ELMONT, N.Y. - — BELMONT, N.Y. - -Maybe Calvin Borel didn't envision it would be quite like this. Maybe he never dreamed he would have a chance to grab his own quirky piece of history today in the 141st running of the Belmont Stakes atop Mine That Bird, as he tries to become the first jockey to win all three races of the Triple Crown series on two different horses.
But Borel has always believed. Anyone who knows him and loves him can attest to that. He has always dreamed of the day when he would ride racehorses faster and better than anyone else in the country. It didn't matter to Borel that his fantasy seemed absurd, that he was a poor kid being raised on a Louisiana sugar-cane farm deep in Cajun country. He struggled so much in school, he had trouble learning to read or write, eventually persuading his parents to let him abandon formal education when he was 13.
Borel convinced himself that every bush-track race he entered, every stall he mucked and every nag he worked, was building toward something. He even revealed to Sports Illustrated that he had to overcome an eating disorder along the way. The journey took the better part of three decades, but now at age 42, that dream has become a reality.
Lisa Funk, Borel's fiancee, asked him recently if he ever envisioned a day when he would win the Kentucky Oaks, the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness in one stretch. Borel's response spoke volumes.
"Every day of my life," he said.
"I had faith in him and his talent, but I know this business," Funk said. "It takes owners and trainers that believe in you and will not listen when people say, 'Why aren't you taking him off in favor of someone else?' I have to give a lot of credit to those people, because they'll give you your breaks in this business."
It's probably fitting that Borel will be riding Mine That Bird as he tries to complete the sweep, an undersized gelding with a crooked gait owned by a pair of New Mexico cowboys and trained by a former rodeo man, Chip Woolley. It's two unlikely camps coming together at the right time to make history and prove just how unpredictable sports can be sometimes.
After riding Mine That Bird to victory in the Kentucky Derby last month, Borel made history by becoming the first jockey to switch horses for the next leg of the Triple Crown. He rode filly Rachel Alexandra to victory in the Preakness in Baltimore on May 16. When Rachel Alexandra's owners decided to skip the Belmont, Borel returned to Mine That Bird.
