Travers Stakes (Grade 1)

SHUG McGaughey walked straight to his pole, the one that offers a view and an escape. Second row, back right corner of the finish-line box, on the edge of the steps. Will Farish and his family settled into the first row boxes. Alison McGaughey stood in a third-row box over her husband’s right shoulder. The Fox TV crew, holding cameras and microphones, wedged into gaps, fans with beers and wine glasses filled in the steps, a waiter ran a ticket for a lunch order.

As Larry Collmus announced that the Travers field was at the gate, McGaughey turned and smiled, almost smirked, raising his eyebrows to his wife. If looks had words, it was: ‘Well, this is it.” After that McGaughey stood silently, like he was being read his rights, shifting from the right side of the pole to the left side, that’s it, for 2:01.05 of the Travers Stakes. McGaughey didn’t utter a word, didn’t pump his fist, didn’t react as Alison screamed, “Come on Code. Come on Code. Come on Code.”

And, yeah, Code came on.

Code Of Honor and jockey John Velazquez rallied from ninth to win the $1.25 million stakes by three lengths over favorite Tacitus and third-choice Mucho Gusto. As Code Of Honor streaked past McGaughey, the Hall of Famer turned away from the pandemonium, walking down the back steps like he was heading home instead of the winner’s circle. That direction offers a moment of solitude, a moment of reflection.

“That was fun to watch,” McGaughey said.

For all the reasons.

Belief

Code Of Honor, a horse McGaughey had believed in since breaking his maiden here last summer, gave the trainer his fourth Travers victory and first since Coronado’s Quest in 1989. Making his eighth career start, Code Of Honor earned his first Grade 1 victory. A victory that had confirmed McGaughey’s confidence in the chesnut homebred who had never finished worse than fourth in his career but had never won the big one. Tantalizingly close in the past, Code Of Honor had arrived.

“That’s the horse we always expected. That’s him,” McGaughey said, as he turned past the old binocular stand. “It looked to me at the three-eighths pole, he wasn’t going anywhere but I knew he couldn’t get in this race with a long, dueling run. He was going to have to do it and I think Johnny knew it too.”

Oh, Johnny knew it.

Two days before the Travers, Velazquez was asked about a horse he had ridden in six of his seven starts, a horse that made the Hall of Fame jockey eschew any other options when the money was down, staying the course from a debut maiden win going six furlongs to a rough-and-tumble second via DQ in the Kentucky Derby to a Dwyer romp in July.

“The big horse. I love this horse, we’ve been very patient with him,” Velazquez said before the Travers. “I loved him for the Derby. I’ve always loved him. That’s why I’m still on him. He’s got a really good chance, brother.”

After the Travers, Velazquez remembered that first conversation.

“I told you I loved this horse,” Velazquez said. “It’s very gratifying when you know you like your horse and he gives you everything he can. That’s why I stick with him, man. I stick with him from way back. And, now, he’s paid me back.”

Code Of Honor broke professionally from stall two and Velazquez perched quietly, allowing Owendale to clear from his inside and Highest Honors, Tacitus and Laughing Fox to clear to his immediate outside.

Favorite Tacitus, equipped with blinkers for the first time, won the pace chores by default, leading Mucho Gusto by a half-length after a quarter-mile in 23.11s. Velazquez settled Code Of Honor along the rail around the first turn.

Passing the quarter pole, Tacitus and Mucho Gusto galloped away from Tax, Highest Honors and Owendale but that was it, they were just galloping, a daunting two furlongs still to go. While they were simply trying to keep pedaling, Code Of Honor was rolling from the outside. Velazquez flicked his unturned whip once, turned it over and smacked twice, and pulled down a pair of goggles as he reached even terms with Mucho Gusto and Tacitus. Even terms didn’t last long as Code Of Honor poured it on with every stride, swapping to his left lead a few strides before the wire.

Code Of Honor finished the one and a quarter miles in 2:01.05.

“He showed up,” Velazquez said. “That’s what we were expecting out of him. He broke good, he got a good position, I was very confident in the way he was doing things and he responded right away.”

Just like McGaughey knew he would.

Yes, knew.

McGaughey recognized something this week that doesn’t always come around to a trainer who has engineered the best and endured the worst: excitement.

Excitement at how Code Of Honor had developed since the Kentucky Derby, excitement about how he won the Dwyer, excitement about how he had trained into the Travers, especially a Monday morning drill that filled the final chamber for a long-sought target.

“When I see what I’ve been seeing. When I saw what I saw Monday morning, I was excited. I’m sure I’ve been excited before but not that much. Not that much. I was really excited about today,” McGaughey said. “My confidence, being older and being through this stuff is a lot more than maybe it was 30 years ago. When you were a kid and you thought all of them were supposed to win. You figure out that that’s not the case. You’ve got to figure the horse, you’ve got to be able to understand that if something doesn’t go right, maybe it will go right next time.”

Things hadn’t gone right in four out of seven previous starts for Code Of Honor. Sure, there was the impressive debut win, the breakout win in the Fountain of Youth and the facile score in the Dwyer. But in between, well, there were blips. Second behind Complexity in the Champagne, scratched with a fever before the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile, a dull fourth in the Mucho Macho Man, a third behind runaway Maximum Security in the Florida Derby and a third, moved up to second, in the Derby.

Sometimes blips can be blessings.

“That’s what I told Mr Farish,” McGaughey said. “We’ve had a couple of bumps in the road but we might not have been here without them. And I want to be here.”

Code Of Honor made sure of it.