After breaking the "Curse of Apollo" in the Kentucky Derby, Justify comes to the Preakness Stakes with the expectation of greatness.
The unbeaten colt arrived at Baltimore's Pimlico Race Course on Wednesday and was made the early 1-2 favorite for the 143rd Preakness on Saturday.
As in the 144th Kentucky Derby May 5 at Churchill Downs, Justify will break from post 7 but with 12 fewer rivals than in Louisville. Derby runner-up Good Magic is the early 3-1 second choice in the eight-horse field with Bravazo (sixth) and Lone Sailor (eighth) also following from Kentucky.
Also entered are Quip, Sporting Chance, Tenfold and Diamond King -- all new to the Triple Crown series. Bravazo and Tenfold won at Oaklawn Park this year, while Quip and Sporting Chance raced in Hot Springs. Bravazo and Sporting Chance comprise an uncoupled entry for Hall of Fame trainer and six-time Preakness winner Wayne Lukas.
Trainer Rodolphe Brisset withdrew Quip from consideration for the Kentucky Derby after the colt finished a distant second to then-unbeaten Magnum Moon in Oaklawn's Arkansas Derby April 14. Magnum Moon, one of four Derby starters for trainer Todd Pletcher, finished a troubled 19th of 20 in Louisville going a mile and a quarter. Pletcher is not represented in Preakness 143.
The mile-and-three-sixteenth Preakness is scheduled for 5:20 p.m. Central with live coverage on NBC Sports (Resort Channel 4) and legal wagering available at Oaklawn and on the track's advanced-deposit wagering system, Oaklawnanywhere.com.
Justify is Hall of Fame trainer Bob Baffert's hope for a seventh Preakness victory and second Triple Crown sweep in three years. Baffert has won the Preakness with his four previous Kentucky Derby winners -- Silver Charm in 1997, Real Quiet in 1998, War Emblem in 2002 and American Pharoah in 2015 -- and also with Point Given in 2001 and Lookin At Lucky in 2010.
The first Kentucky Derby winner not to race as a 2-year-old since Apollo in 1882, Justify will have Hall of Fame jockey Mike Smith aboard. The Scat Daddy colt arrived in Baltimore on Wednesday with "no hiccups," said Baffert. "He was full of himself when he got off the van."
Justify hopes to equal the Preakness victories of recent odds-on program favorites Big Brown (2008) and California Chrome (2014). Justify is the first to wear No. 7 in the first two Triple Crown races since Arkansas Derby winner Papa Clem finished fourth in the Kentucky Derby and sixth in the Preakness in 2009.
Justify won the Derby by 2 1/2 lengths over a sloppy track, which also is forecast for the Preakness. Good Magic, last year's Breeders' Cup Juvenile and male 2-year-old champion, challenged Justify at the quarter pole at Churchill Downs but could not get by the leader.
A dry surface, said Good Magic trainer Chad Brown, "is just another little thing we could have changed about the Derby to maybe help us turn the tables. You don't want to run the same exact race where everyone runs the same exact way and on the same exact track.
"Obviously," Brown said on horseracingnation.com, "we already have some changes here: We're at a different track on two weeks' rest, with different posts, and a slightly different distance. To run on a dry track would be nice as an additional something different."
Jose Ortiz rides Good Magic for Brown, who won the 2017 Preakness with Cloud Computing after not entering the colt in the Derby.
Baffert respects the competition as he prepares unbeaten Justify for his fifth race in 90 days.
"You want some good horses in there," Baffert said. "There is nothing wrong with taking another shot. (Good Magic's) going to be tough. There are some nice horses in there. It's not a gimme."
Sports on 05/18/2018