There are few equestrian businesses that can create as potent a mixture of emotions as horse racing. You need to have the love, care, affection and equipment to take care of a horse and ready him for meets, but also the ability to look past sentimentality to know when a horse lacks what it takes.
The most interesting horses are often the exceptions to the rule; these are horses who lack the temperament, discipline or talent to win but become beloved simply because they enter the horse box trailer and continue to try their hardest even if they do not succeed.
In the United Kingdom, Quixell Crossett was so popular that he had a website and fan club in 2001, decades before social media made that more common, but in America, the ultimate lovable loser was Zippy Chippy.
This was a somewhat ironic moniker, given that Zippy’s behaviour was anything but beloved on the tracks that he would ultimately be banned from during his famous 100-race losing streak, but to explain why, it is important to explore how he got the chance to be banned in the first place.
A Grand Pedigree Sold For A Pickup
Zippy Chippy was born to racing royalty, with a lineage including the likes of Count Fleet and War Admiral, who both won the American horse racing triple crown.
On paper, the story should have been different to that of the undersized Hara Urara and the hapless Quixell Crossett. However, after 20 consecutive losses, he appeared to be just as doomed to failure and early retirement.
That was, at least, until he met Felix Monserrate, a trainer who loved horses far more than he loved winning. He saw a lot of himself in Zippy, and when he heard of the plan his current owner had, he decided to buy the horse off him.
What was the price? One seven-year-old pickup truck that had been used as a makeshift horse cart for years.
In some respects, Felix knew what he was buying, but thought that a thoroughbred from a family of champions was surely going to find that big maiden win sooner rather than later.
Zippy’s first course of action when he stepped into the barn was to bite Mr Monserrate and prove him very wrong.
The Lovable Rogue
Unlike other lovable loser horses that tended to be relatively friendly and primarily known for their performance on the racetrack, Zippy Chippy was seen as almost untrainable.
Whilst he loved to race, he hated being harnessed for races, disliked having a saddle and would generally defy authority. He would stick his tongue out, bite the hats off of spectators and steal food. He would even grab people by the collars and lift them up.
He had a mean streak, and several streaks of refusing to leave the gate got him banned from several racetracks, including his local Finger Lakes in Farmington, New York. His antics allegedly got him banned from every track except for Massachusetts’ Northampton Fair.
However, it was important to note that, unlike Quixall Crossett, Zippy Chippy actually showed flashes of this potential; he placed third 12 times and second eight times, including two back-to-back runner-up positions that highlighted that he could run when he wanted to.
The problem was that he ultimately never did, but this did not stop him, which in turn did not stop him from being a success in other ways beyond the $30,000 he won in prize money.
Loving A Loser
Zippy Chippy has far from the longest losing streak in the world, and indeed was five races away from the US record held by Thrust. However, a horse with his character and profile had not had such a long losing streak before, and this gave him a remarkably large following.
Part of the reason why he lost so many was that he was entered in a lot of races that he had little chance of winning; in America, the lowest level of horse racing is claiming races, where horses can be bought or sold for a specific price, and Mr Monserrate had no intentions of selling him for any price.
His unpredictability also made him an attraction for audiences, who would either see an astonishing underdog performance or a carnival of chaos, depending on the day.
He managed to get onto a People Magazine list of the most interesting personalities of the year 2000, there were plans to make a film of his story, a children’s book was made featuring him, and sales of Zippy-themed merchandise kept his Old Friends farm open for years.
Whilst he never won a race, he won a lot of hearts and used that to bring awareness of the welfare of retired racehorses, ensuring they would receive good care for the rest of their lives.