Get Your Preak Off

[RolloTomasi]

Cox Offers Sackful of Limp Excuses for Skipping Preakness

Eclipse Award-winning trainer Brad Cox will not saddle a starter in the Preakness, he announced on Thursday. Derby runner-up Mandaloun and Grade 1 Arkansas Derby runner-up Caddo River had been under consideration for the second jewel of the Triple Crown.

What happened? Did they bring back the Jersey Derby with a $5 million purse or something?

Where else could you possibly run these horses?

Cox said Caddo River had not yet done enough training to pursue the Preakness after putting in a four-furlong work over a wet Churchill track in :48.80 on Monday. The Shortleaf Stable homebred will instead target the G3 Matt Winn Stakes there at the end of May.

Oh, I had forgotten about the Matt Winn.

Yeah, after missing a chance at finally winning the Derby, I’m sure John Ed Anthony will be satisfied with the consolation prize of winning the Matt Winn. So many horses have won that race to go on and lose a bunch of other races the rest of the year…

And I doubt he’d get a kick out of winning the Preakness again. Been there, done that.

In the case of Mandaloun, Cox said the degree of effort the colt put into his Derby placing was one of the considerations.

Yeah, I would prefer to run in the Preakness off a horrendous race where the horse made no kind of effort. It’s good punishment to wheel ‘em back in that scenario.

“He ran extremely well and hard [in the Derby],” said Cox. “To run him back in two weeks, we feel like it may compromise his ability to run the rest of the year and not only the rest of the year but maybe as an older horse. In the best interests of the horse we feel like to run him back in two weeks is just not the right thing for him.”

Well, yeah, if Cox was silly enough to win a classic race with the colt, I suppose he would compromise the horse’s ability to run as an older horse because they would probably retire him at the end of the year.

Actually, I think the sheer fact that the horse is by Into Mischief is enough to compromise his ability to run as an older horse if Juddmonte decides to start dispersing some of their stock.

Cox had already announced that Essential Quality would skip the Preakness and set sights on the G1 Travers. On Thursday he said he was still mapping out the big gray's route to the Travers, but the G2 Jim Dandy could set up as a possible prep.

Wait…how many days does it take to draw a map to the Travers?

In the last 30 years (ignoring 2020), only a handful of horses have won the Travers that did not start in either the Jim Dandy, Haskell, or Los Alamitos Derby (previously the Swaps at Hollywood).

Those were:
Arrogate - conditioned allowance
Catholic Boy - Belmont Derby
Code of Honor - Dwyer
Golden Ticket - conditioned allowance

So yeah, either (1) sit on him and run him off the bench, (2) run in the Dwyer and sit on him, or (3) run in one of the 2 glaringly obvious races which have accounted for not only the vast majority of Travers winners but probably over 95% of the placings as well down to 4th place.

Wait…now that I think about it, Los Alamitos should go full bore to entice Essential Quality out to California for the race. The Sheik’s entourage alone should double normal daily attendance (and they can stay for the Quarters!)

Even if Cox had three weeks between the Derby and the Preakness, he admitted he would still likely skip the race.

I sure wish he had made his Travers map earlier. Then maybe working backwards he could have skipped losing the Derby and instead waited for the Preakness.

“I don't think it's so much a question of whether you feel confident your horse will run well [in the Preakness]” said Cox. “I think it's the question of what happens after that; it's like going to Saudi Arabia or Dubai and coming back.

I can’t wrap my head around this.

In terms of distance, traveling between Kentucky and Maryland is not as grueling as shipping to the Arabian peninsula.

In terms of climate, the difference in weather between Kentucky and Maryland is not as radical as shipping to the Arabian peninsula.

Even in terms of urban crime, going from downtown Louisville to northwest Baltimore is not that much of a change. And don’t forget Mandaloun wintered in Mid-City New Orleans.

In this case you're talking about the effects of two grueling races in a short period of time that could take their toll. For these 3-year-olds we feel like to have them at their best on Travers Day, on Haskell Day we need to give them more time between races.

I know last year was all screwy, but the Triple Crown is still the Kentucky Derby, Preakness, and Belmont, right?

Did they switch it to the Derby, Haskell, and Travers or something?

Does that make the Discovery Stakes the new Travers?

“I just am not a big fan of running back in two weeks unless you win the Derby and your horse comes out of it well.”

