A Crowning Achievement for Ontario Horseman Lima

Sam Lima has been an ardent supporter of Canadian horse racing in a variety of capacities for more than 50 years and now he is being rewarded for it with a special Sovereign Award to be presented Thursday night in Toronto. The 88-year-old will stand alongside the best in Canadian horse racing in 2017 while being recognized for his ongoing contributions as a horseman and an advocate for backstretch workers. Lima will be only the 11th recipient of the special Sovereign Award and the first one in 11 years.

Lima has owned horses for 55 years in addition to working tirelessly as an executive of the Horsemen's Benevolent and Protective Association of Ontario. He has also been the longtime President of the Toronto Thoroughbred Racing Club (TTRC).

Lima was nominated for the Sovereign Award by the Jockey Club of Canada stewards, although he doesn't know who specifically put forward his name.

When asked what it means to receive the award, Lima responded with his typical candor.

“It means a lot to me,” he said. “All these years–I should have got an award a long time ago. No, no, it's true. What can I say? It's a great feeling to receive an award like this.”

His wife, Frances, and daughter, Carolyn, the eldest of the Limas' four children, are especially proud of him for being recognized with the award. Carolyn helps Lima with his work with the TTRC.

“He's been on top of the world,” Carolyn said. “He's so excited about this. Racing is truly his passion. It's really the love of the sport and promoting Thoroughbred racing as best as he can. That's what he encourages through his racing club. He's still going strong at his age.

“He never missed a meeting at the HBPA in over 50 years–maybe one,” Frances said.

In 2011, the TTRC presented him with a small booklet detailing many of his accomplishments. It was entitled The Life and Racing Times of Sam Lima. It was summed up at the end with two words: “A LEGEND!”

TTRC directors Patrick de Caires and Anthony Ceccanese, who co-authored the book, wrote: “His time and effort to help aid Thoroughbred racing is truly remarkable and difficult to imitate.”

“I think a lot of people still affiliated with coming out to his club meetings have recognized how he has been an ambassador for racing,” Carolyn said.

Frances added, “As a family man, he took his children every week to the races and his mother, who lived with us, too.”

As an owner of a smoke shop that had many racing people as patrons, Lima became fascinated with horses. When his business was expropriated in 1962, he started up a billiard lounge. A year later, he took the plunge into buying and racing Thoroughbreds.

“It was a dream of his,” Frances said. “He always wanted to buy a horse. So he bought a house, a horse and a car and had a baby [the couple's fourth child].”

She laughed as she recalled this memory, which only a horseperson could truly appreciate.

It would take him only six years to reach the pinnacle of Canadian horse racing, the Queen's Plate, as an owner. How it happened in 1969 with Fire n Desire–a horse he had claimed for $12,500 as a 3-year-old–is the stuff of horse racing lore. Lima had his eye on the horse as a 2-year-old racing in Montreal and put in a claim for the son of Nearctic, who was running at Fort Erie Racetrack in his sophomore season. A former jockey, Morris Rose, who once won five races for Al Capone in Kentucky, wanted to go in with Lima for a third, but didn't want to tell his wife. So Lima put up the entire money (with Rose a silent partner) and claimed the horse, who ultimately won the race.

In Fire n Desire's first start for Lima, a change in riding tactics resulted in a last-place finish facing $20,000 claimer–but the result did not deter Lima from entering the horse in the Queen's Plate Trial. Fire n Desire, dismissed at 53-1 on the tote board that day, beat 11 other entrants. Lima had $200 to win on the horse.

“I was a big bettor at one time, not now,” Lima explained.

Fire n Desire, trained by Larry Moorhead, became known as the Cinderella horse and Lima's improbable story became a focus of attention leading up to the Queen's Plate.

“E.P. Taylor never even came near me because I claimed his horse,” Lima said, speaking of the legendary Canadian owner/breeder who built Woodbine Racetrack and campaigned the great Northern Dancer. “E.P. Taylor would not look at me.”

The Plate was run less than a week after the Plate Trial. By then, Rose had publicly proclaimed he owned a third of the horse and his wife, ironically enough, wore a mink coat for the Plate. Sitting in the private box he owned and accompanied by his family, Lima watched as Fire n Desire ran a credible third, depleted from his previous race.

But once again, Lima was not deterred.

Lima decided to take a shot in the Manitoba Derby, shipping the horse to the Western Canadian province for Assiniboia Downs's signature race. It was run the day before the historic walk on the moon by Neil Armstrong. It was going to be one small step for man and one giant leap for Fire n Desire, the favorite at just under 1-2 with the Downs' star jockey Dick Armstrong aboard.

Fire n Desire–one of five horses sired by Nearctic in the race–and Icy Song, the second choice in the field, battled from the opening quarter mile until the finish with neither horse giving up ground. In the end, Fire n Desire won by a head. The headline in one of the paper's the next day said it all: “Fire n Desire Had Just Enough Of Both.”

Lima would go on to have many future successes while maintaining a small-scale operation, including George of Canada, a $12,500 claim who went on to be voted the TTRC's Claiming Horse Of The Year in 1975.

What Lima did for horsemen, in particular those on the backstretch, may be his greatest legacy. As a vice president of the HBPA, he battled through many political wars in the 1990s when the Thoroughbred industry in Ontario was struggling. Sam played a vital role in the construction of a dormitory at Woodbine to house backstretch workers and fought tirelessly for Fort Erie Racetrack, which is the annual site for the Prince of Wales S.–the second leg of the Canadian Triple Crown. Lima proudly wears a ring given to him for 25 years with the HBPA. He's been with the HBPA 46 years and said he is contemplating retirement after this season.

In its heyday, the Toronto Thoroughbred Racing Club took trips to various racetracks throughout North America and had regular meetings at a swanky Toronto hotel.

“We used to go all over the place and, you know what, we used to make money from the memberships and the trips,” Lima said with pride. “We used to go to the best restaurants.”

On Thursday night, at a posh celebration honoring the best in Canadian horse racing in 2017, Sam Lima will rightfully stand proud for all he has done and accept a richly deserved award.