Palace Malice
 

Pretty good decisions, to add blinkers and then to work him 4f in :47+...

Pretty good criticism after the fact... :rolleyes:

Nice roll eyes, make sure they don't fall down and out of your empty skull.

:D

Hey, to be fair here, you strung out the bait, I just took it.

Blinkers are a huge early speed enhancer ... that's why about 90% of horses at 2-year-old in training sales use them in their under-tack drills. And every year there are more and more horses wearing them at 2yo sales.

Even with the addition of the blinkers, I had no idea Palace Malice was capable of that kind of breakaway speed. He set the 4th fastest pace in Kentucky Derby history, and he did it willingly.

Anytime you see a race where the opening half mile was 45.33 and the final half mile was 53.09 ... it's an extremely safe bet that closers dominated it.

John Velazquez had a brutal week. The huge Dreaming of Julia debacle, and both Wise Dan and Orb won the two big races today without him.

I thought blinkers on would make him pay attention, stay focused. Thought it was a good decision, just didn't work out.

It did.

He was hyper focused.

He showed that he had some tactical speed, but man, no way I expected him to be on the lead like that, even with the blinkers. I was thinking that even Oxbow would be gunning it like that. I was thinking that he was freaking in the mud with the way he was setting those fractions