America didn’t wait for the 1973 Belmont Stakes to anoint Secretariat a hero.

The chestnut’s winning combination of looks, power, speed, and charisma captured a nation desperate to find someone who could ford the divides brought on by the Vietnam War and Watergate scandal. Record crowds had turned out at Churchill Downs and then Pimlico Race Course to witness Secretariat twice shatter speed records in the first two jewels of the Triple Crown, the Derby won in a rush from back in the field and the Preakness with an extraordinary, jaw-dropping brush around the first turn. Coming out of the Preakness Stakes, Secretariat was transformed from a renowned athlete into an American icon. He appeared simultaneously on the covers of Time, Newsweek, and Sports Illustrated.

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With the passing of her father, Christopher Chenery, the preceding winter, Penny Chenery Tweedy had battled her two siblings to keep their father’s Meadow Stable going. She had sacrificed time from her own family to oversee the racing and breeding operation, which had won the Kentucky Derby and Belmont Stakes a year earlier with Riva Ridge. Secretariat’s exploits made her horse racing’s ambassador to the world, which began with the media frenzy that rained down on her after the Preakness.

“It was Hell week, just brutal,” she said in 2013, looking back 40 years. “I did three magazine cover stories, and that was exhausting. Long interviews with a great deal of repetition, and everybody thinks their story is the most important. That part was work. I tried to be a good team player; I like people and enjoy being interviewed, but that was just too much.”

Besides posing for photographers, it was business as usual for Secretariat leading up to the Belmont Stakes, which meant more of the hard work in the mornings upon which he thrived. Trainer Lucien Laurin planned to continue on the path that had worked just fine — strong, fast breezes to keep his star sharp.

“He was a big eater who needed strong gallops between his races,” said Ron Turcotte, Secretariat’s regular jockey, in 2013. “We wanted to keep working him hard because it really sharpened him up and got him on his toes and ready to run. When you looked at him in his stall, he was always relaxed; once you took him out, he was all horse.”

Back at his home base in New York, Secretariat was sent out a week after the Preakness to drill six furlongs in 1:12 1/5. Then, eight days before the Belmont Stakes, Secretariat put in his major piece of work, a one-mile work with Turcotte up. Secretariat rolled past the mile mark in 1:34 4/5, and galloped out nine furlongs in 1:48 3/5. Such times would have been considered lightning fast for a race, let alone a breeze. Had he done too much this time?

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“That work, from my point of view, he was going well within himself,” said Turcotte. “I think he broke the track record going a mile. Our intention was to let him gallop out a mile and an eighth so that he was ready to go a mile and a half.”

Even knowing what he had in the shedrow, that work was enough to give Laurin pause. He surely didn’t want to become known as the trainer that caused his star to leave the most important race of his life on the training track. Three days before the Belmont, trainer and jockey got into a debate. Laurin thought Secretariat had done enough, and wanted Turcotte to go an easy half-mile with him.

“We argued,” said Turcotte. “I insisted we shouldn’t change what had been working. Right after the renovation break, Lucien said, ‘Ron, take him his usual way; you know what to do.’ “

Secretariat was timed in an eye-popping :46 3/5 that day.

“The next day we took him out to walk and he reared on his hind legs,” Turcotte said. “He was really ready to run.”

Penny Chenery was of two minds heading into the Belmont Stakes. On the one hand, coming out of the Preakness, she had supreme confidence in her horse. His two Triple Crown races had erased the doubts and negativity that swirled around Secretariat following his defeat in the Wood Memorial Stakes. She had considered the Preakness the likelier tripping point, but that race was now safely in Secretariat’s column. On the other hand, she knew that Bold Rulers weren’t supposed to be able to get a distance of ground. She’d heard it plenty after the Wood Memorial.

“It seemed to me we had it in the bag after the Preakness,” she said. “The 12 furlongs was the major concern. But part of me thought maybe it was Sham’s turn. His speed might make a difference. In the end, I had faith in my horse. I would have been very surprised if he didn’t run well.”

A field of five lined up for the Belmont Stakes June 9. Twice a Prince, My Gallant, and Pvt. Smiles composed the supporting cast, but few in the crowd of 67,605 thought this was anything other than a match race between Secretariat and Sham. Sham’s connections wanted him on the lead, hoping the distance would compromise Secretariat’s chances.

“In the post parade [Secretariat] was very calm,” said Turcotte. “He was good and quiet when the assistant starter put him in the gate. I broke [from the inside post] on the lead and gave him a chance to get his feet under him and picked his head up right away. I didn’t want to fight him or get shut off early. I just let him roll through there. I talked to him: ‘Easy boy, take it easy.’ He was running with a long, stretching stride, a nice lope. He was doing it so nicely, breathing good. Everything was going perfect.”

Sham was hustled out of the gate by Laffit Pincay Jr., but Turcotte kept Secretariat alongside him. It was as though the two colts just decided to throw down from the start rather than play strategy games. They sped together through an opening quarter in :23 3/5 and a :46 1/5 half-mile, the fastest in Belmont Stakes history. At that point the Big Red horse continued to power ahead, and Sham, a mere mortal, began to slip backward.

Secretariat reached the halfway point in 1:09 4/5, a winning time sprinting in a six-furlong race. Could he keep this pace up? Had Turcotte gone completely off the wall?

“People can say I was crazy, but it didn’t matter how fast he was going,” said the rider, “as long as he was doing it nice and striding out. It all depends on how easy the horse is going. I’d won the Belmont the year before when Riva Ridge went three-quarters in 1:12. This horse, in 1:09 and change, was doing it as easy as Riva had.”

Secretariat overwhelms the opposition in the 1973 Belmont Stakes. (BloodHorse Library/Winants Bros. Inc.)

Up in his catbird seat, Chic Anderson, calling the race for CBS television, put aside any doubts those in attendance might have had, exclaiming the words that still today bring shivers: “Secretariat is widening now. He is moving like a tremendous machine.”

Turcotte turned for home, his eye at one point catching the timer on the infield toteboard. With the other, he took in the sea of screaming fans in the grandstand, all the while talking to Secretariat and making sure he was still paying attention. He knuckled down ever so slightly, just letting the colt run to the wire in 2:24, shattering the track record by two and three-fifths seconds.

“You can’t find the words how awesome it was,” he said. “To have won the first Triple Crown in 25 years, and to do so the way he did it. It was mind-boggling.”

Chenery was in awe watching the 31-length victory unfold. This was the reward and the vindication of so many deeply held beliefs: that she should continue her father’s stable; that this horse deserved to be the most valuable colt in racing history; that there was something extraordinary at work.

The exaltation at the moment of triumph came in the form of a joyous, two-handed wave to the crowd, a winning smile radiating across the huge grandstand.

“That run was for my father,” she said. “He would have been mighty thrilled having his lifetime goal achieved. I wish he could have been there.”

The post-race interviews went on forever, but when Chenery got to the trustees’ room for a champagne toast, she was greeted by industry titans Paul Mellon and Jock Whitney, “important men whose recognition dad would have been pleased with. They waited all that time to congratulate me, and I was highly gratified by all that.”