SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – “Welcome,” esteemed race announcer and ceremony emcee Tom Durkin said, looking out at the crowd of current and incoming National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame members and fans gathered in the Humphrey S. Finney Pavilion, just down the street from Saratoga Race Course. “I don’t think I’ve ever said those words with such joy following last year’s, as Queen Elizabeth would say, ‘annus horribilis,’ ” Durkin said. In a stark contrast to the summer of 2020, when Saratoga raced without fans and the pavilion stood empty and silent, with the Hall of Fame induction ceremony and other events canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic, the building was bursting to the rafters with emotion on Friday morning. The Hall of Fame welcomed both its Class of 2020 and 2021 in a cathartic two-hour ceremony for the 10 total newcomers celebrating family, memories, and historic accomplishment. “Quite a daily double,” Durkin said of the two classes. The Class of 2021 for flat racing included a double of the sport’s all-time greats elected in their first year of eligibility, leading trainer Todd Pletcher and Triple Crown hero American Pharoah. Seven-time Eclipse Award winner Pletcher, 54, was a popular inductee in Saratoga, where he has 14 times been the leading trainer. The trainer received a sustained ovation from the semi-limited but enthusiastic crowd, the majority unmasked, as owner Mike Repole, who had introduced him for induction, helped him don his navy blue Hall of Fame blazer onstage. In a succinct acceptance speech, Pletcher paid homage to his family and to his mentor, now-fellow Hall of Fame trainer Wayne Lukas, who he worked under as an assistant. Pletcher said he is often asked about the most important thing he learned from Lukas. “The answer is there’s not one thing, it’s everything,” Pletcher said. “Everything matters, everyone matters, every horse matters.” Pletcher also paid tribute to Lukas’s son Jeff, who he worked under as his father’s top assistant until he was seriously injured in a backstretch accident in 1993. “I feel like no one has been more influential in the way that I try to conduct my business,” Pletcher said of Jeff Lukas, who died in 2016. “Jeff was a detail-oriented person, he was driven, he was motivated, he was a skilled horseman, and he had the unique ability to make those around him better. There’s no doubt in my mind that if he hadn’t had a tragic accident, then Jeff would have been inducted into the Hall of Fame years ago.” The ebullient Repole – who owned two of Pletcher’s 11 individual Eclipse winners, Uncle Mo and Vino Rosso – was less succinct as he introduced the great trainer. “I just got a text from NYRA. Post time will be 3 o’clock,” he joked as he launched into the speech that provided several moments of levity on an emotional day, but was serious in its depth. “We’ve gone from client to partner to friend to brother,” Repole said of Pletcher, emphasizing that their relationship has been built not only in success, but in adversity. He said that during Uncle Mo’s illness in 2011, which kept him out of the Kentucky Derby, both men worried about the colt, “and I worried about him and he worried about me. We were more worried about each other than we were for ourselves.” Repole also discussed the pair consoling one another following the death of the popular Caixa Eletronica in a training accident in 2014. American Pharoah broke a 37-year drought when he swept the 2015 Triple Crown, triggering an outpouring of emotion at Belmont Park. Owner and breeder Ahmed Zayat recalled that day in his acceptance speech, along with watching thousands of fans watching the colt gallop at Saratoga, and fans waving to his passing horse trailer in Lexington. The owner also noted fans wearing American Pharoah gear in the audience. “We all [know] American Pharoah, the racehorse,” Zayat said, “but I want to talk about American Pharoah, the people’s horse, the horse that excited fans. … There are memories that I will never forget of what American Pharoah meant to the sport and to the public.” Zayat thanked trainer Bob Baffert for opening his barn in order to allow as many fans as possible to interact with the kind-tempered colt, who is now a leading young sire for Coolmore’s Ashford Stud in Kentucky. Baffert, who continues to deal with the fallout from this spring’s Kentucky Derby positive test of Medina Spirit, was not among the Hall of Fame trainers who returned and were recognized at Friday’s ceremony, as a handful of demonstrators from animal-rights groups stood outside the building. Zayat, who filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy, is also a controversial figure in the sport. Another champion elected in his first year of eligibility was 2012 and 2013 Horse of the Year Wise Dan – although he had to wait a year for his induction ceremony after being elected in 2020. The gelding was owned and bred by Morton Fink, who died in November 2019. “My only regret is that Mr. Fink is not here,” trainer Charlie LoPresti said. “He was so proud of that horse. ... I think it put years on his life.” The gelded Wise Dan is living out his retirement at LoPresti’s farm in Lexington, Ky. “He touched the lives of a lot of people,” LoPresti said. “He was just an incredible athlete. Trainers look their whole life trying to have a horse like that.” LoPresti cleared his throat several times while speaking, visibly emotional. Even more emotional was trainer Mark Casse, who was also elected in 2020. “This is gonna be tough,” said Casse, 60, and already a Canadian Hall of Famer, after he was introduced by owner Aron Yagoda. “I have a better chance of winning the Kentucky Derby than I do of getting through this speech without losing my composure.” Indeed, Casse choked up several times, none more so than when he began to speak of the sacrifices his mother made in supporting his career. Casse’s wife, Tina, joined him onstage to read part of his speech when he was unable to speak, recounting when, at the time of his parents’ divorce, Casse asked his mother if he could live with his father, the late trainer Norman Casse, in order to continue pursuing the sport. Leading steeplechase trainer Jack Fisher was voted into the Hall of Fame by the committee for that sport. “To me, it’s all about the horses,” the trainer, 58, said. “I just try not to screw it up too bad.” The Hall of Fame’s historic review committee voted to elect racehorse Tom Bowling and jockey Darrel McHargue. Michael Veitch, chairman of the historic review committee, accepted for Tom Bowling, while a video tribute was played to recognize McHargue, who was not able to attend the ceremony. Durkin said a presentation of McHargue’s plaque would be made to him later this year in California. Joining the Hall of Fame’s Pillars of the Turf for their contributions to the sport were breeder, owner, and philanthropist Alice Headley Chandler, revered steward J. Keene Daingerfield Jr., and owner, breeder, and racing executive George D. Widener Jr., already a Hall of Fame Exemplar of Racing. Video tributes to Daingerfield and Widener were played at the ceremony. Meanwhile, the plaque for Chandler, who died in April, was accepted by her son, bloodstock agent Reynolds Bell. He was joined on the stage by Chandler’s husband, John Chandler, and her sons Headley Bell and Mike Bell. “Mom kept it pretty simple – take care of the horse, and the horse will take care of you,” Reynolds Bell said. “We heard that often growing up. Mom would be incredibly humbled by this award today, and would thank all the horses and people who made it possible.”