As the world counted down to a new millennium, America’s oldest sport remained timeless in the face of the changing culture around it. The sport continued to celebrate its traditions, welcoming new names to the pantheon of champions that the 20^th century had produced. In races as enduring as the Kentucky Derby and the Travers Stakes, names like Holy Bull, A.P. Indy, and Real Quiet dominated headlines, sometimes eclipsing the performances of other champions of the era.

In a decade that produced superstars Cigar and Silver Charm, Hansel, Lonesome Glory, and Thunder Gulch also brought home racing’s biggest prizes with performances that continually remind us why we love this ageless sport.

Hansel (1988-2017)

E. P. Taylor held Dancing Count, a son of Taylor’s dual classic winner Northern Dancer, in high enough esteem that he stood the colt at stud even after Dancing Count was sidelined by injury after his lone start and win. One of his daughters, the unraced Count On Bonnie, was part of the broodmare band owned by Marvin Little Jr., the former farm manager for Newstead Farm in Upperville, Va. When Newstead’s stock was dispersed in 1985, Little moved on to Kentucky, taking his horses with him; among those was Count On Bonnie’s colt sired by Irish champion Woodman, a bay splashed with a wide blaze, a hind sock, and a fore coronet, a colt who would be named Hansel.

As a son of Woodman, Hansel’s name came from the Hansel and Gretel fairytale, where the young protagonists’ father was a woodsman. Little entered him in the 1989 Keeneland September yearling sale, where Hansel was purchased by Frank Shipp and Joe Albritton for $150,000. He ran in the yellow and green checkered silks of Albritton’s Lazy Lane Farm as part of trainer Frank Brothers’ barn.

Hansel winning the 1991 Preakness Stakes. (BloodHorse Library/Maryland Jockey Club)

The Woodman colt was a winner from the word go. He broke his maiden in his first start at Arlington Park near Chicago and then went east to Belmont Park to try graded stakes company for the first time, winning the Grade 3 Tremont Breeders’ Cup Stakes by three lengths. His starts in the Sapling Stakes at Monmouth Park and the Hopeful Stakes at Saratoga were both on sloppy tracks, which Hansel had a hard time handling, but he persevered enough to finish in the top three in both. Brothers sent him back to his home base at Arlington for the colt’s final start of 1990 in the Arlington-Washington Futurity. After encountering a traffic jam approaching the stretch, jockey Pat Day guided Hansel through a hole on the rail and charged up to win by a neck.

To start his 3-year-old season, the Woodman colt bled in the Fountain of Youth Stakes at Gulfstream Park, finishing fifth behind 2-year-old champion Fly So Free. He faced Fly So Free again in the Florida Derby, but was unable to catch the winner, finishing third. By the time he tried the Jim Beam Stakes at Turfway Park, Brothers knew Hansel needed a victory to get him back on the Triple Crown trail and the colt delivered. Facing 10 opponents at 1 1/8 miles, he stalked the leaders in third until the stretch and then poured on the speed to take the Grade 2 stakes by 2½ lengths in track record time.

To keep his colt on edge ahead of the 1991 Kentucky Derby, Brothers sent Hansel to Keeneland for the Lexington Stakes, an easy nine-length victory. That set the Lazy Lane colt up for his run for the roses, where he entered the starting gate as the 5-2 favorite and crossed the finish line 10th behind winner Strike the Gold. Brothers floated the possibility that Derby day’s heat and humidity might have contributed to the performance, but regardless, the Woodman colt did not show up as he had in the Jim Beam and the Lexington Stakes, leaving Brothers pondering what was next: send him to Pimlico for the Preakness or go for the Jersey Derby instead. After Hansel logged a three-furlong workout in :34 3/5, the trainer sent his charge east to Baltimore and a stunning seven-length win in the Preakness. That set up a trip to New York and another date with Strike the Gold in the Belmont Stakes.

