Tomcito trying to earn a Derby trip

Canonero II was the only horse on the cargo plane from Venezuela in April 1971, with the horse bound for the Kentucky Derby.

The horse shared the trip with hundreds of chickens and ducks, a flight to Miami that turned back twice because of engine fire and other problems. Canonero II got to Churchill Downs, but they didn't want to let him in because no one had heard of him.

"These are different times," said Dante Zanelli Jr., trainer of another South American-raced horse, Tomcito, who's at Keeneland awaiting Saturday's $325,000 Coolmore Lexington Stakes.

Horse travel and communications have changed radically since Canonero II nearly won the Triple Crown in 1971. Modern technology sent Tomcito's classy reputation ahead of him to the United States.

Just how classy he was, no one could be sure. He was Horse of the Year in Peru and defeated older horses last fall to win at the Derby distance of 11/4 miles and the Belmont distance of 11/2 miles. The question was not whether he was a good horse, but how he would stack up against Grade I American horses.

Tomcito answered the question in the Florida Derby on March 29, finishing third. He'll race in the Lexington Stakes not to prove himself again but to augment his graded stakes earnings of $151,292, not enough to get into the top 20 eligible for the Derby.

Tomcito will carry top weight of 123 pounds in the 11/16-mile Lexington Stakes. He will be ridden by Jorge Chavez, who like jockeys Edgar Prado and Rafael Bejarano was born in Peru.

The Zanelli family brought Prado and Bejarano to the United States in different eras. Eclipse Award winner Prado came first in 1986; Bejarano followed in 2002, desirous of becoming another Prado. Thus, the Zanelli family has a history of bringing in top jockeys -- which perhaps will bode well for Tomcito in the top American races.

Zanelli Jr., Peruvian born and a longtime resident of Lexington, heard about Bejarano from his father, Dante Zanelli Sr., a horse trainer in Peru. When Zanelli Jr. first brought Bejarano to the United States, he started the apprentice jockey at River Downs and Hoosier Park in Indiana.

Bejarano did not speak English and was having trouble getting mounts. At Hoosier Park, he was having so much trouble that he drove back to Lexington, wanting to give up at that track.

Zanelli told him, no way. The trainer had made about 40 copies of a story about Bejarano published in the Lexington Herald-Leader. Zanelli instructed Bejarano to drive back to Hoosier Park and tack up the copies in every corner of every barn.

Bejarano started back to Indiana about 10 p.m. that night, spent hours tacking up the copied story, finished about 3 a.m. and phoned Zanelli.

"He called me and said, 'Trainer, I'm finished,' " Zanelli recalled. "Needless to say, he couldn't get up that morning. But when he woke up, people had read the story, and he had five mounts in the entries. He won with three of them and finished two seconds. He was leading apprentice, and the rest is history."

The same Zanelli touch is intended to transform Tomcito into the hottest horse on the North American circuit. Zanelli has no concern now about how the son of Street Cry will stack up against horses in the United States. But he does have some mild concerns about asking Tomcito to go only 11/16 miles.

"Perhaps his disadvantage could be the 11/16 miles, the shorter stretch," Zanelli said. He needs to go longer. He's a better horse, the longer they go. But I think he belongs."

These are high expectations for a horse who once sold for $7,500 at the Keeneland September sales -- and has returned to Kentucky, his birthplace, with a Derby agenda.