Preakness | Horse Racing Free Tips

Asmussen’s Preakness Trio: Pneumatic ‘Doing Extremely Well,’ Max Player Showing Good ‘Energy’

Steve Asmussen's trio of Preakness contenders each had the easy half-mile workout Monday that is typical for the Hall of Fame trainer's horses five days before a race.

Winchell Thoroughbreds' Pneumatic, winner of Monmouth Park's Pegasus Stakes in his last start after finishing fourth in the Belmont Stakes (G1), worked a half-mile in 50.20 seconds over the Oklahoma training track at Saratoga. Max Player and Excession each were timed in 49.80 seconds at Churchill Downs.

“It's what we asked for, and they handled it really well,” Asmussen said of the three colts. “Pneumatic is doing extremely well since his win in the Pegasus. We're excited about getting him the opportunity at this level.”

Pneumatic drew Preakness Post No. 10 Monday.

“He had an outside draw in the Pegasus, a little bit shorter field, but an outside draw nonetheless,” Asmussen said. “Joe (Bravo) worked out a really good trip and hopefully he can do the same.”

Max Player, owned George Hall and SportBLX Thoroughbreds, will make his second start for Asmussen, having finished fifth in the Kentucky Derby. Max Player was third in both the Belmont Stakes and Travers when trained by Linda Rice.

Asmussen termed the work “a little leg-stretch,” adding, “I like his energy.”

Max Player drew Post No. 8 for his Preakness start.

“I think that's an excellent draw. I think he'll be able to stay a little closer from there,” Asmussen said. “Very anxious to see how he runs.”

Calumet Farms Excession will be making his first start since he was a fast-closing second at 82-1 odds behind the well-regarded Nadal in Oaklawn Park's Grade 2 Rebel Stakes on March 14. Excession will break on the rail, which Asmussen called “perfect.”

“He can follow the fence and make his late run,” he said.

Asmussen is shooting for his third victory in the Preakness, following Horses of the Year Curlin in 2007 and the filly Rachel Alexandra in 2009.

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Drury: Art Collector’s Versatile Style Will Be A Major Advantage In Preakness Stakes

Tommy Drury didn't get much sleep on Monday night of Kentucky Derby week. The trainer of one of the top Derby contenders, Art Collector, had found a decent-sized cut on the back of the colt's right front hoof, apparently suffered during his Monday morning gallop.

Drury and owner/breeder Bruce Lunsford faced a difficult decision. The colt's hoof was sensitive to the touch, and neither man wanted to subject the horse to the stress of the Run for the Roses unless he was 100 percent. Still, it would have been the first starter in the Kentucky Derby for both Drury and Lunsford, and making the decision to walk away from what could be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity was challenging.

“It was certainly difficult,” Drury said on an NTRA teleconference this Monday. “The Derby is a race of a lifetime for a horse trainer. At end of day, the responsibility we have is to put the horse first. It would not have been fair to lead him over there knowing there was an issue going on. It was a no-brainer. We want our horse to be good for the long haul, not just one race.”

Instead, Art Collector will be the 5-2 second choice in this Saturday's Preakness Stakes at Pimlico. He'll face a field of 11, including Kentucky Derby winner Authentic (9-5 favorite) and Kentucky Oaks runner-up Swiss Skydiver (6-1).

Art Collector, a 3-year-old son of Bernardini, won the G2 Blue Grass Stakes at Keeneland in July. He stalked the pace in that race, then won the Ellis Park Derby with a solid frontrunning display. That versatility in tactics gives Drury a bit of confidence heading into the Preakness Stakes.

“He has a little stop and go to him,” Drury explained, adding that jockey Brian Hernandez, Jr. is very familiar with Art Collector's style. “You can use him and get him going again if you need to. In a race like this, that can be beneficial.”

The post position, three, won't be an issue for Art Collector either, Drury said. The colt is quick enough to get out of the gate and near the lead, and tactical enough for Hernandez to be able to take back off the pace if others decide to go.

No matter what happens this Saturday, Drury is looking forward to the future with Art Collector. This year, the Breeders' Cup Classic is the likely next stop on the colt's schedule, and Drury will also look for Art Collector to return as a 4-year-old.

“Art Collector is a very special horse to us,” summarized Drury. “He has taken my career to places I've never dreamed it would go. I've not had anything like him ever before.”