The Derby winner had been hemmed in on the rail throughout the Preakness and was unable to factor in the race while Hansel got a clean trip and an easy victory. But New York was a state where Lasix, the anti-bleeding medication furosemide, was not allowed and the debate raged about how Hansel, who had bled in the Fountain of Youth and had run on Lasix since, would fare without the medication. The Belmont results negated that debate. He stalked the pace for the first mile, running third behind Another Review and Corporate Report, then pressing Corporate Report on the backstretch before taking over with a half-mile to go. Behind him, jockey Chris Antley took Strike the God five wide on the final turn and started his usual closing run, homing in on the leader.

Over that last furlong, Strike the Gold continued to pursue Hansel and the lead; the wire looming, Hansel held on, his gameness keeping him going as he tired. In the end, he prevailed by a head over the Derby winner, clinching two-thirds of the Triple Crown.

Hansel’s performances in both races made him look like the best 3-year-old in training, which made his lackluster third in the Haskell all the more confusing. As jockey Craig Perret, who rode the winner Lost Mountain, observed, Hansel did not like being boxed in early, so when Jerry Bailey asked the colt to run, he did not respond, struggling home third, beaten by 13 lengths

Three weeks later, Hansel joined Fly So Free, Strike the Gold, Lost Mountain, and Corporate Report for the Travers Stakes at Saratoga. In the stretch, Jerry Bailey had the Preakness-Belmont winner poised to pass the front-running Corporate Report when he felt something go amiss with the Woodman colt. Hansel was able to hold on for second by a neck, but it was clear he was running on three legs. A veterinary exam showed that it was not a fracture, but a torn tendon sheath, a career-ending injury. With a record of seven wins, two seconds, and three third-place finishes in 14 starts and $2,936,586 in purse earnings, Hansel retired to stud at Gainsborough Farm after Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum, founder of Godolphin, purchased him in September 1991.

After standing at Gainsborough in Kentucky and then Questroyal in New York, Hansel was sold to a Japanese breeder in 2000, where he stood until 2005, when Albritton was able to buy the stallion back and return him to Lazy Lane Farm. Of his 436 foals, he counted Group 1 winner Loving Claim and multiple graded stakes winner Guided Tour among his best. Hansel died in 2017 and is buried at Lazy Lane.

Lonesome Glory (1988-2002)

Many of racing’s elite in the early 20^th century owned Thoroughbreds who competed on the flat and over the jumps, including Samuel Riddle, whose Man o’ War reigns as the century’s best racehorse. His nephew Walter M. Jeffords Sr., co-owned Faraway Farm with Riddle, and passed on that love for horses and racing to his son, Walter M. Jeffords Jr., who continued the family tradition of owning and breeding horses into the 1980s. The family was also active in the Mid-Atlantic foxhunting community, where they met fellow hunters Bob Crompton and Bruce Miller. In 1987, Jeffords sent his homebred mare Stronghold to Transworld, a Kentucky-bred Irish St. Leger winner standing at Gainesway Farm. In February 1988, Jeffords’ mare foaled a chestnut colt with a prominent blaze, who would be named Lonesome Glory for a Pennsylvania hunting ground that the Jeffords frequented.

Jeffords died when the Transworld colt was a yearling, his wife, Kay, taking over the few remaining horses in their stable. Lonesome Glory was a handful as a young horse, enough that Jeffords had him gelded and ruled out a show career for him, but it was clear he had potential, which prompted Crompton to introduce the gelding to fellow huntsman Fulmor Miller. The elder Miller encouraged son Bruce, a longtime steeplechase trainer, to take a look at Lonesome Glory. What he saw was enough to prompt Kay Jeffords to send her son of Transworld to his stable. Under the tutelage of Miller’s daughter Blythe, Lonesome Glory evolved from a problem child to a champion.

Miller held off on starting the gelding until he was 3 to give his charge time to mature and prepare for his career over the jumps. Lonesome Glory broke his maiden in his fourth start, a maiden special weight steeplechase at Fair Hill. He earned his first stakes win in the Foxbrook Supreme Hurdle at Far Hills under Blythe Miller the following year and then sealed his first Eclipse Award as champion steeplechaser with a win in the Sport of Kings Challenge Stakes at Cheltenham in England. Over the next seven seasons, the chestnut gelding sealed his place in the Hall of Fame with a bevy of wins in many of the steeplechase division’s key races.

