What a shocking denouement to California Chrome’s race for the Triple Crown. We speak not of his tied-for-fourth-place finish but of the bitter interview that one of the owners of the Coast colt, Steve Coburn, gave to the National Broadcasting Company, even before the victor, Tonalist, got to the winner’s circle. Mr. Coburn was upset that his colt was beaten by a horse that had not qualified for the Kentucky Derby or run in the Preakness.

It was an excruciating interview to watch. Mr. Coburn called the rules “not fair to these horses.” He favored an “all or nothing” Triple Crown. He complained that Chrome had a “target on his back” and called the entering into the Belmont of a horse that had not raced in both the Derby and the Preakness the “coward’s way out.” It seems that he would have preferred the diluted glory of a race that was easier to win.

Tonalist’s owner, asked about this as he received the trophy on live television, had the graciousness to decline to comment. And it is certainly true that none of the horses that finished ahead of Chrome in the Belmont had run both the Derby and the curves at Pimlico. But all these owners knew the rules when they entered the test of champions, as the mile-and-a-half of the Belmont is called. What signal does it send to our youth to start complaining about the rules at this stage of the game?

Particularly because California Chrome has such a magnificent story. His owners tried to embroider it with their own narrative as working individuals who by dint of their brains, guts, and luck got to the highest race of the sport of kings. He was “everybody’s horse,” someone said. The truth, though, is that the Triple Crown is not a contest of class but of character — and character not so much of the owners, though Secretariat’s Penny Chenery (who was there today) taught the world a thing or two about that. It is a test of the character of the horses.

And, oh, how the champions have it. We think of Whirlaway. What a whacky steed. His trainer, according to cardchronicle.com, once called him “crazy, stupid, ornery, nervous, and brilliant.” In one race, Whirlaway went to the outside rail, ran beside it the whole way, and still won. His trainer took to cutting off his inside blinder. Who could imagine that the rules would have been blamed by Whirlaway’s owner? Or Whirlaway himself? What a laugh.

We’ve always been struck by the ability of horses to remember. It has been said that Man o’ War screamed with rage when he was being broken and that the anger fueled his incredible will to dominate a race. Once, in the days when horses started at a tape rather than gates, he was facing in the wrong direction when the horses took off and finished second by a nose. He won another race by one hundred lengths.

It does a disservice to Tonalist and to Chrome to complain, ex post facto, about the rules. When halfway through the Belmont Secretariat started pulling away from Sham, the announcer couldn’t keep up with him. When that most glorious of all steeds thundered out of the final turn, he was 18 lengths in front. He gained another 13 lengths by the time he crossed the finished line. Secretariat knew what he was. He couldn’t have cared less about which of the nags behind him had run been at the Derby or the Preakness.