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‘You Always Have That Dream’: Calhoun Looking Forward To Saddling Mr. Big News In Preakness

Bret Calhoun has accrued 3,192 victories and $86 million in purse earnings – both ranking 28th all-time in North America – in 26 years of training horses. The 56-year-old Texas product has won 42 graded stakes and 302 stakes overall.

But showing how difficult it is for the overwhelming majority of horsemen to even get a horse to the Triple Crown, Calhoun only last year had his first Kentucky Derby (G1) starter in Chester Thomas' By My Standards. This year he and Thomas had their second Derby starter in Mr. Big News, whose rallying third now is giving the men their first horse in the Preakness Stakes (G1).

“It's exciting. You always have that dream to have a Triple Crown horse,” said Calhoun, whose large stable is a force in Kentucky, Texas and Louisiana. “The horses that I've had the opportunity to train for years haven't necessarily been 3-year-old classic types as far as pedigree or conformation, really. I always would have loved to have competed in the classics but never thought it was realistic until here recently when we got just a little bit better caliber of horses that had talent and could develop into that kind of a horse.”

The like-minded Thomas appreciated Calhoun's work with 2-year-olds and began sending him horses a few years ago at the same time he was going to the sales to upgrade his stock. Another major client, Texan Tom Durant, was doing the same.

“Obviously it gives you a little bounce in your step to know you have those kinds of horses in your barn,” Calhoun said at Churchill Downs.

The son of a Texas school teacher who also owned and trained horses, Calhoun opened his own stable in 1994. His first graded-stakes score came in 2003 with Toby Keith's Cactus Ridge in Chicago's Arlington-Washington Futurity (G3).

A critical career move came in 2007 when Calhoun began a Churchill Downs-based division in Louisville for spring, summer and fall. Three years later, he won a pair of Breeders' Cup races with Chamberlain Bridge in the $1 million Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint (G1) and Dubai Majesty in the $1 million Filly & Mare Sprint (G1) on her way to the female sprinter championship.

Finding the right 2-year-old to join the Triple Crown trail the next spring proved more elusive.

When By My Standards won the Louisiana Derby (G2) at 22-1 odds off a maiden victory, it was Calhoun's biggest victory with a 3-year-old. The Kentucky Derby didn't turn out well, an 11th-place finish in a roughly run race played out over a horribly muddy track, but By My Standards has emerged among this season's top older horses. When By My Standards got a break after the Derby last year, Calhoun and Thomas' Mr. Money picked up the slack by reeling off four graded-stakes victories.

Thomas, the Madisonville, Ky., entrepreneur who races in the name of Allied Racing, looked like he had several promising 3-year-olds in the spring. Others seemed more advanced, but Calhoun and Thomas believed the Giant's Causeway colt would thrive at the longer distances.

Mr. Big News finished fifth behind stablemate Mailman Money's fourth in a division of the Fair Grounds' Risen Star (G2). In only his third start, Mailman Money lost by only 2 1/4 lengths with a wide trip.

When it came time to enter the $1 million Louisiana Derby, staged right after COVID-19 began shutting everything down, Mailman Money got in the race and Mr. Big News landed on the also-eligible list, needing a scratch to run.

“We felt (Mailman Money) deserved to run, but honestly we were desperate to run Mr. Big News because he was doing so, so well,” Calhoun said. “At the last minute we decided to run Mailman Money and not Mr. Big News. And of course Mailman Money didn't run well that day and Mr. Big News worked incredible that next day. I was just sick that I didn't run him.”

With Keeneland canceling its spring meet and options shrinking, Mr. Big News was sent to Arkansas for the $200,000 Oaklawn Stakes, which offered a fees-paid spot in the Preakness Stakes to the winner. That non-graded race on April 11 was positioned on what normally would have been the Arkansas Derby, which was moved to the first Saturday in May after the Kentucky Derby was delayed until Sept. 5.

“Things are a little backward this year,” Calhoun said. “It's interesting because Mr. Big News won a stakes at Oaklawn that won a berth into the Preakness. At that point in time, I don't think we even knew when the Preakness was going to be run. We didn't know if this horse was going to be that caliber or not. Typical situation, improving 3-year-old, and here we are running Oct. 3 and he's moved forward, improved and taken us there.”

