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Will Sovereignty’s Belmont win result in radical overhaul of Triple Crown calendar?

| By Matt Rybaltowski | Reading Time: 4 minutes
Bill Mott's decision to skip the Preakness may lead other risk-averse trainers to bypass a chance at the Triple Crown for added rest.
belmont winner circle

In a carbon copy of the Kentucky Derby, Journalism jockey Umberto Rispoli made a decisive move on the far turn Saturday at the Belmont Stakes, only to be outflanked by archrival Junior Alvarado yet again.

Aboard Derby winner Sovereignty, Alvarado angled to the far outside to move within striking distance. By the time the rivals reached the eighth pole, Sovereignty found a new gear and easily raced past Journalism, the Preakness winner. Practically shot out of a cannon, Sovereignty finished the final quarter in a fleet 23.99 seconds, completing the last eighth in under 12.

At the classic distance of 1 ¼ mile, his time of 2:00.69 ranked as the second fastest ever at venerable Saratoga Race Course, a track that opened in 1863. This came after Godolphin LLC and trainer Bill Mott had taken the unusual step of skipping the Preakness while pointing Sovereignty toward the Belmont. Removing any chance for a Triple Crown, Mott opted to rest his horse for five weeks.

“The Godolphin team and myself together made a decision,” said Mott in the post-race press conference.  “I think you have to be man enough to stand up to the decision you made. In this case, I don’t think it was wrong.”

Opting for longer breaks

For decades, the Triple Crown has maintained a consistent schedule for one of the most gruelling propositions in sports. Since 1919, only 13 horses have won all three races, with Justify as the last in 2018. The Kentucky Derby is typically held on the first Saturday of May with a two-week break before the Preakness. From there, horses receive three weeks off before the final leg, the Belmont.

Gone are the days when trainers routinely enter their horses on short rest. Whirlaway, the 1941 Triple Crown winner, raced an astounding 60 times in a lengthy career. Several years later, Citation became the eighth Triple Crown winner when he accomplished the feat in 1948. Calumet Farms’ Citation notched 32 wins in 45 lifetime starts, producing career earnings in excess of $1 million.

Mystik Dan, the 2024 Kentucky Derby winner, ran just seven times as a three-year-old and only once after finishing a tiring eighth in the Belmont. As with Journalism, Mystik Dan represents a rare case of a three-year-old that entered all three legs. Mystik Dan took off six months before returning in last December’s Malibu Stakes. Flightline, the 2022 Horse of the Year, only raced three times that year and just six in his illustrious career.

Johny Avello, DraftKings director of sportsbook operations who has booked horse racing for more than 40 years, indicated that a change in the Triple Crown calendar should at least be considered.

“Race purists probably won’t like it, but it might be the right thing to do for the game – five weeks to run three races is very difficult,” Avello told iGB.

Moving back The Preakness?

Avello spoke following La Cara’s resounding win in The Grade I Acorn. On a sloppy track at Saratoga, La Cara led from the start, upsetting previously undefeated Good Cheer. The victory handed trainer Mark Casse his first career Acorn.

Casse, who has more than 3,560 career victories, won the 2019 Preakness with War of Will. At last month’s Preakness, only three horses from the Derby returned for the second leg of the Triple Crown.

Casse entered Sandman, who finished third behind 8/5 favourite Journalism. Of the 20-horse field in the Derby, only Journalism, Sandman and American Promise returned for the Preakness.

Describing Bill Mott as one of the “greatest horsemen” in the history of the sport, Casse told iGB that he would never question the trainer’s decision-making on the track.

But Casse has recently shifted his position on the timing of the Preakness. Casse now supports a larger cushion between the first two legs.

“If you move it back 30 days, you will have a better field,” Casse noted. “It’s still not going to be easy, but I’m for moving it back.”

‘It’s happened before, it’ll happen again’

Prior to last Friday’s Just A Game Stakes, Mott was in no mood to discuss the possibility of a revamped calendar. When approached by iGB, Mott declined to comment on any potential changes to the Triple Crown schedule. However, he answered several direct questions on Sovereignty, adding that the decision to skip the Preakness was in the “best interests of the horse”.

If the Preakness were moved to the first weekend of June, the New York Racing Association could respond by moving the Belmont to a date near the Fourth of July. While Journalism pushed himself to the limit by racing three times in a short period, some suggest that Sovereignty received a distinct advantage with a five-week break.

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Godolphin director of bloodstock Michael Banahan appeared with Mott at the post-Belmont press conference. While the likes of American Pharoah and Justify have ascended to the pinnacle of the sport in winning the Triple Crown, Banahan pointed to the many Belmont Stakes photo finishes that have robbed others of the accomplishment.

Since 1995, 11 horses have won the first two legs, with those like Real Quiet and Smarty Jones then beaten before the wire in excruciating fashion.

“It’s happened before and it’ll happen again,” Banahan said of the decision to skip the Preakness with the winner of the Kentucky Derby. “Those are decisions that whomever wins in the future will need to make.”

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