THOROUGHBRED RACING : Owners of Three Peat Bullish About Future in Breeders’ Cup

As omens go, a third consecutive NBA championship for the Chicago Bulls would provide nothing but good vibes for Gary and Harry Biszantz, owners of a four-legged fast break named Three Peat.

With his victory in an allowance race at Hollywood Park last Sunday, the handsome chestnut has fought his way back to racing’s center stage after a forced layoff of more than seven months, during which he nearly died after an attack of colic.

“I’ll tell you how close we came to losing him,” said Gary Biszantz, who owns the Cobra golf equipment company as well as a successful racing stable. “We had to call the insurance people to let them know the end might come at any time.”

But Three Peat pulled through and, surprisingly, has become a bigger, stronger version of the quick gelding who made such a splash during the spring of his 3-year-old campaign a year ago. At this point, the logical goal for his owners and his trainer, John Sadler, is the $1,000,000 Breeders’ Cup Sprint on Nov. 6 at Santa Anita Park.

Three Peat has run only nine times but has won three and finished worse than third only once. He got off to a bad start in the spring of 1991 at Golden Gate Fields, when he went postward a heavy favorite in what was supposed to be his competitive debut. But his nerves came unglued and he threw his jockey into a flower bed, then scampered off to the stables, leaving no one impressed.

Three Peat suffered a chip in an ankle during those unscheduled antics, costing him the rest of a potentially lucrative 2-year-old season. Later, Three Peat was turned over to Sadler, who brought him back to the races in February of 1992.

After winning a kinder, gentler debut by seven lengths, Three Peat finished second in a minor Santa Anita stakes event, then headed east to knock ‘em dead in the seven-furlong Bay Shore Stakes at Aqueduct. The New York crowd made Three Peat 7-5, showing that the pocketbook takes precedence over regional pride.

Two subsequent Eastern starts did nothing to tarnish Three Peat’s resume. He was a close second on a muddy track in the Riva Ridge Stakes, then first in the Dwyer Stakes, only to be dropped to second because of Chris Antley’s overly aggressive ride.

“He was a better horse than people thought he was,” said Gary Biszantz, who races Three Peat in partnership with his 84-year-old father, Harry. “The Bay Shore was awesome, and the Dwyer was a real disappointment, especially since he ran so great.

“Now, he’s physically mature,” Biszantz added. “He’s carrying more weight, even putting it on after each of his races. It’s a bit too early to tell if he’ll be as good as he was last year. But the signs are good.”

Based on genetics, Three Peat has every right to be a top horse at almost any distance. He is a grandson of both Northern Dancer and Mr. Prospector, the two most influential stallions of the last 25 years. The inspiration for his name comes from his dam, a mare called Whatsoraire, who delivered Three Peat during the spring of 1989--when the Lakers failed in their attempt to win a third consecutive NBA title.

Since then, Three Peat has changed hands three times: for $15,000 as a weanling, for $38,000 as a yearling and then for $55,000 as a 2-year-old. Recent headlines got Gary Biszantz thinking of one more possible transaction.

“I know Michael Jordan likes golf,” Biszantz said. “And I hear he likes to take a little gamble. Maybe I should have offered him half interest in a racehorse named Three Peat.”

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Four champions from 1992--A.P. Indy, Pleasant Tap, Sky Classic and Rubiano--were retired at the end of the year. Three others--Flawlessly, Gilded Time and Saratoga Dew--have yet to run in 1993, and the season is half over.

That leaves Paseana and Eliza to carry the load, and they are doing their share. Paseana won the Milady Handicap at Hollywood Park last weekend. And Saturday, it will be Eliza’s turn in the Princess Stakes at 1 1/16 miles.

There are no world-beaters among the four 3-year-old fillies entered against Eliza, which suits her trainer, Alex Hassinger, just fine.

“She could use an easy race,” Hassinger said Thursday morning as he put the finishing touches on Allen Paulson’s pride and joy. “Her last two have been the kind that would jerk the heart out of most horses.”

Eliza ran third to the colts Personal Hope and Union City in the Santa Anita Derby on April 3, then finished a frustrated second to Dispute in the Kentucky Oaks at Churchill Downs on April 30.

“She was an angry girl after the Oaks,” Hassinger said. “She doesn’t know how to do anything but try as hard as she can, and she was just spinning her wheels on that surface at Churchill.

“It took something out of her, too,” the trainer noted. “It was a week or so before she was back to her old self. Then she started biting and kicking when you’d go in her stall. That’s the Eliza we know.”

Hassinger hopes that Eliza can relax during the early running of the Princess, launch her trademark charge into and around the far turn and then coast home, leaving plenty in reserve for the Hollywood Oaks on July 11.

“Of course,” Hassinger added. “I really wouldn’t mind a walkover.”

Horse Racing Notes

Fans of Flawlessly won’t have to wait much longer for her reappearance. The daughter of Affirmed worked a mile on the turf in 1:39 1/5 at Hollywood Park on Thursday morning as she prepares for the $300,000 Beverly Hills Handicap on June 27. . . . Jolypha, who will challenge Flawlessly, is training across town at Santa Anita, where she worked seven furlongs in 1:27 last Monday.

Gary Stevens, who broke his left thumb May 31, will be back in action Saturday with at least five mounts, including Swazi’s Moment in the Princess. He will be wearing a plastic tube-like splint over the thumb.

“In a way, I was hoping the doctor would tell me I needed one more week,” said Stevens, who started working horses Wednesday morning and went water-skiing that afternoon. “I was just getting used to relaxing a little.”