Justify looks to prove talent trumps curses in Kentucky Derby

Like Justify, Bodemeister didn’t race as a 2-year-old.

“We have a good enough horse that can win it, but it’s a very competitive race”, Baffert said. But the big field effects every horse in the race, and winning the Kentucky Derby with relatively few starts under a horse’s belt is not that uncommon an occurrence.

Good Magic is another name to keep in mind out of the sixth slot next to Audible, an Eclipse Award-winning colt.

Later this year, Pletcher, 50, will send out his 20,000th starter. Always Dreaming won the race from the fifth stall.

Derby is that one day out of the year where what might be considered fashion don’ts are perfectly acceptable. The bar is just set so high. So far in 2018, he is undefeated in two starts, having won the Listed Patton Stakes at Dundalk in Ireland prior to the UAE Derby.

Good Magic has some big wins, capturing the Breeders Cup Juvenile and Blue Grass Stakes.

Previous year he had Sonneteer in the Kentucky Derby, a horse that finished in the 16th spot. “Whether it happens this year or whatever, but it will happen because Bodemeister nearly got away with it”.

There’s also plenty of uncertainty surrounding the colt, starting with the staff. Trainer Aidan O’Brien has never placed in the Kentucky Derby.

The man who told us not to ever pick a white-haired horse to win any race. was none other than a 2005 Kentucky Derby trifecta victor. The message was clear that Vino Rosso didn’t like Tampa Bay. “Our last party we went through five bottles of bourbon”, she said.

The pace of the Kentucky Derby also fits nicely with the narrative that longshots have a chance to disrupt trifectas and superfectas down the home stretch. For this bet to win, Justify and Bolt d’Oro must finish first and second – in either order – and Audible, Free Drop Billy, My Boy Jack, Hofburg, or Solomini must finish third.

Pletcher, a two-time Derby victor trying to become the first trainer in 20 years to win consecutive Derbies, sends out the aforementioned potent foursome of Audible, Magnum Moon, Noble Indy and Vino Rosso, all winners of major preps in their most recent races.

“The Apollo curse is something I don’t even think about and it’s something that’ll be broken, whether it’s this year or another year”.

Twenty horses will meet on the track at Churchill Downs for the Kentucky Derby on Saturday. He won his first start this year as a three-year-old.

Mendelssohn will try to become the first European-based horse to win the Kentucky Derb on Saturday.

“It’s great, you know”, jockey Florent Geroux said.

He might have the right horse.

The Bob Baffert trainee won’t have it easy as he faces what is arguably one of the saltiest fields in Derby history. “Back in the day, people used to run their horses much earlier. We train them throughout the winter, then they are sent to the various trainers around the country in May and June of their two-year-old year”.

“Churchill Downs race 12, $2 trifecta, 7 and 11 with 7, 11 with 2, 5, 9, 10, 17”. “They run with everything they have”.