They are the keepers of the legend, the tellers of the tale. Four men, one woman. One living, four gone. It has been 50 years since Secretariat won the Triple Crown (the first in 25 years at the time; prelude to a longer drought that would commence just five years later) and passed into a singular racing afterlife with his ethereal Belmont.
The story stood tall in its own moment, deservedly and meaningfully; but it has since undergone that rarest of sports metastases: A moment already seen, forever becoming must-see.
Big Red, long interred in rich Kentucky earth after a career less than 16 months in length, has grown bigger. Because a woman stood strong.
Because a jockey sat just as strong. Because a race caller went for broke. Because a writer wrote. Because a photographer shot.