Lonesome Glory’s 1993 Breeders’ Cup victory. (BloodHorse Library/Skip Dickstein)

At age 5, he earned the 1993 Eclipse with wins in the Breeders’ Cup Chase at Belmont Park, where he set a track record, and the Swan Lake Hurdle Stakes at Great Meadows in Virginia. The following year, Lonesome Glory won his first Temple Gwathmey Hurdle, one of the division’s biggest races, and the Colonial Cup Steeplechase at Camden. He would get his first Iroquois Steeplechase win in 1995, taking another of steeplechase’s famed races, and add the A. P. Smithwick Memorial Hurdle and the New York Turf Writers Cup Steeplechase Handicap at Saratoga and his second Colonial Cup. Then Miller sent Lonesome Glory to England, where he won by 11 lengths at Sandown to cement his third Eclipse Award.

The gelding was winless in three starts in 1996 but found his stride again at age 9 in 1997, taking the Grade 1 Carolina Cup Hurdle and another Colonial Cup Hurdle Stakes, his four in-the-money finishes enough to earn another Eclipse Award. His final two seasons featured wins in the Grade 1 Carolina Cup and the Grade 1 Royal Chase for the Sport of Kings Hurdle at Keeneland, earning his fifth Eclipse in 1999. He joined the likes of Secretariat, Affirmed, and Forego on the list of horses who had won five or more Eclipse Awards during their time on the racetrack.

Lonesome Glory retired to trainer Bruce Miller’s farm, where he spent his post-racing years in his own paddock. In 2002, he got cast, or laid down too close to a fence in a position which left him unable to get up, and broke a bone in his left hind leg. Efforts to repair the fracture were unsuccessful and Miller and Jeffords had to make the difficult decision to euthanize the five-time champion steeplechaser at age 14. To honor his legacy of dominance over nine seasons, the New York Racing Association added the Grade 1 Lonesome Glory Handicap to its yearly slate of stakes races.

Thunder Gulch (1992-2018)

He might have played second fiddle to stablemates Timber Country, the 1994 champion 2-year-old male, and Serena’s Song, the filly who beat the boys more than once at 3, but Thunder Gulch proved himself to be another star for trainer D. Wayne Lukas.

Thunder Gulch was a late May foal for a stallion who made his career as a sprinter, although he did finish second in the Belmont Stakes, and a mare who was a winner in England but could only place in a Group 1 race at 2. He was bred by Peter Brant, who bred and raced both sire Gulch and dam Line of Thunder, and then was purchased for $40,000 by Ken Ellenberg at the 1993 Keeneland July yearling sale. He intended to pinhook, or resell, Thunder Gulch at a 2-year-old in training sale the following year but was unsuccessful. Instead, the colt went to trainer John Kimmel as Ellenberg continued his efforts to sell the colt, eventually bringing in Howard Rozins as a 60% partner, while Ellenberg sought a buyer for his 40% share. However, Thunder Gulch did not make that easy.

His workouts were slow at first, which was definitely not going to attract interest, but in August, the chestnut colt seemed to put it together, enough for Kimmel to enter him in a maiden special weight race at Belmont Park. With John Velazquez in the saddle, Thunder Gulch overcame a troubled trip to finish third and then earned his first win in his next start. His first stakes try came in the Grade 2 Cowdin Stakes, where he got away slow and ran sixth early before rallying to finish second. His performance was enough to attract the attention of bloodstock agent Demi O’Byrne, who was scouting for horses for Michael Tabor, a partner in the English ownership group Coolmore who was trying to break into the American market. After a positive report about the colt, Tabor was not interested in a share of Thunder Gulch; he wanted full ownership and offered Ellenberg and Rozins $475,000, a nice sum for a horse that had not yet notched his first stakes win.

