Reading List: The wait is over - American Pharoah wins the Triple Crown

Thirty-seven years, and they were worth the wait.

American Pharoah ended horse racing's drought Saturday, winning the 147th running of the Belmont Stakes to capture the Triple Crown, the first since Affirmed in 1978.

The result was never in doubt, American Pharoah leading wire-to-wire, winning by 5 1/2 lengths. Greatness.

Hours after history was made, the columns began rolling in. Read a sampling of the best below.

Sports Illustrated's Tim Layden writes poetically about June 6, the day the page horse racing was stuck on for so long finally turned:

And so in the long shadows of an early evening in the 37th June since the last, the last, the last—and my god, the last—at a venerable place where hope and desperation had so often melted into painful defeat, history finally let go. The moment unfolded as if from another time, asking a sport for trust that had been lost in too many defeats, too many disappointments, too many euphoric buildups that crashed in gutting failure and sent its loyal fans sulking into the darkness, unfulfilled. For so long, horse racing had been stuck on the same, yellowed page, so many times the Triple Crown had seemed at hand and so many times cruel reality dropped a hammer on old Belmont Park and so many times a generation and more was left without a legend of its own to pass along, left instead to live with musty recollections, growing more distant by the year.

It was a bay colt named American Pharoah, who finally set everybody free. At a few minutes before seven on Saturday night, he won the 147th running of the Belmont Stakes and became the 12th winner of racing’s Triple Crown (the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness Stakes and the Belmont Stakes), mercifully ending the drought that had held racing hostage since 1978, when Affirmed held off Alydar in the stretch at Belmont to win the third Triple Crown of the decade. Twelve horses had since won the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness, only to fail in the Belmont Stakes (a 13th, I’ll Have Another, won the first two legs but was scratched from the Belmont with an injury). Twelve horses had lost in every imaginable way, and some had begun to say that perhaps there would never be another Triple Crown at all.

All of that ended in dominance. ...

Read Layden's full column.

America's been through a lot since 1978 and the last Triple Crown, writes The New York Times' Joe Drape:

There had been only 11 of them in history, and America had elected five presidents, fought three wars and lived through at least three economic downturns since Affirmed had last completed the feat in 1978. In the interim, 12 other very good racehorses had pulled into the starting gate at this grand old racetrack on Long Island with a chance to become the next great horse, only to fall short at the hands of a great rival, as Sunday Silence did to Easy Goer in 1989 or as Real Quiet did in 1998 in a heartbreaking photo finish, or to find the mile-and-a-half distance of the Belmont Stakes just too much, as California Chrome did last year.

But as American Pharoah bounded into the stretch amid a deafening roar, the memories of the gritty Affirmed, the speedy Seattle Slew (1977) and that tremendous machine Secretariat (1973) were summoned from backside to grandstand, and rightfully so.

No one doubted that American Pharoah was about to enter the history books. He was bouncing down the lane as if jumping from one trampoline to another, and no one was going to catch him.

Read Drape's full column.

Yahoo Sports' Pat Forde counted the strides into the history books:

American Pharoah used 306 strides to enter thoroughbred racing immortality. ...

Three hundred six balletic, beautiful strides to detonate a celebratory roar that sounded more like Baton Rouge on an autumn Saturday night than a racetrack. To trigger a noise the likes of which the sport hadn't heard in how long? Maybe not since Secretariat himself set the bar for legendary brilliance here 42 years ago. ...

This is how moving horse racing can be. ...

Nobody who was here will forget it. ...

Believe it. American Pharoah, the newest equine immortal, made it happen in 306 magical strides.

Read Forde's full column.

ESPN's Ian O'Connor calls American Pharoah "the world's greatest athlete":

There he was parading about in the winner's circle, the world's greatest athlete, his muscles and veins bulging as if he were hooked up to some overheated generator about to explode.

American Pharoah was sweating profusely under a fading sun, huffing and puffing and flaring his nostrils for dramatic effect after conquering a mile-and-a-half test of character and will that had broken so many lesser horses before him.

The bay colt turned his head just so to shoot a bloodshot glance from his left eye at the unruly admirers fighting to take his picture. I was almost close enough to reach out and touch him, not that I would've ever dared. In the presence of greatness, I couldn't help but think this horse deserved to be written up on Steinbeck's laptop, or Hemingway's, and certainly not mine.

Read O'Connor's full column.