As if there were any sort of doubt, trainer Bob Baffert confirmed Sunday morning that Kentucky Derby champion Justify would continue his quest for the Triple Crown at the Preakness Stakes on May 19.
“I didn’t tell them I’d think about it,” Baffert said of the telephone invitation he received from Preakness officials, via the Associated Press. “There’s no reason to say no.”
As for Justify’s challengers at Pimlico, don’t expect to see too many of the 19 horses he bested at Churchill Downs on Saturday. Trainer Todd Pletcher doesn’t like running a horse after just a two-week break, so his four Derby entries — third-place Audible, Magnum Moon, Vino Rosso and Noble Indy — likely will not be shipped to Baltimore for the Preakness, which is capped at 14 horses. The same can be said for Bolt d’Oro and Mendelssohn, according to the Baltimore Sun’s Childs Walker, who adds that we’ll next see fifth-place finisher My Boy Jack and seventh-place Hofburg at the Belmont Stakes.
Bravazo, who finished sixth in the Kentucky Derby, likely will run in the Preakness for trainer D. Wayne Lukas, a six-time winner of the race. Other possibilities are Quip, the Arkansas Derby runner-up, and Diamond King, who will be a local favorite as the winner of the Federico Tesio Stakes at Laurel Park.
But what about Good Magic, which finished 2 1/2 lengths behind Justify in second place on Saturday? Trainer Chad Brown told Walker on Sunday that he will reassess his Preakness chances after recuperating back in New York.
“I don’t know,” said Brown, who won the Preakness last year with new-shooter Cloud Computing. “The horse is sound. He looks good, but I just have to observe him. … I want to get the horse back home and evaluate his energy level. We’ve just got to go from there.”
Good Magic’s sire, Curlin, won the Preakness in 2007 after finishing third at the Kentucky Derby.
Skipping the Preakness after the Kentucky Derby is hardly rare, as trainers sometimes are hesitant to send their horses out only two weeks after a major race or have plans to point them toward other races down the line. Of the 29 Preakness entries over the past three years, only 12 ran in the Kentucky Derby. Nevertheless, only four horses have won the Preakness having not run in the Kentucky Derby over the past 34 years.
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