Regret

Regret was a famous American thoroughbred racehorse and the first of three fillies to ever win the Kentucky Derby.

Foaled at Harry Payne Whitney's Brookdale Farm in Lincroft, New Jersey, and sired by the 1913-1915 leading sire and National Museum of Racing and Hall of Famer Broomstick, (son of Ben Brush, also inducted into the Hall of Fame), and out of Jersey Lightning who goes back to the great Longfellow through his Kentucky Derby winning son, Riley), Regret was bred by owner Harry Payne Whitney.

Trained by James G. Rowe, Sr., in 1914 Regret became the first of only four horses to ever win all three Saratoga Race Course events for two-year-olds: the Saratoga Special Stakes, Sanford Stakes and Hopeful Stakes. Joining her would be Campfire (1916), Dehere (1993), and City Zip (2000). The following year, campaigning as a three-year-old, she won the 1915 Kentucky Derby. For her performances that season, Regret earned the most prestigious honor in racing, voted the Eclipse Award for Horse of the Year.

Regret was retired to the new Whitney farm in Lexington, Kentucky after the 1917 racing season. In this last season, she raced in the Brooklyn Handicap against the best of her generation: Old Rosebud, Roamer, Omar Khayyam (winner of the 1917 Kentucky Derby), Boots, Ormsdale and Chiclet. In the final strides, she was defeated by a nose by her stablemate, Borrow, giving away 5 pounds.

Ultimately a disappointment as a broodmare, she produced only one major stakes winner—Revenge—out of eleven foals.

She died in 1934, aged 22, and was buried at the Whitney farm in Lexington.

Regret was inducted into the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame in 1957. In the Blood-Horse magazine ranking of the top 100 U.S. thoroughbred champions of the 20th Century, she was #71. (Roamer ranks 99th, Old Rosebud, 88th.)

Career Record

Out of 11 starts in four seasons (1914-1917), Regret won nine, and placed second in one. The only race she was not placed in was the 1916 Saratoga Handicap. Throughout her career, she was never beaten by a female horse.

Of Interest

In a poll among members of the American Trainers Association, conducted in 1955 by Delaware Park Racetrack, Regret was voted the third greatest filly in American racing history. Gallorette was voted first.

1915 was the year of the Triple Crown filly as Rhine Maiden won the Preakness Stakes but Regret was not entered in the Preakness to challenge her. Not since 1915 has more than one Triple Crown race been won by a filly.