Always Dreaming rewards many with Kentucky Derby victory

Their record for wins as a jockey-trainer combination substantiate that definition.

After two days of intermittent rain, the track was sloppy with a great deal of surface water visible. When the leader faded, Always Dreaming assumed the lead by a head at the 3/4 pole and widened it out from there. I was a little anxious down the back side, but I could tell Johnny was riding him confidently. “On the turn I asked him and he didn’t really respond, but then he surprised me and kept on after the victor”, said Prat.

The 49-year-old watched his 1-for-45 record, a mark that avoid a goose egg because of Super Saver in 2010, morph into the most handsome 2-for-48 in the history of obscure statistics. Calvin Borel was aboard that day. Always Dreaming won that by 4 lengths. His first came astride Animal Kingdom in 2011 for trainer Graham Motion.

This story has been corrected to show that trainer Todd Pletcher is not in the racing hall of fame.

So, in the paddock Saturday, Pletcher gave Velazquez a leg up on Always Dreaming, assisting his old friend just as he had 20-some years ago on an affordable claiming horse.

So has Velasquez, whose Derby record was a modest 1-for-18. From the time the victor of the Florida Derby arrived at Churchill Downs 12 days before the race, he was full of energy and ready to run.

Always Dreaming provided trainer Todd Pletcher with his second career Derby win in 48 attempts.

Saeed bin Suroor, who was at Churchill Downs, insisted he would get to the bottom of the problem.

Always Dreaming paid $11.40, $7.20, $5.80 for a $2 bet.

Lookin At Lee finished in second place, and Battle of Midway rounded out the top three.

Lookin at Lee held on for second, which was odd because the colt was 33-to-1.

Thunder Snow eased • UAE Derby victor Thunder Snow bucked out of the starting gate and immediately was pulled up by jockey Christophe Soumillon in the opening moments of the Derby.

When Always Dreaming unloaded at Churchill, Pletcher felt the dark bay colt was too wound up too soon. The third-place finisher in the Florida Derby earns 20 points, and the lowest Kentucky Derby qualifier had 30.

Bob Baffert, winning trainer of the Kentucky Oaks on Friday, and 3-time victor of the Derby was the trainer of Always Dreaming’s sire, Bodemeister.

Thunder Snow was away slowly and nearly immediately dropped to the tail of the field, and when jockey Christophe Soumillon threw the reins at him to try to urge his mount into the race, Thunder Snow bucked several times and quickly was pulled up. The colt walked off the track without apparent injury. Immediately upon straightening away, he gave the colt the signal, hitting him with the whip once left-handed and with the right hand twice.

Not Classic Empire. He was the morning line favorite, but he had to rally from 12th to finish fourth. And he had done it after arriving in Churchill Downs and pretty much indicating he felt ready to go right away, a matter that did stoke some concern around the barn, as Pletcher switched exercise riders among other tweaks. Despite being the favorite, this was a race where it was seen as anyone can win. This one we hadn’t, and this is the one we wanted to win together.

The day’s surprise, at least statistically, was that Pletcher-trained horse survived the traffic and tension. Needless to say, the word dream was quite popular among them.

None of the other come-from-behind horses challenged the top three. “I said to myself I’m about to win the Kentucky Derby“, he said.

Arkansas Derby victor Classic Empire, last year’s 2-year-old champion, got up for fourth. The second part of our exacta box, Girvin, was 13th.

The swarm’s picks for second and third-McCracken and Irish War Cry-finished eighth and tenth, respectively.