On March 1, Linda's Chief, trained by Robert Frankel, had established himself credibly with a track-record time of 1:33 4/5 in winning the mile San Jacinto Stakes.

These two met for the first time March 17 in the 11⁄16 mile San Felipe Handicap, with Linda's Chief taking the win and Sham, the slight favorite, finishing fourth.

The Frank Martin entry of Sham, ridden by Laffit Pincay Jr., and the lesser regarded stablemate, California Juvenile stakes winner Knightly Dawn, was the post-time 5:2 second choice.

Sham won the race, equaling the stakes record of 1:47 established in 1965 by Lucky Debonair, with Linda's Chief in second place 21⁄2 lengths back.

The Wood Memorial, contested April 21 as the final New York prep to the Kentucky Derby, established Sham as a formidable rival to Secretariat.

Before 134,476 fans, the largest crowd to see a horse race in the United States to that date, Sham ripped two teeth out on the starting gate at the Kentucky Derby.

Although bleeding from the start, Sham finished second behind Secretariat, who came away with a 21⁄2 length victory running 1:592⁄5 for the 11⁄4 miles, the first horse to break two minutes in the Kentucky Derby.

When asked about the effect of Sham's start, Laffit Pincay said, "It's difficult to see how he could have run much better than almost 1:594⁄5, and yet, logically, hitting his head on the gate and losing the teeth couldn't have helped him."

Considering the terminal velocity of the horses and the distance between them in lengths, Phil Dandrea estimates the gap between Secretariat and Sham at 0.348 seconds.

With a Maryland racing record audience of 61,653 looking on, Secretariat defeated Sham for the second time in two weeks in the 98th running of the Grade 1 Preakness Stakes.

Pushing a blistering race-record pace, the pair was approximately a dozen lengths ahead of the pack when Secretariat began to pull away, as track announcer Chick Anderson described, "like a tremendous machine."