The Week in Review | Horse Racing Free Tips

The Week in Review: McPeek is Different, And That’s Why He’s Successful

The book on training the modern racehorse goes something this: Give them at least six weeks off between races, start them no more than five times a year and never take a chance. It's a book that, apparently, Ken McPeek has never read.

Among top-tier trainers, there is no one like him. He'll run fillies against the boys, run back in a week and he's not afraid to throw a 50-1 bomb into a race or, in the case of 2022 GI Belmont S. winner Sarava (Wild Again), a 70-1 shot. It hurts his winning percentage, which is at 17% on the year. But McPeek doesn't seem to care. His job is to make money for his owners, and he understands that the more chances he gives his horses, the more money his clients are likely to make.

McPeek dipped into his bag of tracks Saturday when he entered Classic Causeway (Giant's Causeway) in the Caesars Belmont Derby Invitational, a decision that led to a Grade I win in a $1-million race.

The colt had shown a lot of promise early in his career and was among the top contenders for the GI Kentucky Derby after winning the GII Tampa Bay Derby. Then trained by Brian Lynch, Classic Causeway went off form and finished eleventh in the GI Florida Derby and eleventh again in the GI Kentucky Derby. The owners made a move after the Kentucky Derby and turned the horse over to McPeek. In his first start for McPeek, he ran third in the GIII Ohio Derby, a sign that maybe he was about to come around.

That might have set him up for some of the big dirt stakes coming up for 3-year-olds. Instead, McPeek targeted the Belmont Derby. Never mind that Classic Causeway would have to come back in two weeks or that he had never run on the grass. It was a $1-million race, and McPeek decided to take a shot, something few other trainers would have done with this horse.

It didn't hurt that Classic Causeway was the recipient of a lucky break. Emmanuel (More Than Ready) was not only a top contender in the race but the clear speed. But he was scratched by the stewards for reasons that remain unclear. The New York Gaming Commission tweeted the following: “The Commission Steward has ordered the scratch of Emmanuel, scheduled to run in today's Belmont Derby, due to issues relating to veterinary records. The matter remains under review.”

With Emmanuel out, Classic Causeway was the only speed in the race. Jockey Julien Leparoux picked up on that and put in a heads-up ride. Classic Causeway led by a length after a half-mile had been run in :48 and, from there, they couldn't catch him.

McPeek's aggressive handling of horses was also on display at Horseshoe Indianapolis, where he had a good showing Saturday. He got a win in the $100,000 Mari Hulman George S. with Semble Juste (Ire) (Shalaa {Ire}), who was coming back in nine days after winning an allowance at Churchill. In the GIII Indiana Oaks, he ran Runaway Wife (Gun Runner) off an eight-day layoff and Silverleaf (Speightster) off a nine-day layoff. Runaway Wife finished second and Silverleaf was third. McPeek also ran Rattle N Roll (Connect) in the GIII Indiana Derby, just a week after he won the American Derby. He finished seventh.

On Saturday, McPeek also won the GIII Iowa Oaks with Butterbean (Klimt). She was coming back in 28 days, by McPeek standards a long layoff.

The only horse he ran all day that had more than four weeks off was Tiz The Bomb (Hit It a Bomb), who was making his first start since the May Kentucky Derby in the Belmont Derby. He finished ninth.

On the day, McPeek ran horses in five different races, all of them stakes. He won two and had two others, both fillies, finish in the money and pick up black type. Among that group, everyone was running back in 28 days or less. That just doesn't happen anymore.

A Record-Breaking Belmont Meet For Chad Brown

Chad Brown winning a training title at the NYRA tracks is no longer big news, but what Brown accomplished at the Belmont meet that ended Sunday was historic.

With 153 starters, he won 47 races, setting a new record for most wins by a trainer at the Belmont spring-summer meet. The old record was 44, set by David Jacobson in 2013. But Jacobson compiled those numbers during a year in which the meet ran for 56 days. This year's meet ran for 44 days.

Twelve of Brown's winners came in graded stakes races and four were in Grade I's. He won 14 stakes overall. He won 27 turf races and 20 on the dirt. But his winning percentage on the turf was 26%, while he won with 41% of his dirt starters.

More Small Fields

They could only find five horses to run in the GII Suburban S. Saturday out at Belmont–a race that has been won by Easy Goer, Dr. Fager, Forego, Buckpasser, Kelso, Bold Ruler–and one came from the barn of the racing secretary's best friend, Uriah St. Lewis. The winner, Dynamic One (Union Rags), had never before won a graded stakes.