Thunder Gulch winning 1995 Fountain of Youth. (BloodHorse Library/EQUI-PHOTO)

It was a move that would pay dividends for the Englishman. He moved the colt from Kimmel’s barn to D. Wayne Lukas, the future Hall of Famer that dominated the sport for much of the previous decade. After a fourth in the Grade 3 Nashua Stakes, the son of Gulch then got his first stakes win in the Grade 2 Remsen Stakes and then headed west to Hollywood Park, where he finished second behind Afternoon Deelites in the Grade 1 Hollywood Futurity. His win in the 1 1/8-mile Remsen proved that Thunder Gulch had stamina, so Lukas put Tabor’s colt on the Triple Crown trail, starting with the 1995 Fountain of Youth Stakes.

To keep the colt focused, Lukas added blinkers and told jockey Mike Smith to keep Thunder Gulch outside of horses, his preferred running style. Going wide on the final turn at Gulfstream Park, he rallied late to win by a neck.

In his next start, the Florida Derby, Thunder Gulch sat behind front-runners Star Standard and Kings Fiction in third early and then made his move on the turn. Suave Prospect used an inside bid to take command in early stretch but Thunder Gulch would not be denied and battled gamely in the final strides to eke a victory by a nose. All four of his wins to that point had come with photo finishes, which did not mark Thunder Gulch as a horse to watch for the Kentucky Derby. A fourth in the Blue Grass Stakes at Keeneland only fueled his skeptics.

He entered the gate at Churchill Downs as a longshot at 24.50-1, a third stringer behind Timber Country and Serena’s Song, but Lukas had tapped jockey Gary Stevens, who had won the 1988 Derby on Winning Colors for the trainer, to ride Thunder Gulch. Together, they turned in a grand performance, running just behind the leading pack of horses until the far turn. Stevens moved the colt past tiring horses and entered the stretch poised to make his bid. In full flight, Thunder Gulch put away Talkin Man in early stretch and powered clear to take the 121^st Kentucky Derby by 2¼ lengths. Two weeks later, he was third behind Timber Country in the Preakness, and then returned to the winner’s circle in the Belmont Stakes, taking the third jewel of the Triple Crown by two lengths. That launched a winning streak that would only be ended by injury.

Thunder Gulch returned to Lukas’s homebase in California and beat future star Da Hoss by two lengths in the Grade 2 Swaps Stakes. Then came the Travers at Saratoga and a chance at a historic feat: win the Kentucky Derby, the Belmont Stakes, and the "Mid-Summer Derby," a triple last completed by Shut Out in 1942. Breaking from post-position five, the Gulch colt reared at the break but recovered within a few strides to race in fourth early. Around the far turn, Stevens gave Thunder Gulch the cue and off the Derby-Belmont winner went; he passed front-runner Pyramid Peak with ease and drew off to win by 4½ lengths. The performance sealed the colt’s place as the leader of his division and his next start added another accomplishment to his resume.

Thunder Gulch at Ashford Stud. (BloodHorse Library/Anne M. Eberhardt)

In the Kentucky Cup Classic at Turfway Park, he faced older horses for the first time and endured a rough trip, where he was floated wide on the far turn and had to work hard while carrying the race’s highest weight to pass Judge T C in late stretch and win by a length. Ahead of a planned trip to the Breeders’ Cup Classic, Lukas sent Thunder Gulch to Belmont Park for the Jockey Club Gold Cup and a date with Cigar, the future Hall of Famer who had not lost a race that year and was on track to win Horse of the Year. The Derby winner was expected to challenge Cigar in the 1 ¼-mile Grade 1 but was a fading fifth instead. The next day, the discovery of a fracture in his left front cannon bone meant that Thunder Gulch’s days on the racetrack were done, but his victories were enough to earn him the Eclipse Award as champion three-year-old male.

He retired to Coolmore’s Ashford Stud in Versailles, Ky., standing stud there for 19 seasons until he was pensioned in 2015. His best foal, Point Given, copied his sire’s success in the Triple Crown classics, winning the Preakness and the Belmont and then adding the Haskell and the Travers Stakes. When American Pharoah retired to Ashford after his Triple Crown season in 2015, the pensioned Thunder Gulch served as a calming presence for the newly retired stallion as he settled into life after the racetrack. Three years later, Thunder Gulch succumbed to the infirmities of old age at age 26, leaving behind memories of his fortitude and grit over his two seasons on the racetrack.