Triple Crown Winner’s Coach Billy Turner dies at 81


Seven other horses challenged Won the Belmont Stakes by four lengths in June In 2 minutes 29 ⅗ seconds — Secretariat’s stunning 2:24 record time four years ago, but close to the times of the race’s top winners.

“We knew in advance that this was not a record-breaking course and this was not a record-breaking horse,” Mr Turner told reporters. “He’s doing what he’s supposed to. If something pushes him, it’s like the first race he’s broken records this year. But it’s hard to find a horse to put pressure on him.”

William Hutt Turner Jr. was born on February 29, 1940, in Rochester, NY, and grew up in Towanda and Unionville, Pa. His father worked at Eastman Kodak; his mother, Esther (Allyn) Turner, was a housewife and raised dogs.

Mr. Turner began his horse racing career in his late teens as a hurdler for the trainer. William Burling Cocks. “The falling part isn’t too bad; It hurts to hit the ground, Mr. Turner told Sports Illustrated in 1977. Broken ribs and collarbones, stuff like that. But you can tape a broken collarbone and ride with it.”

After Mr. Turner became assistant coach for Mr. Cocks, he began training purebreds in the mid-1960s. It started working in 1969. Dust Commander and other horses for Robert E. Lehmann, a retired contractor. But some time before Dust Commander won the 1970 Kentucky Derby, Mr. Lehmann fired Mr. Turner for not winning often enough.

When Mr Turner took Slew, he got a second chance at Derby, which Mr. Hill said was a gifted storyteller who “never let the truth get in the way of a good story”. However, his relationship with the horse ended a few months after Slew lost his first race (finding fourth at Hollywood Park in Inglewood, California) in July 1977.

Slew’s owners and Mr. Turner described it as an amicable separation, but the break began when Mr. Turner drank excessively.



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