Whitmore or Vekoma; Who is America's sprint champion?

While the Breeders’ Cup successfully identified 2020 Eclipse Award champions, as horses such as Authentic, Monomoy Girl, and Improbable effectively ended their respective divisional races, it also created intriguing questions for voters as we near the end of a stormy season. One of the more fascinating decisions to be made is between Vekoma and Whitmore in the category of Champion Male Sprinter.

A case could be made for a few other candidates, but my scorecard says it comes down to these two.

Perhaps the most telling decider in a tight race is head-to-head competition, but Vekoma was scratched from the Breeders’ Cup Sprint because of a fever. It meant the two would never face each other, leaving it up to the voters to decide who had accomplished more.

Speed and brilliance is on the side of the younger Vekoma. A winner of 6-of-8 lifetime, and a graded stakes winner at both 2 and 3, the son of Candy Ride was picture perfect as a 4-year-old.

After a near 11-month layoff following a failed Kentucky Derby run, Vekoma returned in 2020 with his running shoes on. In late March, he reminded us what we had been missing by kicking it in down the stretch on route to a 3 3/4-length victory in Gulfstream’s ungraded Sir Shackleton Stakes.

Off that impressive victory, Vekoma returned for another shot in Grade 1 racing, and he responded in a big way. Taking to the off track at Aqueduct like a duck to water, he left a strong field in his wake with a 7 1/4-length win in the Carter Handicap. The romp earned a career-high Beyer Speed Figure of 110.

Proving that the Carter result was not because of the slop, he came back to easily handle another strong field by going wire to wire in the Grade 1 Met Mile (G1). The final time of 1:32.88 was one of the fastest ever in the historic race at Belmont Park.

At the time, he was a prime candidate for a Horse of the Year title. Unfortunately, that was the last time we would ever see Vekoma in a race. He retired having won all three starts in 2020 impressively and at three different tracks.

Meanwhile, Whitmore would certainly win this award if it came down to popularity. After all, how can you not love the venerable 7-year-old? A finalist for the Vox Populi Award, persistence certainly paid off for the Ron Moquett-trained warrior. The son of Pleasantly Perfect has not missed an edition of the Breeders’ Cup Sprint the past four seasons, and this year he finally broke through with a decisive victory. 

In his three prior Breeders’ Cup Sprint attempts, the former Kentucky Derby runner was twice defeated by the champion Roy H, finishing eighth to him at Del Mar in 2017 and second to him at Churchill Downs in 2018, before running third to Mitole at Santa Anita last year. This year at Keeneland, he left no doubt in the $2 million race, rolling home a 3 1/4-length winner in the 14-horse field.

While Vekoma’s limited racing career leaves a taste of what could have been, the powerful chestnut has danced every dance in a career of more than $4.2 million in the bank and 15 wins out of 38 starts.

With a record of 3-for-7 in 2020, Whitmore ran only one poor race in the season, and that came on a very sloppy track at Saratoga. He fired and tried hard in each of his other six races, a quality we’ve come to expect from the hickory gelding.

He began the season strongly with four straight solid races — two wins and two seconds, all in stakes, including a graded stakes win and a Grade 1 runner-up — and he finished off the year in the best possible fashion.

Short-lived brilliance or steady, grinding excellence? The decision for Eclipse Award voters will not be an easy one.

In the end, my preference goes to the horse who ran all year over a horse who ran but three times this season.

While it’s true that Vekoma was the more spectacular horse in 2020, Whitmore was the horse who was there at the end, and he came through big time. Rallying on a track where it was not easy to come from behind, he displayed all the characteristics of a champion by deftly moving through the field on his way to an easy victory in the division’s most important race.

While I feel for trainer George Weaver, Vekoma’s owners and all his connections for not having the opportunity to run, my choice would be Whitmore. The Breeders’ Cup clinched it for me.