Secretariat: The Horse That Ran Away With America’s Heart
In the summer of 1973, a little known horse named Secretariat stormed into the sports world. What is known as one of the greatest runs in horse racing, Secretariat swept away the competition at the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness Stake, and the Belmont Stakes to win the Triple Crown, something that hadn’t happened in over 20 years. William Nack, the author of “Pure Heart,” was there for almost every step of Secretariat’s journey to greatness, getting an unprecedented look into Secretariats magical run that captured America.
Starting from the horse’s “year two season”, Nack followed Secretariat extensively, writing about him closely after being blown away by one of his early performances which soon caused him to follow the horse around in hopes of getting a good article done. Nack does a brilliant job in building up Secretariat as an elite level athlete while keeping it in perspective that he’s a horse. When talking about seeing Secretariat for the first time after not seeing him for awhile, Nack writes: “The colt had filled out substantially since I had last seen him under tack in the fall, and he looked like a some medieval charger” (Nack 555). The way he talks about Secretariat filling out reminds me of what a football coach would say about one of his players, but then Nack quickly reminds the audience of how Secretariat is only a horse by comparing him to a medieval charger, a powerful war horse from way back in the 17th century.
In addition, Nack plays the role of a writer beautifully. The story is in first person point of view so we’re getting these events through his eyes and how he processed them. We see how Nack starts getting infatuated by Secretariat and it soon becomes almost an obsession for him. When reminiscing about his times with the horse, Nack says: “Horses have a way of getting inside of you, and so it was that Secretariat became like a fifth child in our house” (Nack 550). The way he compares Secretariat to one of his own children shows the audience how deeply he cares for him. The way he writes about Secretariat builds the horse up to almost a larger than life athlete. Nack does great justice through his words by showing how dominant of an athlete Secretariat actually was. There’s countless examples of when Nack would go to Secretariats training sessions and be blown away at how fast he could run. The story is more about Secretariat behind the scenes rather than during races. The audience gets to see what Secretariat was like when he was training or how he was in his down time. This gives the audience a unique view of events that most writers couldn’t access which helps “humanizes’’ Secretariat and puts into perspective that after all that Secretariat is a horse.
All in all, Nack does a brilliant job of building up Secretariat as an athlete. A lot of people would have their doubts about a horse being considered an “athlete”, but Nack proves those doubters wrong through his incredible story telling.