Between the June 11 GI Metropolitan H. and the GI Woodward S., likely to be run this year on Oct. 1, NYRA will offer five graded stakes for males on the dirt. (The other two are the GI Whitney S. and the GI Jockey Club Gold Cup). Please don't try to tell me this isn't a problem.

Juan Vazquez and the Pennsylvania Racing Commission

For years, the Pennsylvania Racing Commission seemed like a do-nothing organization run by bureaucrats who had better things to do than to truly police the sort. But it looks like that has changed.

Juan Vazquez, who has a long and troubling history of breaking the rules, shipped a horse in January from Belmont to Parx. The horse, Shining Colors (Paynter), arrived in such bad shape that she had to be euthanized due to what the stewards said was a case of severe laminitis. Vazquez was suspended for 2 1/2 years Friday, and the stewards called his actions “grossly negligent, cruel and abusive.”

This was not your typical slap on the wrist, but a penalty that fit the crime. Obviously, the racing commission has had enough of Vazquez's flouting the rules and it brought its hammer down on a trainer who should have been thrown out of the game years ago.

He is eligible to return on Jan. 26, 2025. Will someone–a racing commission, a track?–let him race at that time? One would hope that the sport can show enough backbone that Vazquez will never participate again. Just don't count on it.

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Letter to the Editor: Terence Collier

However the TDN looks upon itself introspectively, the daily readership of its North American content can probably deduce that without advertising revenues from the Thoroughbred breeding industry, it would be difficult for its publishers to put out such an excellent and comprehensive daily edition. The lead article in June 27th's issue by Bill Finley–“Do we really need so many stakes races?”–obviously comes from the writer's perspective more concerned with payoffs from exactas and trifectas than the majority of the TDN's readers.

Bill says, “The problem is obvious. There aren't enough horses and there are too many stakes.” He says, “the American Graded Stakes Committee hasn't done its job.”

His solution, all too glibly proffered by one with little skin in the breeding and owning game, is to throw out iconic races like the Mother Goose, the Hollywood Gold Cup and to take the knife to the NYRA stakes schedule. Simple answer, problem solved.

Hardly!

During my 43-year career with Fasig-Tipton, I attended many grading review meetings of the American Graded Stakes Committee (AGSC). Of all the alphabet committees that the Thoroughbred industry has spawned, I have never known a group of professionals more effective, more diligent or better-prepared than these unpaid guardians of our graded stakes system.

Let's take it step-by-step. It is a simple process to take the scalpel to the number of stakes races. There is currently a minimum purse requirement of $50,000 or $75,000 for a stake to earn the “black-type,” that will appear in a Thoroughbred's pedigree. The Thoroughbred breeding industry, with the assistance of TOBA, The Jockey Club and the Society of International Thoroughbred Auctioneers, monitors this system on a day-to-day basis to ensure black-type standards are correctly maintained. That minimum is reviewed annually and, with the dramatically improved purses everywhere at maiden and allowance levels, there is justification for a school of thought to raise the minimum. However, the consequence of, let's say, doubling the minimum, would eliminate a lot of stakes races from black-type, but would, at the same time, devastate the racing programs of second-tier racetracks, who rely on the “honor” of awarding black-type to encourage owners to stay or come into the game.

Anyway, that would be a meaningful debate. By tradition, the number of graded stakes should be an acceptable percentage of the total black-type races. The Graded Stakes Committee should be considering the “pyramid” created by total of all races on the bottom, to Grade I stakes on the top. The pyramid system is acknowledged by every recognized world-wide racing authority.

In my active years, the U.S. percentage was always far the lowest of any major international racing country, albeit, truthfully, because North America has an overwhelming number of total races. Each year I read in the TDN the annual report of the AGSC, which regularly features a consistent and regrettable number of downgraded or eliminated stakes races.

If those who currently sit on the AGSC are not maintaining the standards established by their predecessors, they should be open to question from anybody who cares about the quality and diversity of racing in North America, including Bill Finley. It is a simplification to say that, because our foal crop is well under 50% of its peak, we should slash the number of graded stakes.

Bill's example of short fields in such races as the 2022 GII Mother Goose is a fixable aberration, which, if seen repeated, will result in yet another downgrading of a race which was, until recently, an integral Grade I part of the Fillies' Triple Crown.

Bill's quoting the statistics of racehorses now running less than six times per year, half of what it was 20 years ago, is not caused by an excess of stakes-races. The blame for that, if blame is the right word, is squarely on the shoulders of trainers with divisions of high-class horses who feel that their win-to-runner percentage is inviolable. We have quality racing year-round in the U.S. We should incentivize trainers to run more frequently and penalize those whose runners fill a stall year-round and only show up at the racetrack every other month at most.

