Leatherbury

LAUREL -- Wait For the Lady certainly was in no mood to wait for the ladies in yesterday's $56,300 Gala Lil Handicap.Leading at every call, the filly posted a classic "lone speed" victory in the 1 1/16-mile race at Laurel Race Course.Trainer King Leatherbury oversaw the saddling of Wait For the Lady and Thirty Eight Go Go, then had to leave for a formal affair. He didn't witness the race, but the results surely were what he had hoped for: Wait For the Lady proved herself an effective route runner and Thirty Eight Go Go finished a strong-closing third, then returned to the unsaddling area in apparent fine shape.

King Leatherbury's quest to become the third trainer in history with 6,000 winners will continue after Will's Cat and All Irish were unable to win yesterday at Laurel Park. In the sixth race, Will's Cat was gaining at the wire but lost by a half length to Toscani. In the day's final race, All Irish was never a factor, finishing sixth in a 13-horse field. "This is taking an awfully long time," said Leatherbury, who is 0-for-20 during the Laurel summer meet. Leatherbury has no starter today but will saddle two 10-1 shots on tomorrow's card: Bello Ragazzo and Gimme.

As far as King Leatherbury is concerned, the magic number is one.With Leatherbury's countdown toward training 5,000 winners reaching a crescendo, a discrepancy arose yesterday after one of his horses, Lost Island, scored as the 8-5 favorite under apprentice Austreberto Salazar, in the second race.Official Daily Racing Form records did not conform with the figures of Leatherbury, who has himself at 4,999 entering today's card."According to my records, I'm one off," said Leatherbury.The problem arose when the Form did a "re-calculation" of Leatherbury's career total after receiving race-by-race charts 11 from Pimlico, according to the Form's statistical supervisor Jennie Parks.

Despite assurances by Delaware Park officials that they would not recruit Maryland-based horses, the track has granted stalls for the coming meet to Maryland's top two trainers.Dale Capuano and King Leatherbury each will have 15 stalls at Delaware Park when it opens in April, the first time they have had operations there.The two Maryland-based trainers typically vie for the most wins at meetings of Pimlico Race Course and Laurel Park.Trainers of the class of Capuano and Leatherbury would not have considered Delaware Park in the past.

On the same day the Daily Racing Form ran an article burying King Leatherbury, the estimable trainer staged a resurrection by winning two races in a row at Laurel Park. After winning only two races since June 21, when Laurel's meet began, Leatherbury won the second and third races Thursday with the 2-1 Blizzard Warning and the 48-1 Fleet Admiral. That was the same day the Form ran an article proclaiming: "Much of the Maryland racing community is wondering if the game has passed Leatherbury by. At 67, he isn't making the sharp, aggressive moves he used to and certainly isn't winning races as often as in the past."

Maryland's King Leatherbury is one of only three thoroughbred trainers to saddle 5,000 winners, so his enthusiasm for the post-race ceremony is not what it once was."I very seldom go down [to the winner's circle] and get my picture taken any more," Leatherbury said yesterday. "But it was different when I won a Maryland Million race. It was Maryland, and I got pumped up for it."Such is the atmosphere that will surround the eighth annual Maryland Million program Oct. 9 at Laurel Race Course, a happening that Pimlico-Laurel president Joe De Francis labeled "the brightest success story the industry has enjoyed over the last eight years."

King Leatherbury said it might seem a little ridiculous.But the state's leading trainer is running Bidding Up, a horse that last competed in a $27,000 allowance race at Laurel, for a $6,000 purse today in the featured eighth race on the opening card at Timonium.The horse is expected to be a heavy favorite, although Leatherbury cautioned that an out-of-state invader, Foyt Sparkler, could upset.Leatherbury is running the horse at Timonium because "my horse is eligible for the [starter allowance]

King Leatherbury entered 1992 with 4,800 wins, which should make the summer of 1993 the target area for his becoming the third trainer in North America to win 5,000 races.(McGee's over-under line: Aug. 4, 1993.)As Leatherbury's legend grows, and as he continues to operate the way he does -- he seldom goes to the barn in the morning or does any physical work with his horses, preferring instead to "manage" his large stable from an office -- skeptics continue to question his horsemanship.Leatherbury, 57, used to do the dirty work.

After a long and frustrating summer, King Leatherbury raced into the record books yesterday on the opening program at Timonium Race Course. The venerable Maryland thoroughbred trainer finally broke the 6,000-win barrier when Cherokee Sunrise pulled away for a 4 1/4 -length victory in the seventh race, a maiden special event for 2-year-olds. Third on the all-time list, the Baltimore native and Mitchellville resident joined Dale Baird and Jack Van Berg as the only trainers with as many wins.

Ah Day came flying out of the fog yesterday evening, spraying mud and not holding back. It was a sight trainer King Leatherbury wasn't expecting but was happy to see. "I wasn't that confident today," Leatherbury said after Ah Day had won by 5 1/2 lengths over Vegas Play in the $150,000 Federico Tesio Stakes at Pimlico Race Course. "He was coming off a big effort 10 days ago, running in the mud and going a mile and an eighth for the first time. I was criticizing myself for running him in that allowance race [April 12]