This Ones For Phil was in good shape -
until he ran a 21.72 second quarter
I bet TOFP and Theregoesjojo to win. SamePage and Quality Road and maybe even Taqarub were supposed to duel on a 21.72 1st quarter with Prado carefully keeping TOFP out of the pace duel,
but the rest is history...
Quality Road ran back to his debut race. He's a nice horse, he's better than War Pass was at this time last year, and Quality Road can actually press as well as lead.
Lets be honest - this was a good field, but it's not really what its hyped up to be as "One of the Best Derby Preps in ages...". Most of these horses aren't classic distance horses. It was a nice field of sprinters and milers coming together with a lot of big figures.
Maybe if you get some of the sprinters out of the way it could help a horse like Quality Road even more in the Florida Derby he gets to relax up front.
They ran all ran pretty well to form - the race tactics and pace scenario just didn't materialize the way you would expect.