Don't do what we so frequently do in every walk of life–make a knee-jerk decision that wipes out decades or even centuries of racing history. Give Bill Finley back his full fields, his exactas and trifectas and the opportunity to experience an AGSC grading meeting. Perhaps he will appreciate the hard work this group undertakes to maintain the integrity and tradition of racing in North America.

Yours respectfully,

Terence Collier

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The Week in Review: Is the ‘Fresh Horse’ Angle Getting Stale?

For the second year in a row, the GI Preakness S. was won by a fresh horse who didn't run in the GI Kentucky Derby. Since both of Saturday's top two Preakness finishers–Early Voting (Gun Runner) and Epicenter (Not This Time)–were publicly declared out of the GI Belmont S. even before the last of the crab cakes cooled at Pimlico, it will be up to another relatively rested horse to step up and snag the third jewel of the Triple Crown.

That's not an unfamiliar scenario, and recent history tells us the most likely Belmont win threat could be among the Derby also-rans.
Since 2000, New York's “test of a champion” has been won by 10 horses who ran in Louisville then opted out of Baltimore. During that same time frame, seven horses won the Belmont after not having run in either the Derby or Preakness. We also had two Triple Crown winners (Justify in 2018 and American Pharoah in 2015), and two other horses–Afleet Alex in 2005 and Point Given in 2001–who lost the Derby, won the Preakness, then won the Belmont (the pandemic-altered 2020 Triple Crown scheduling was an anomaly that isn't counted here).

The connections of Rich Strike (Keen Ice) voluntarily held out their Derby winner from the Preakness, citing the desire to have a fresh colt for the Belmont. Yet the 80-1 hero from the first Saturday in May is unlikely to be favored on June 11.

Rich Strike's underdog appeal will undoubtedly attract supporters and a sizable rooting interest. But going from being a blue-collar, no-pressure afterthought who lucked into the Derby off the also-eligible list to being the focal point of microscopic attention in the media capital of the world will be a daunting ask for this overachieving (and sometimes ornery) former $30,000 maiden claimer.

Trainer Todd Pletcher might not have pioneered the now-prevalent “skip the Preakness” methodology. But he's certainly done his part to lend credibility to the “less is more” approach when targeting the Triple Crown's concluding leg.

The Pletcher-conditioned Tapwrit was sixth in the 2018 Derby, passed on the Preakness, then won the Belmont. Similar story for Palace Malice in 2013, except that he was 12th at Churchill. Pletcher's other Belmont winner, the filly Rags to Riches, had the same five-week spacing in 2007, except her circumstances were different, having won the GI Kentucky Oaks prior to taking on males in New York.

Using those templates as a guide, Pletcher is aiming two contenders (at least) toward the Belmont: Mo Donegal (Uncle Mo), who got buried with the dreaded rail draw in the Derby, waited too long to uncork a far-turn bid, then displayed sneaky-good acceleration inside the eighth pole to finish fifth, and Nest (Curlin), the filly who won three straight stakes this past winter and spring prior to being the beaten fave (second) in a very competitive renewal of the May 6 Kentucky Oaks.

Barber Road (Race Day), a gritty stayer who was sixth in the Derby, is the only other confirmed Belmont probable among those who ran in the first leg of the Triple Crown. Creative Minster (Creative Cause), a minor-impact third in the Preakness, is also being pointed to the Belmont.

Although that list of Belmont contenders looks light at the moment, it's sure to be shored up over the next 2 1/2 weeks.
Chief among names percolating around the periphery are We the People (Constitution), winner of the May 14 GIII Peter Pan S. with a 103 Beyer Speed Figure.

Two other colts who had formerly been under Derby consideration but instead won confidence-boosters on Saturday could also be in the mix: Ethereal Road (Quality Road), who scored in the Sir Barton S. on the Preakness undercard, plus Howling Time (Not This Time), who captured an allowance/optional claimer at Churchill.

Parsing the outcome of the Preakness need not be a drawn-out affair. Armagnac (Quality Road), an 18-1 outsider, went to the lead. The jockeys aboard two other on-paper speed threats–Fenwick (Curlin) and Simplification (Not This Time)–chose not to force the issue through moderate early fractions. Jose Ortiz, knowing what he had underneath him, willingly conceded the lead with Early Voting and instead sat second, applying quiet but palpable pressure through consecutive quarters in :24.32, :23.12, :24.06 and :24.05 for the first mile of the race.