Well, seeing how you have had so much success in the classics at this point, I’ll defer to you.

But the numbers seem to say otherwise. In the past 45 years:

8 Preakness winners did not start in the Derby in their prior start.

17 Preakness winners won the Derby in their prior start (including 4 TC winners).

and…you guessed it…

20 Preakness winners lost the Derby in their prior start.

Cox could not say yet whether he would send any runners to the Belmont.

Only 5 weeks in between and you have to run 12 furlongs? Fucl< that.

That’s like surviving an earthquake in Haiti, escaping the subsequent cholera outbreak by braving a voyage across the Caribbean on a migrant raft made of sheep bladders, reaching Honduras and outflanking CIA-funded death squads through anaconda-infested jungle, hitching a ride in Oaxaca with a coyote dude on the back of a turnip truck through cartel territory and miraculously reaching Tijuana, only to end up waking up in a bathtub full of ice after a night of partying in Zona Norte and finding out you’re missing a kidney…

“Honestly I'll just see how things play out in the Preakness and who's going to show up in the Belmont,” he said.

Does anyone really think that this dude’s Travers map is going to include the Belmont Stakes?

He might have a runner in the Dwyer if we are lucky…

[King Glorious]

The problem is not that Cox thinks this way (well, that is a problem, but that he’s not alone. So many have adapted this way of thinking that I almost fear that the Preakness is going to become a virtual walkover with no significant Derby also rans and a bunch of “new shooters” that have blanks in their guns. Then when there is no TC on the line, I feel like the Belmont Stakes is the dumbest race in America. It used to make sense when the Jockey Club Gold Cup was 12f so it was interesting to find out which 3yo could handle that distance and take on their elders in the fall. Now though, it’s not a Test of Champions. It’s a battle of attrition with a bunch of horses sired by sprinters and milers seeing who can survive at a distance they’ll likely never see again unless they switch to grass. Trainers don’t prepare for the TC anymore. They train only for the Derby and as much as I hate to say it, if you don’t win the Derby, the Preakness is not a good spot to return in. More likely than not, none of the horses has ever run back in two weeks in their career and to ask them to do so after what was probably their toughest race ever is a shock to their systems. I know that the argument will be that the high majority of those that win the Preakness are horses that exit the Derby (or the Oaks in the case of Rachel Alexandra) but I believe it has more to do with the lack of competition in the Preakness rather than a sign that running back that quick led to their repeat performance.

I think the best thing you said was pointing out the absolute hypocrisy in the statement, “best interest of the horse.” I hate it about 95% of the time I hear that. As if what’s in the horse’s best interests changed whether he won the Derby or lost by a neck.

[RolloTomasi]

Originally Posted by King Glorious

Trainers don’t prepare for the TC anymore. They train only for the Derby and as much as I hate to say it, if you don’t win the Derby, the Preakness is not a good spot to return in. More likely than not, none of the horses has ever run back in two weeks in their career and to ask them to do so after what was probably their toughest race ever is a shock to their systems. I know that the argument will be that the high majority of those that win the Preakness are horses that exit the Derby (or the Oaks in the case of Rachel Alexandra) but I believe it has more to do with the lack of competition in the Preakness rather than a sign that running back that quick led to their repeat performance.

This is poorly argued in the face of 37 of the last 45 Preakness winners having exited the Derby.

I can't recall more than a handful of those Preakness' being won in a landslide (Hansel, Funny Cide, Smarty Jones, Afleet Alex) and even then only the Funny Cide Preakness had a weak field devoid of any significant Derby runners (although Peace Rules was quite accomplished both before and after).

Meanwhile, since it is such a shock to the system for a horse to run back 2 weeks after the Derby, I figure history would be replete with tales of glory of uber-successful Derby also-rans that skipped the Preakness. But there aren't too many. Holy Bull (who won the Met Mile about a week after the Preakness), Lemon Drop Kid (who used the Peter Pan as a prep for the Belmont), and General Challenge (who utilized a now defunct 3yo stakes program at Hollywood Park to regroup from his Derby debacle) are all I could find as far as I looked. Maybe there have been a bunch in more recent years.

[freddymo]

FDA guidance on certain newly approved equine therapeutic drugs suggests more time required to get maximum benefit ... Have a heart, SCIENCE IS REAL

[joeydb]

I thought with the headline, there would be something like this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IIcyFSYhvV4