Posted on Tue, Apr. 29, 2008

Is one a Derby diamond?

Funny Cide trainer has two horses in this year's run for the roses

By John Clay

HERALD-LEADER SPORTS COLUMNIST

Mark Cornelison | Staff

Trainer Barclay Tagg walked out Big Truck with Kristen Troxell up. Photo by Mark Cornelison | Staff

Barclay Tagg has the reputation of being a tad rough around the edges, a cantankerous hardboot who has too much work to do with his horses to stop and answer a bunch of questions from the know-nothing media.

Truth be told, Tagg isn't that bad.

Besides, for this year's Kentucky Derby, he has a diamond to go with his rough.

Or at least Charles Fipke does, Fipke being the owner of Tale of Ekati, winner of the Wood Memorial back on April 5, and the Derby entrant with the second-highest total of graded stakes earnings heading into Wednesday's draw for the 134th run for the roses.

Tale of Ekati is half of a Tagg-team entry. The 70-year-old trainer, who won the Derby on his first try with Funny Cide in 2003, also has Big Truck, winner of the Tampa Bay Derby on March 15.

"I like the way they're coming along," said Tagg the other day. "If I didn't, I wouldn't be bringing them."

It is Fipke who knows about diamonds. A Canadian geologist and prospector, Fipke and his partner, Dr. Stewart Blusson, discovered the kimberlite pipes that became the Ekati Diamond Mine, which now produces over $400 million annually.

With a net worth of over $500 million, thanks in part to 10 percent ownership in the mine, Fipke jumped into the thoroughbred business in 1981. As a prospector might, his dogged determination started bearing fruit when his Perfect Soul ran in both the 2002 and '03 Breeders' Cups, finishing 8th in the '02 Turf and ninth in the '03 mile.

In 2004, Fipke arrived at the Keeneland November Sales bent on purchasing Silence Beauty, a mare by Derby winner Sunday Silence, with the intentions of breeding her to Perfect Soul. Fipke paid $525,000 for the mare, who was in foal to Tale of the Cat. A year later, J.B. McKathan, who was breaking the yearling in Ocala, told Fipke that instead of selling the offspring, he should run him.

Fipke went with the name Tale of Ekati, and shipped the runner to Tagg, who after his Funny Cide triumph ran sixth with Showing Up in 2006 and 10th with Nobiz Like Shobiz last year. Under the Tagg touch, Ekati finished second in the Sanford, won the Belmont Futurity, then ran fourth in the Breeders' Cup Juvenile.

His 3-year-old debut was a baffling sixth-place finish in the Louisiana Derby, won by Pyro. Undeterred, Tagg returned to New York. There, Ekati ran down War Pass to win the Wood.

Though the race's winning time was the slowest since 1952, Tagg pointed out that all the races were running slow at Aqueduct that day, and that, "Time only matters if you're in prison."

From New York, Tagg came to Keeneland, to work Ekati, and run Big Truck in the Blue Grass. The latter didn't work out so well. Big Truck ran 11th. Tagg blamed the Polytrack, which is why he shipped both horses to Churchill on Saturday.

The duo worked over the Downs track yesterday. Big Truck's time of 59 and two-fifths was the fastest of the day for the 22 horses who worked the five-furlong distance. But it's Ekati who has received the most attention.

"He's fast. And he made the cut," said Tagg on Saturday before putting his duo on the van for Louisville. "Same with the other horse. They've both won major races over their preps. They're doing well."

Tagg refers to Ekati as a "very nice horse" that appears to have a style all his own. Big Truck is "maturing. He tries hard every day. I think both of them are moving forward every day. They were both immature, but they're coming along well."

Then there is Tagg's diamond. It's been five years since the gelding Funny Cide won both the Derby and the Preakness, introducing the thoroughbred world to the yellow school bus of Sackatoga Stables and the veteran Tagg.

"I never used to get too many 3-year-olds," he said. "I've been lucky to get back a couple of times since then. But I thought (Funny Cide) had a very good chance. You need a lot of luck in the Derby, and that horse was dead-on that day and ran very, very well. He had some luck that day; he had a good trip. That's what you have to have."

This year, maybe what you have to have is a diamond.