Armed (May, 1941–1964) was an American

Thoroughbred The Thoroughbred is a horse breed best known for its use in horse racing. Although the word ''thoroughbred'' is sometimes used to refer to any breed of purebred horse, it technically refers only to the Thoroughbred breed. Thoroughbreds are ...

gelding

race horse Horse racing is an equestrian performance sport, typically involving two or more horses ridden by jockeys (or sometimes driven without riders) over a set distance for competition. It is one of the most ancient of all sports, as its basic pr ...

who was the American Horse of the Year in 1947 and Champion Older Male Horse in both 1946 and 1947. He was inducted into the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame in 1963.

Background

Armed was sired by the great stakes winner

Bull Lea A bull is an intact (i.e., not castrated) adult male of the species ''Bos taurus'' (cattle). More muscular and aggressive than the females of the same species (i.e., cows), bulls have long been an important symbol in many religions, includ ...

, the sire of Citation. His dam was Armful, whose sire was Belmont Stakes winner

Chance Shot Chance Shot (1924–1952) was an American-bred thoroughbred racehorse and sire. Bred by August Belmont, Jr. at his nursery stud in Lexington, Kentucky, he was sired by the great Fair Play, which made him a half brother to Man o' War, out of the ...

and whose grandsire was the great Fair Play. Besides being small for his age and very headstrong, Armed had the habits of biting and kicking

hay Hay is grass, legumes, or other herbaceous plants that have been cut and dried to be stored for use as animal fodder, either for large grazing animals raised as livestock, such as cattle, horses, goats, and sheep, or for smaller domesticat ...

out of his handler's

pitchfork A pitchfork (also a hay fork) is an agricultural tool with a long handle and two to five tines used to lift and pitch or throw loose material, such as hay, straw, manure, or leaves. The term is also applied colloquially, but inaccurately, to ...

. Since he was also practically untrainable, his trainer, Ben A. Jones, sent him back to Calumet Farm to be

gelded A gelding is a castrated male horse or other equine, such as a pony, donkey or a mule. Castration, as well as the elimination of hormonally driven behavior associated with a stallion, allows a male equine to be calmer and better-behaved, makin ...

and turned out to grow up. He returned to the track late in his two-year-old season and resumed training.

Racing career

His first start was as a three-year-old the following February, and he won at

Hialeah Park The Hialeah Park Race Track (also known as the Hialeah Race Track or Hialeah Park) is a historic racetrack in Hialeah, Florida. Its site covers 40 square blocks of central-east side Hialeah from Palm Avenue east to East 4th Avenue, and from East 2 ...

by eight lengths. He won again less than a week later but then won only once in five more starts and had to be rested due to an

ankle The ankle, or the talocrural region, or the jumping bone (informal) is the area where the foot and the leg meet. The ankle includes three joints: the ankle joint proper or talocrural joint, the subtalar joint, and the inferior tibiofibular joi ...

injury. Armed raced for seven seasons, from 1944 to 1950, finishing with a 41-20-10 record in 81 starts. On April 20, 1946, under jockey Douglas Dodson Armed broke the track record for a mile and a sixteenth on dirt with a winning time of 1:43 1/5 in the

Philadelphia Handicap The Philadelphia Handicap was an American Thoroughbred horse race held thirty-eight times between 1913 and 1950 at Havre de Grace Racetrack in Havre de Grace, Maryland. Run on dirt, the race was open to horses of either sex age three and older. F ...

at the Havre de Grace Racetrack. In 1947, again ridden by jockey Dodson, he defeated U.S. Triple Crown champion Assault in a

match race A match race is a race between two competitors, going head-to-head. In sailboat racing it is differentiated from a fleet race, which almost always involves three or more competitors competing against each other, and team racing where teams consi ...

at Belmont Park and set a track record of 2:01-3/5 for one and one-quarter miles while winning the

Widener Handicap The Widener Handicap at Hialeah Park Race Track in Hialeah, Florida was a Grade III stakes race for Thoroughbred racehorses 3-years-old and up. It was run over a distance of miles (10 furlongs) until 1993 when it was modified to miles. Initially ...

and carrying 129 pounds. He repeated as American Champion Older Male Horse and was voted 1947 American Horse of the Year honors. In the Horse of the Year poll conducted by ''Turf and Sport Digest'' magazine, he received 151 of a possible 173 votes to win the title from Citation,

Stymie A stymie is an obsolete rule in the sport of golf. It legislated for the situation where a player's ball lay behind or blocked by another player's ball; the blocked player was not afforded relief. In the modern game, the blocking ball is temporar ...

, Bewitch and Assault.

Retirement and death

Armed died in 1964 of an

intestinal The gastrointestinal tract (GI tract, digestive tract, alimentary canal) is the tract or passageway of the digestive system that leads from the mouth to the anus. The GI tract contains all the major organs of the digestive system, in humans and ...

tumor A neoplasm () is a type of abnormal and excessive growth of tissue. The process that occurs to form or produce a neoplasm is called neoplasia. The growth of a neoplasm is uncoordinated with that of the normal surrounding tissue, and persists ...

. In 1963, he was inducted into National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame. In ''

The Blood-Horse ''BloodHorse'' is a multimedia news organization covering Thoroughbred racing and breeding that started with a newsletter first published in 1916 as a monthly bulletin put out by the Thoroughbred Horse Association.

'' ranking of the top 100 U.S. thoroughbred champions of the 20th Century, he was ranked #39.

References

{{reflist
Armed's pedigree

TB Library profile of Armed by
Avalyn Hunter

External links

KY Horsepark Calumet 1947
1941 racehorse births 1964 racehorse deaths Thoroughbred family 3-o Racehorses bred in Kentucky Racehorses trained in the United States Horse racing track record setters American Thoroughbred Horse of the Year United States Thoroughbred Racing Hall of Fame inductees