Meanwhile, at the back of the pack, it was evident by the midway point that the two favorites, Epicenter and the filly Secret Oath (Arrogate), had left themselves too much work to do. While both had endured jostling early in the race, it shouldn't have adversely affected either considering both were in the process of being rated off the pace when the bumping occurred.

Joel Rosario was first to move with a sense of urgency, sending Epicenter up the rail to tag onto the back of the first flight about a half-mile from home. Luis Saez soon mimicked the favorite's “let's hustle” move, expect he stayed widest with Secret Oath. The end result for both was more or less the same: Epicenter had to ride out the run through the far bend while pocketed with nowhere to go, then he had no true spark once he cut the corner and had a clear shot. Secret Oath once again launched into the same loop-the-group maneuver that had come up short in the GI Arkansas Derby, and she similarly petered out in the stretch.

With the favorites foundering behind him, Early Voting simply ratcheted up the torque on Armagnac, going head-and-head for the lead between the seven-sixteenths and quarter poles before cracking that rival for good. He responded to urging like a colt who knows his job, drifted only slightly under left-handed encouragement, then shifted back inward to finish up 1 1/4 comfortable lengths clear of a wheels-spinning Epicenter through a final three-sixteenths in :18.99 and a 1:54.54 clocking for the 1 3/16-mile Preakness (105 Beyer).

The only real surprise was that Early Voting had drifted up to 5.7-1 in the betting. Otherwise, the race unfolded in drama-free fashion. If you didn't know it was the Preakness, it could have been any other race at any level on any given day of the week–an overmatched speed horse gets reeled in by a stalker who gets first run, and no one else is firing through the lane.

In sum, Early Voting's measured, methodical victory was a microcosm of how the 4-for-4 colt got to the Preakness in the first place. His connections–trainer Chad Brown and owner Klaravich Stables–had taken the calculated, patient path in prep races and bypassing the Derby, and it paid off at Pimlico, just as it did five years ago when the same owner/trainer combo won the Preakness with Cloud Computing.

Racing isn't the only sport in which the metrics-driven “waiting game” has cycled into vogue. We see it in major-league baseball, where pitchers are removed from starts solely based on pitch counts, even if a no-hitter or World Series game is on the line. High-value college football recruits now routinely skip important, season-ending bowl games so as not to sully their draft status. And pro basketball teams routinely sit their stars during the regular season with the hope of having fresh bodies for the playoffs, where wins count most.

It's tough to dismiss the current over-reliance on analytics when these formulaic approaches keep producing results. And in racing, you certainly can't argue when owners and trainers opt out of potentially arduous spots citing a desire to “do what's best for the horse.”

But there is a difficult-to-define aesthetic cost to mapping out Triple Crown campaigns so conservatively and meticulously. Having already arrived at the point where getting into the Derby has devolved into a chase for qualifying points, the final two legs of the series are at risk of becoming an exercise of which connections have played the “fresh face” percentages most effectively.

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Don’t Bet On Most Accomplished Colt Being Favored in Derby

The Week in Review by T.D. Thornton

Epicenter (Not This Time) is the first horse on this year's GI Kentucky Derby trail to arrive back in the proverbial clubhouse. His afternoon work is finished for the next six weeks, and he's earned his berth in America's most important horse race in a thoroughly professional manner that checks many of the boxes on the Derby desirability list.

Epicenter's never-in-doubt dismantling of the GII Louisiana Derby field serves as a microcosm of his overall body of work: He's an adept breaker from the gate. His running style is speed-centric without a crazed need to seize the lead. He cranks out up-tempo quarter-mile splits without showing visible signs of duress. He can fight the entire length of the stretch (although he didn't need to in Saturday's even-keeled 2 1/2-length win), and he gallops out past the wire like he wants more.

You want additional attributes that suggest a blanket of roses on the first Saturday in May could be within this $260,000 Keeneland September colt's grasp? Epicenter, as a January foal with six lifetime races, has an edge as one of the oldest and most seasoned sophomores. His Beyer Speed Figures have ascended in each race without any wild fluctuations that might make them seem suspect. He's won four starts, including three around two turns, one each at nine furlongs and 1 3/16 miles, and one over the Derby surface at Churchill Downs.

Epicenter's only loss within the past six months came after he forced the issue from between foes in the GIII Lecomte S., held off a wall of horses at the top of the lane, repulsed a strong bid from the all-out favorite through the length of the long Fair Grounds stretch, then got nailed the wire by a last-gasp 28-1 shot (before quickly surging back in front several jumps after the finish).

