Arrow-right Camera
The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Preakness Full Of Weakness Without Grindstone Or Unbridled’s Song, Saturday’s Field Watered Down Significantly

Gene Guidi Detroit Free Press

Kentucky Derby winner Grindstone has taken early retirement. Unbridled’s Song, regarded by many as the fastest 3-year-old on the planet, will spend the next couple of months resting an ailing foot.

Their absence has led to a larger-than-expected 12-horse field for Saturday’s Preakness at Pimlico Race Course. But the size of the field doesn’t alter the fact that only a handful of horses seem to have a legitimate shot to claim the second jewel of thoroughbred racing’s Triple Crown.

Almost half the field can be dismissed using the most basic handicapping tenets:

Allied Forces: The British-bred colt has five lifetime starts - all on grass. That won’t help much Saturday because the Preakness is run on dirt.

Feather Box: Trainer Angel Cordero all but admitted he’s here to give his horse a prep race for the June 8 Belmont Stakes in New York.

“I figure, if my horse is going to get beat, he might as well get beat by good horses,” Cordero said.

Mixed Count: Every year, one or two Maryland horses that have little chance in the Preakness are entered. Mixed Count is this year’s Maryland-bred sacrificial lamb.

Secreto de Estado: New York connections always enter hopelessly overmatched horses in big races. This year’s entry has yet to win a race in the United States in five tries.

Tour’s Big Red: At least this horse has accomplished something, winning a Grade 3 race at Pimlico last month. But every time he has tried the big boys, the Florida-bred has come up short.

The remaining seven Preakness starters have one thing in common: They competed in the Kentucky Derby.

Why is that important? Because for the last 10 years, the Preakness winner has come out of the Derby. That’s not to say non-Derby horses fail to run in the money; they just don’t win.

The Derby horses that have won the Preakness in recent years didn’t necessarily run big races in Louisville. Only two Preakness winners in the last 10 - Alysheba in 1987 and Sunday Silence in 1989 - also won the Derby.

Four Preakness winners in the last 10 - Snow Chief (11th in 1986), Hansel (10th in 1991), Pine Bluff (fifth in 1992) and Tabasco Cat (sixth in 1994) - didn’t even hit the board in the Derby.

Of the seven Derby horses entered in this year’s Preakness, three - Editor’s Note, In Contention and Victory Speech - are winless in their last combined 14 starts and don’t appear to be coming up to career-best efforts.

That means the winner should come out of the remaining four horses: Cavonnier, Prince of Thieves, Skip Away and Louis Quatorze.

Cavonnier and Prince of Thieves, second and third in the Derby, are logical contenders, although Cavonnier took some time to bounce back from his taxing Derby effort and might not be in peak form.

“He looked like a greyhound after the Derby,” trainer Bob Baffert said. “But he has put the weight back on.”

Prince of Thieves is reminiscent of last year’s Preakness winner, Timber Country. Both ran respectable races in the Derby and appear to have some improvement in their immediate future.

Skip Away was a disappointment in the Derby, ending up 12th after a wide trip. The race before the Derby was a sixth-length romp in the Blue Grass; if he can come close to that performance, he has a chance in the Preakness - especially because he seems to possess the only legitimate front-end speed.

Louis Quatorze, who finished 23 lengths behind Grindstone in the Derby, was probably too bad to be true. The Nick Zito-trained colt worked well at Pimlico this week and picks up the riding services of Pat Day, who has won the last two Preaknesses.