Spectacular Bid: Thoroughbred Legends

Thoroughbred Legends #9

by Timothy T. Capps

Called the greatest horse ever to look through a bridle, Spectacular Bid achieved what few racehorses ever do--perfection--when he went undefeated in nine races at the age of four.

Genres: Horse Racing, History, Nonfiction, Horses

144 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2001

Reviews

[Jay French · Rating 3 out of 5]

As the Thoroughbred Legends series goes, this is, well, another one of them. While they all tend to follow a flow, they also all tend to have some “personality” in the writing. In “Spectacular Bid”, there was good and bad. I found the opening chapter, dealing with horse pedigree, to be almost unreadable. Given the way the author wrote this, there were just too many names to keep track of. The pedigrees of other horses that Bid competed against are also included, and this was overwhelming. When you get to the end of the book and the breeding chapters, you understand why Capps included this detail, but it could have been better presented. The race stories I found had plenty of personality and I enjoyed these middle chapters. The pictures show the horse along with others in his line, and allow you to see the horse become more grey as time went on.

[Sarah B · Rating 2 out of 5]

This series seems to be hit or miss for me, and unfortunately this one was a big miss. I didn't care for the writing style in this book at all as it was just too dry. It seemed to be just a bunch of facts (names of various horses and people, race names, locations, etc) in paragraph form. There wasn't any attempts to dress the information up to make it more fun to read. You know, to create the excitement about the horse and the wins?

But worse than the dry style was the fact this book told me nothing about what Spectacular Bid actually was like. You know, his personality! That is one thing I expect to learn from reading these. Some horses are mouthy, some are a tad nervous so travel with a stall mate, some just love to run. Well I didn't learn anything from this book...

But there were other weird things I noticed in here too! They included some stuff that left me feeling very lost and confused. And yes I took notes while reading this book.

So page 81 says this: "we had a big concern that he might not be able to come back, after the piece of his foot that Dr Harthill had to cut away".

Ummm... What is that paragraph talking about? There was only that short quote and then no further explanation. So is this some surgery or is this just a hoof trimming by a farrier? But since it's a doctor makes me think it's surgery? But how can you not explain what that is?? I had reread this section several times and cannot find any explanation at all.

Then there is yet more confusion about this Dr Harthill. Because the NYRA didn't like him and he needed to be escorted to the barn and back by security. But why?? Why didn't the NYRA like this doctor?? I just don't understand why the book doesn't clear up these mysterious statements. If you go through the trouble to include them you should explain it as well!

A bizarre fact mentioned in here was that the trainer Delp was feeding the horse jelly doughnuts! How outrageous!

The Kentucky Derby was only one page in here. It was all matter of fact.

I also had the impression that the names of the various races were hidden in the paragraphs. Like instead of putting the race name first the author would often stick it either at the middle or near the end of a paragraph. I thought that was very sloppy. I actually almost missed the information on the Preakness because of this...

This one was a disappointment.

[Wendy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I never really knew much about Spectacular Bid before I read this, other than that he was a would-be Triple Crown winner who only lost due to a bad ride.

There's much, much more to it than that. Like the superb Seattle Slew and the powerhouse Affirmed before him, Spectacular Bid improved with age, and his four-year-old season was very impressive--so impressive, in fact, that he had a walkover race, meaning no one else dared send their horses out to test him.

The people behind his story are...interesting, in a way, but I didn't particularly like him. The Bid himself more than made up for that, and I jumped on the bandwagon of his fans after reading this.

Capps has a few weak books in this series, but this is him at his best, much like in the Affirmed and Alydar volume.

Very much worth the read--dive in without hesitation and learn why you should love Spectacular Bid, too.

[Paulette Gerkovich · Rating 2 out of 5]

I can't imagine a more thorough history of Spectacular Bid being written. The level of detail is phenomenal, and I enjoyed learning more about this incredible horse. However, this is a book for those interested primarily in bloodlines, statistics, and earnings - not the more passionate side of anything horse-related. If I didn't have a strong, personal connection to one of Bid's "children," I probably would not have finished reading this book.

[Peter · Rating 2 out of 5]

Spends a little too much time on Spectacular Bid's pedigree and not enough time on the races, especially the "safety pin" incident. This book could have been great given the subject, but wasn't researched enough.