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Tale of two mighty mites: Ida Schultz and her namesake Miz Ida

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The real-life Miz Ida Schultz. Photos courtesy Stan Schultz

When the 3-year-old filly Miz Ida competes Saturday in Kentucky Downs’ $75,000 Kentucky Cup Ladies Turf, no one will cheer louder than a diminutive 85-year-old watching from 940 miles away.
If you’re at Gulfstream Park for simulcasting, you can’t miss Ida Schultz. Not only will she be hollering and giving the jockeys long-distance instructions, she’ll be the one attired in lime green, to match the lime green and black silks of Miz Ida’s owners: Bert, Elaine and Richard Klein of Louisville.
Bert and Elaine wanted to name a horse for their close friend, a Holocaust survivor whom they credit with giving Elaine advice that dramatically improved her health. It was by chance that Richard, who manages the racing and breeding operation he owns with his parents, chose as Ida Schultz’s namesake the first foal of May Gator, their former $30,000 claimer turned stakes-winner.
Now Miz Ida is 4 for 7, including capturing the Fair Grounds’ LaCombe Memorial and Indiana Downs’ $125,000 Indiana Distaff. Both Idas are tiny and possess sweet but feisty dispositions.
“I think there is something to be said that Ida’s positive attitude — even though the horse doesn’t know her — has carried over into the filly,” Richard Klein said. “There has to be some correlation between the horse’s name and Ida Schultz.”
When the tornado hit Churchill Downs on June 22 last year, the then-unraced Miz Ida was in one of the most damaged barns, with the roof ripping off.
“Miz Ida was in the stall at the very end where the whole thing flew off,” said Sue Margolis, wife of trainer Steve Margolis. “She was in the worst part. But there she stood (until rescued). They’re little survivors, both mighty mites. I don’t know how the Kleins knew to name that horse after her. It was the perfect horse.”
Ida Schultz was 12 in her native Poland when she and her family were sent to concentration camps. Moved to 17 different camps, including Auschwitz, she was the only one in her family to survive.
Though 17, she said she weighed just 65 pounds when liberated in 1945 by General Dwight Eisenhower’s Ninth Army. Five years later, she moved to America.
Schultz, an avowed lover of animals and people, says she concentrates on positive thoughts, but acknowledged, “Sometimes (things) bring it back, and it’s hard.”
For instance, just seeing a police officer can instill terror.
“I get very frightened,” she said. “I tell my husband, ‘Please don’t speed. If the cop stops us, I’m going to die.’ Because I see something else in front of me… It’s a horrible thing.”
Stanley Schultz doesn’t think it’s a coincidence that a horse named for his wife of 52 years would turn out so well.

Above: Ida and Stan Schultz in front of the Kentucky Derby Museum

“She’s lucky just being alive and talking to you,” he said by phone. “Ida is a very charming lady. Everybody likes her, and some of us love her. She creates good vibes wherever she is. We root for every horse Bert and Elaine run. But this horse is a special one for us. She’s a little small, but she runs her heart out.”
Ida Schultz has not been able to attend any of Miz Ida’s races in person, but she has met her namesake at Margolis’ stable when visiting the Kleins. Watching her races from afar, she apparently works as hard as the filly.
“She instructs the jockey how to win the race,” Stanley Schultz said with a laugh. “… She gets pretty nervous, too. When the horse paid $24 three races back… she started yelling and screaming. Everybody’s looking at her. She goes, ‘That’s my horse! That’s me! That’s Miz Ida!’ … She ran the whole race with her.”
Schultz became a racing fan through Stanley, the couple regularly going to the tracks in New York before retiring to Florida and moving near Gulfstream Park. She met the Kleins at the track about 10 years ago.
“You know how you see somebody and it gives you that feeling like a touch on the heart?” Schultz said. “I love those people. I would give my last drop of blood for them.”
Ida Schultz never met a stranger, at least at the track, where the jockeys call her Mama. She speaks to Gulfstream owner Frank Stronach (an Austrian native) in German and counts trainer Todd Pletcher among her friends, telling a reporter, “Ask him about the lady with the number on her arm; he’ll know.
“He told me I’m his guardian angel. We were standing at Aqueduct, freezing in February, and he couldn’t get a winner (when he first started training). I told him, ‘Todd, look at me. Mark my words, kiddo, you’ll be No. 1.’”
But it’s the Kleins around whom she bases her wardrobe. When Elaine Klein told her they’d named a filly Miz Ida, Schultz said, “Oh, I went bananas. I was so happy.”
So the original Miz Ida will be at Gulfstream to watch the Kentucky Cup Ladies Turf.
“Are you kidding?” she said. “Sure. And I’ll be dressed in lime color, believe me.”


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