Last year in the aftermath of California Chrome’s failed Triple Crown bid at Belmont Park, owner Steve Coburn unleashed a torrent of abuse at the what he perceived to be cowardly horsemen.
Coburn’s thinking went that because the majority of his rivals had skipped the Preakness Stakes, the second leg of America’s Triple Crown, they had no right to down California Chrome in the final leg of America’s three-race series.
Wind forward 12 months, and American Pharoah bids to erase America’s 37-year wait for a Triple Crown winner the hard way when he faces seven fresh rivals in Saturday’s Belmont Stakes.
He is the only horse to have run both in the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness Stakes.
He may have the constitution for it, however. American Pharoah faces his fifth race in just 12 weeks, but he has shown an athleticism in those races that promises to take him to at least the brink of greatness. And perhaps beyond.
UAE interest centres around UAE Derby winner Mubtaahij, who will attempt to become the tenth horse bred outside the US to win the Belmont. Godolphin run Frosted, who was fourth at Churchill Downs, as the international stable seek their first victory in the American Classic. Frosted ran further than any other horse save for American Pharoah in the Kentucky Derby, and was the only horse to be closing as American Pharoah, Firing Line and Dortmund all jostled for the first three places from the outset.
Many see the Belmont Stakes as a race to target the favourite in an effort to delay the inevitable of a Triple Crown win, but not Frosted’s trainer Kiaran McLaughlin.
“This race has nothing to do with downing American Pharoah,” the trainer said. “The big picture is to win Grade 1s for Frosted. He is a Godolphin homebred and this is about an American Classic race. It is a huge racing day and everybody is going to be watching around the world.”
As an illustration of how may people will be watching in America, on Thursday the broadcaster NBC revealed that California Chrome’s run in to fourth was one of only two shows on US television in the second quarter to average 20 million viewers.
There will be over 100,000 people crammed in to Belmont Park, but the star of the show himself will not hear a thing. American Pharoah has dealt with much in his seven-race career but when it comes to noise it is time for the ear plugs.
“He is a very intelligent, smart horse, but he’s a little noise sensitive and that’s why we put the cotton earplugs in his ears,” Baffert added. “You know, that’s why on the walk-over from the Derby with all the people running next to him, they really set him off; he didn’t like that.”
Baffert has won the Belmont Stakes once, with Point Given in 2001. He trails behind legends such as Woody Stephens, who set out the template of training a horse on the deep dirt at Belmont, known as the Big Sandy, when saddling five successive winners in the 1980s.
Baffert has shunned this approach, favouring to work American Pharoah at Churchill Downs before flying in earlier this week. With 146 previous Belmonts to look back on Baffert will not be short of advice from his elders. Woody Stephens is no longer with us, having died in 1998 but D Wayne Lukas has won the Belmont Stakes four times and the Hall Of Fame trainer put his stamp of approval on American Pharoah when speaking from Churchill Downs this week.
“I think he’ll win and win easy,” the legendary 79-year-old handler said. “The thing that makes American Pharoah probably in a better position than most of them in the past 30 years is the fact that he’s had two easy races (Rebel Stakes and Arkansas Derby), one tough one (Kentucky Derby) and then another easy one (Preakness). So he’s got that going for him.”
Some endorsement.
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