The 102 Beyer this Winchell Thoroughbreds colorbearer earned in his Louisiana Derby romp is going to get a lot of ink. But here's an even more impressive set of metrics that won't get as much attention: Of all the two-turn Derby qualifying races run in 2022, regardless of the distance, only three of them have featured internal quarter-mile splits under 25 seconds each. Epicenter orchestrated two of those performances–his Louisiana Derby and Grade II Risen Star S. wins (The other prep with all sub-25-second quarters was the GIII Holy Bull S. at Gulfstream.)

Yet despite that impressive list of accomplishments, it's a likely bet Epicenter won't be favored on Derby Day.

More than any other race of the year, betting on the Derby is highly driven by headlines and easy-to-grasp media narratives. Recency bias also plays a big role, meaning the wagering public puts outsized emphasis on events that have just occurred at the expense of those farther back in the rear-view mirror.

Put another way, Derby bettors love to zero in on compelling story lines that have to do with explosive last-race wins by young colts perceived as sky's-the-limit contenders (especially if they have human connections who love to talk up their chances).

While Epicenter is a lot of things in racehorse terms, it would be a stretch to label him as “flashy.” Crank-it-out consistency is more his style, and those types of Thoroughbreds typically get overlooked because there's no wave of hype driving the wagering sentiment.

Six weeks is a small eternity in the lead-up to the Derby. As the glow of Epicenter's shining winter/spring campaign recedes, how many times between now and May 7 do you think trainer Steve Asmussen is going to have to politely address his 0-for-23 record in the Derby, the longest active drought on record? That one stat will be repeated over and over again, and even if you don't believe it's entirely relevant to Epicenter's chances, it will certainly serve to inflate his odds.

Epicenter's broad, bay shoulders must also carry the burden of the Louisiana Derby itself. Not only is the premier race in New Orleans one of the least-productive Kentucky Derby prep races in history, but it's also one that increasingly appears to be infused with weird juju.

The Louisiana Derby dates to 1894. Only two horses have won the Louisiana Derby and then the Kentucky Derby–Grindstone in 1996 and Black Gold in 1924. One Louisiana Derby runner-up–Funny Cide in 2003–also scored in Louisville. But that's it. No other horse who even competed in the Louisiana Derby–regardless of where he finished–has ever crossed the finish wire first under Churchill's twin spires.

Yet now, because of oddball circumstances, the Louisiana Derby is on the verge of having two of its also-rans within the past three years recognized as Kentucky Derby winners via disqualification–Country House in 2019 (because of Maximum Security's in-race foul) and Mandaloun in 2021 (pending the still-under-appeal drug DQ of Medina Spirit).

Country House never raced again after his Derby win via DQ. Grindstone also never raced again after his Louisiana/Kentucky Derby double, and when he died last week at age 29, he was the oldest living Kentucky Derby winner.

But the career arc of Black Gold is more improbable than both of those bizarre happenstances combined.

According to legend (as recapped in Black Gold's National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame bio), a horse owner in the 1910s named Al Hoots had a deathbed vision that his 34-for-122 mare U-See-It (sometimes spelled without the hyphens) would be bred to Col. E. R. Bradley's stallion Black Toney, and that the foal would win the Kentucky Derby. The mare had been so special to Hoots that he once–armed with a shotgun–refused to hand her over after she got claimed out of a race in Juarez, Mexico.

Several years later, after Hoots died, his widow, Rosa Hoots, did indeed breed U-See-It to Black Toney. When oil was discovered a short time later on her Oklahoma property, Mrs. Hoots became wealthy overnight, and in the spirit of the fortuitous oil strike, she named the colt Black Gold. As her husband had predicted, Black Gold won the 1924 Kentucky Derby, making Rosa the first woman to breed and own a Derby winner.

Black Gold was retired to stud but was not fertile. He sired exactly one foal, a colt. It was killed by a lightning strike.

At age six, Black Gold was returned to the racetrack for an ill-fated comeback. He went 0-for-4, and in his final start at the Fair Grounds, on Jan. 18, 1928, he suffered a catastrophic injury and was buried in the track infield.

The Louisiana Derby hasn't been short on talent in recent decades. Some pretty nice winners out of that race–Risen Star, Peace Rules, Hot Rod Charlie–blossomed into Grade I victors without winning the Kentucky Derby. Asmussen himself even trained two eventual Grade I grads who won the Louisiana Derby, namely Gun Runner and Pyro.

This spring, Epicenter has a chance to rewrite the Derby map that links New Orleans and Louisville. And if you like his chances in the aftermath of his Louisiana Derby score and what he's shown us so far, just wait another month and a half for his price to ripen come Kentucky Derby day.

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