Garrett Gomez, was settled in close to the pace, never more than two lengths back of the lead. At the top of the stretch, Gomez had Budroyale in third, only two heads back of the leader Cat Thief, a three-year-old who had won the Swaps Stakes in July and had placed third in the Kentucky Derby earlier in the year, but whose overall form lacked any consistency. Cat Thief and Budroyale engaged in a bumping battle down the lane, but Cat Thief, a long shot at more than 19-1 odds, won by 11/2 lengths.
It wasn't until after he watched a replay of the race a half hour later that West realized how intense the bumping had been. Gomez hadn't said anything to him and the stewards didn't deem the bumping severe enough to lodge an inquiry. For the veteran West, it was kind of a bittersweet result because the horse had validated himself, but West was disappointed the controversial bumping had cost him a shot at winning.
As Sengara and his family exited the track to go back to the backstretch, they encountered Cecilia Straub-Rubens, who had travelled from California to watch the greatest horse she had bred. Sengara had never met the woman, but recognized her trademark big glasses. Sengara made a remark to his children that this was the woman who bred Budroyale. And then Sengara and the breeder engaged in a touching embrace, as if they had known one another for 20 years.
A CELEBRATION
Later that night, Sengara and his family had a celebratory dinner with the Wests. Sengara recalled the comment he made about the Mercedes and promised to deliver. A month later Ted West Sr. bought a black Mercedes and had the abbreviated word 'Budryle 'printed on the plates.
"I never liked personally-licensed plates, but I did it as a tribute to the horse," West said. "He paid for it."
Budroyale was subsequently named California horse of the year, winning the award on the same day he won a stakes race.
Sengara eventually retired the gallant gelding to a farm in Langley, B.C.
Budroyale finished with 17 wins, 12 seconds and two thirds in 52 career races and earned $2,840,810. He was a true rags-to-riches horses and one of the greatest claims in the history of the game.
