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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Wednesday, May 20, 2009

This date in sports history: 1978 — Triple Crown winner Affirmed wins Preakness by neck


Associated Press

May 20

1900 — The second modern Olympic games open in Paris.

1919 — Babe Ruth of the Boston Red Sox wins a game on the mound and at the plate as he hits his first career grand slam to beat the St. Louis Browns 6-4.

1941 — Ten days after his Preakness victory, Whirlaway races against older horses for the first time and defeats four rivals in the Henry of Navarre Purse at Belmont Park in New York.

1950 — Heavily favored Hill Prince, ridden by Bill Boland, wins the Preakness Stakes by five lengths over Middleground.

1967 — Damascus, ridden by Willie Shoemaker, wins the Preakness Stakes by 2¼ lengths over In Reality.

1972 — Bee Bee Bee, a 19-1 long shot ridden by Eldon Nelson, wins the Preakness Stakes by 1½ lengths over No Le Hace.

1978 — Affirmed, ridden by Steve Cauthen, continues the battle with Alydar and wins the Preakness Stakes by a neck.

1990 — Monica Seles ends Steffi Graf's 66-match winning streak and takes the German Open with a 6-4, 6-3 victory. Graf's streak is the second longest in the modern era of tennis. Martina Navratilova won 74 straight matches in 1984.

1990 — The 18th triple dead heat in modern thoroughbred history takes place in the ninth race at Arlington International Racecourse. All Worked Up, Marshua's Affair and Survival are timed in 1:24 4-5 over seven furlongs.

1999 — Robin Ventura becomes the first major leaguer to hit grand slams in both games of a doubleheader, leading the New York Mets to a sweep over Milwaukee, 11-10 and 10-1.

2001 — Barry Bonds hits two homers in San Francisco's 11-6 loss to the Atlanta Braves, for a total of five in two games, making him the 23rd player in history to do so.

2005 — Nextel Cup rookie Kyle Busch becomes the youngest winner in Craftsman Truck Series history, holding off Terry Cook and Ted Musgrave in a three-lap closing sprint at the Quaker Steak & Lube 200.

2006 — Kentucky Derby winner Barbaro breaks down at the start of the Preakness, galloping a few hundred yards while his eight rivals pass him. Bernardini wins the $1 million race, beating Sweetnorthernsaint by 5¼ lengths.

2007 — Roger Federer ends Rafael Nadal's 81-match winning streak on clay with a 2-6, 6-2, 6-0 win in the final of the Hamburg Masters. It's Federer's first clay-court title in two years. Nadal, ranked No. 2 in the world behind Federer, had been unbeaten on the surface since April 2005, a run that included 13 titles.