Albeit not directly. A sixth in Keeneland's Toyota Blue Grass (G2) rescheduled for July 11 seemed to derail Mr. Big News' Derby hopes. The new Plan B was to run on the new Derby Day, but in the Grade 2 American Turf.

“The Blue Grass was supposed to be his litmus test to figure out if he belonged with the upper echelon of the 3-year-olds,” Calhoun said. “Gabe (jockey Gabriel Saez, who was serving a suspension) wasn't able to ride him that day. Mitchell Murrill rode him well but didn't give him the type of trip that he prefers.

“We did get a little bit discouraged about moving on to the Derby, but we weren't discouraged with him. We thought it would be a safer play to take a little bit of a lower road. Lo and behold, the Derby doesn't overfill, gives us an opportunity to run. We were very confident in him getting a mile and a quarter. So we took our shot and it worked out well.”

Calhoun is realistic about the Preakness and making up 3 1/4 lengths on Kentucky Derby winner Authentic — as well as impressive Blue Grass winner Art Collector, who missed the Derby with a foot issue.

“We've got to be better, honestly,” Calhoun said. “We've got to improve, and Authentic has to either regress a little bit or have some kind of trip that's unfavorable to him and favorable for me. He was very impressive Derby Day. He earned it. He set hot fractions and finished up well. So there's a margin there that we're going to have to find a little more horse.”

Still, he says Mr. Big News has given him “every indication” that the colt is doing as well as he was heading into the Derby. And if Mr. Big News makes headlines in the Preakness?

“That's just another step forward in your career, kind of the pinnacle,” Calhoun said. “It's what I think every trainer and owner in this business strives for, a Triple Crown victory.”

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Authentic Draws Post Nine; 11 Entered In 2020 Preakness Stakes

Kentucky Derby winner Authentic will be the 9-5 morning-line favorite in Saturday's Grade 1 Preakness Stakes at Pimlico, and drew post nine of 11 in the 1 3/16-mile contest. Hall of Famers John Velazquez and Bob Baffert will team up again to try to win two of three legs of this unique 2020 edition of the Triple Crown.

Second choice on the morning line at 5-2 will be Blue Grass Stakes winner Art Collector, who missed the Kentucky Derby with a minor cut to his hoof suffered on Monday of Derby week. The talented colt is fully healed, according to trainer Tommy Drury, and will break from post position three under regular jockey Brian Hernandez, Jr.

Trainer Ken McPeek will send out the Kentucky Oaks runner-up Swiss Skydiver from post position four in the Preakness Stakes, and the filly will get a new pilot in jockey Robby Albarado. She was tabbed at 6-1 on the morning line.

Baffert will also enter Kentucky Derby late scratch Thousand Words, who flipped over in the paddock and broke the wrist of assistant trainer Jimmy Barnes. The difficult colt will be ridden by Florent Geroux from post position five, and is 6-1 on the morning line.

Kentucky Derby runner-up Tiz the Law decided to skip the Preakness, but third-place finisher Mr. Big News will enter the classic for trainer Bret Calhoun. The late-running colt will break from post two and is 12-1 on the morning line.

Additionally, trainer Steve Asmussen will send out three entrants in the 2020 Preakness Stakes: Excession (Post 1, 30-1), Max Player (Post 8, 15-1), and Pnuematic (Post 10, 20-1).

The full field, with jockey, trainer, and morning-line odds, is as follows:

Excession – Sheldon Russell – Steve Asmussen (30-1)
Mr. Big News – Gabriel Saez – Bret Calhoun (12-1)
Art Collector – Brian Hernandez, Jr. – Tommy Drury (5-2)
Swiss Skydiver – Robby Albarado – Ken McPeek (6-1)
Thousand Words – Florent Geroux – Bob Baffert (6-1)
Jesus' Team – Jevian Toldeo – Jose D'Angelo (30-1)
Ny Traffic – Horacio Karamanos – Saffie Joseph, Jr. (15-1)
Max Player – Paco Lopez – Steve Asmussen (15-1)
Authentic – John Velazquez – Bob Baffert (9-5)
Pneumatic – Joe Bravo – Steve Asmussen (20-1)
Liveyourbeastlife – Trevor McCarthy – Jorge Abreu (30-1)

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