HUE and CRY

Amid the commotion surrounding Hansen's appearance in the Blue Grass Stakes comes the "news" that Patrick Valenzuela will grace us with his presence once again in the jockey's quarters.

Dr. Hansen's unorthodox pursuit of the Kentucky Derby includes debate on the merits of a paint daubed juvenile champion to jazz up the paddock scene at Keeneland. By race time the issue had "all come out in the wash", as it were. The whole exercise was a lot more interesting than P Val.

Come to think of it, the renegade jockey was involved in a Breeders' Cup race years ago that, if you can stretch a point, had something to do with paint and a horse owner.

That was the inaugural Juvenile Fillies at Hollywood Park and P Val finished first aboard Fran's Valentine, only to be disqualified for wracking up the field at 74-to-1 aboard Earl Scheib's filly. Outstandingly inherited the victory by way of the stewards, a harbinger perhaps of the scrum that would take place a few hours later beweenWild Again, Slew of Gold , and Gate Dancer.

And the paint angle? Earl Scheib was noted for his nationwide paint shops and the slogan that he would paint any car, any color for $99. He had to paint a lot of cars to make up for P Val's indiscretion.

Fernando Toro was so incensed that he and the younger rider nearly came to blows, quite a feat as Chilean Toro was a caballero noted for his decorum.

I was working television back then and witnessed the near fisticuffs. Toro won the next race with Royal Heroine for Robert Sangster and smiles returned to the English faces.

Earl Scheib, the Paint King of Green Thumb Farm, stormed out of the track and left with his entourage.

I take the Libertarian view when it comes to the current discussion on what constitutes suitable deportment. We have been beating the bushes for some time now trying to attract new owners with not a lot of success. Let's not scare them away.

A DEL MAR TALE

This is a Del Mar story. Actually, it is a Bobby Frankel story that happens to take place at Del Mar.

In the summer of 1983 the first horse I ever bred was ready to race at Hollywood Park.

My trainer of choice was Bobby Frankel. I was a little daunted by his gruff demeanor but I was looking for a trainer who was a consistent winner with any kind of horse. I wasn't even sure he'd want to take on a British Columbia-bred maiden claimer named Bold Runaway .

I had only one request of Frankel: Let me know if we can win a bet.

"Maybe, maybe not," he told me when we met in the paddock at Hollywood Park. I took that as a "no" and made only a modest wager of support rather than conviction.

We ran second.

Three weeks later we were at Del Mar where terse instructions told me "bet your money".

My life at that time was embroiled in an unpleasant and costly divorce. My two children joined me for the trek from Santa Barbara. I was so sure that Bold Runaway would win that I plunked down a four-figure win bet. Not very clever, I realize, to drive a horse's odds down to 6-t0-5 on the nose. But I had blind faith in Frankel at that time and I needed a winner to boost my morale as well as that of Shannon and Josh.

Bold Runaway walked her beat under Martin Pedroza and,

after cashing my tickets, we went back to the barn to bid her adieu before the long ride home. To my dismay what I saw was my filly walking lame.

On the way out of the barn I bumped into Bobby. "Did you see your filly?

" he said, smiling.

"I think she's gone lame," I said. "Please have the vet look her over."

He muttered something to himself that sounded like "everybody's a trainer these days" and strode away.

The next morning, however, Bobby was on the phone with news that Bold Runaway had indeed suffered a slab fracture of her knee. The news was not unexpected so I paused, wondering what to do next, when Bobby asked what I planned to do with her.

"I'm not sure," I said. "Try to find her a good home."

"Would you take fifteen for her?" he said.

By that time I did not know if he meant fifteen hundred, fifteen thousand or fifteen cents. I knew enough about horse dealing to not make the first bid.

"I have a season to the top quarter horse stallion in America,"he explained. "I'll give you $15,000 for your filly and breed her."

Since I figured she was worth $1000, tops, I jumped at the offer while, at the same time, wondering which of us was loco. The sharpest guy in racing overpaying tenfold for a filly with no pedigree and a broken knee.

Bobby knew of my domestic disorder and seemed charmed by Shannon and Josh as only 5 and 10-year-olds can do. For years I wondered what his motive for that gesture represented. I didn't bring it up, perhaps in fear that he might want the money back.

Many years later I was in a group of horsemen, Frankel among them,

kibitzing at a Saratoga charity function. A couple glasses of wine loosened my tongue and I told the story for the first time outside my immediate family.

"Why, Bobby, why"? I asked.

He just smiled.

WHAT'S IN A NAME?

The recent running of the Queen's Plate brought to mind my first appearance as a commentator for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) on that nation's richest and most coveted event.

On that occasion the royal family was represented by the Queen Mother. The TV team was briefed on protocol should we be spoken to by the Queen Mother.

The producer assumed that I was a Canadian citizen. She was surprised to learn that I was an American in Canada that allowed me to work. I told her that I was not entirely comfortable with the bowing and curtsying that Canadians love to shower on what are called "The Royals'.

I decided to behave myself, figuring the odds were pretty high that she would wish to come and speak to me in Woodbine's leafy walking ring. During a two-minute commercial break I began to sweat as the Queen Mother headed in my direction.

Just in time she stopped to chat with jockey Ken Skinner who had the mount on longshot Market Control for Kinghaven Farm. "I'm going to back your horse," she told Skinner and ambled off to watch him win at boxcars.

This year it was the reigning monarch, Queen Elizabeth II who attended and received vigorous applause from her subjects. Another head of state that I encountered in a happy winner's circle was Sheik Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum. He had just won the Irish Derby with the great filly Balanchine.He was known around the world as simply Sheik Mohammed who can play the game in blue jeans and a T-shirt in Kentucky or a morning suit and top hat at Royal Ascot.

As I exited the Curragh I noticed a tall woman, regal in bearing, and greeted her as a fellow American-Mrs. Jean Kennedy Smith, the US ambassador to Ireland and sister to President John F. Kennedy. I couldn't help but think that high station in life doesn't grant immunity from life's woes.

The Aga Khan (make that H.H. Aga Khan as in His Highness) races with great success wherever he goes but he keeps a low profile when when he wins a big race. His breeding operation is second to none and I would love to talk breeding patterns with him. But I'm still not sure about this HH business.

The late Joe Taylor once drove me through a field of about 50 mares owned by the Aga Khan, boarded at Taylor Made farm, most of them grey as I remember.

On this side of the Atlantic, I was questioned from time to time why I addressed my main client, John Franks, simply as John while most called him Mr. Franks. I said that I was 47-years-old when we met, hardly a novice at this game and that we had terrific success right from the start. There were camp followers aplenty around him who adopted an obsequious demeanor with an eye on his pocket book more than proper etiquette.

And then there was the ecumenical duo of Prince Khalid of Juddmonte and Bobby Frankel. "Bobby called him Prince Khalid" said Juddmonte manager Garrett O'Rourke. "But not very often. They spoke about twice a year."