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This is Bailey's Daily Blog site to complain, compose, give utterance to, or just plain wax poetic. I am, if I may say, an adorable, sweet, TALENTED, 4 1/2 year old Beagle (that's 32 in people years who was rescued from Zell Miller's and Saxby Chambliss' South Georgia!). I love the Red Sox, my mom, gramdma's cooking, ice cream and playing in the dog park! I am learning how to email and blog with no opposable thumbs! IT'S BLOG-GONE FUN! WOOF!:)Thursday, May 05, 2005
Kentucky Derby: Favored Bellamy Road draws an Outside Post
By Seattle Times news services
Here are the morning line odds and post positions for the 131st running of the Kentucky Derby : http://www.derbypost.com/tipsheet.html
Kentucky Derby favorite Bellamy Road, with exercise rider Carlos Correa up, works out along the backstretch at Churchill Downs. Bellamy Road's trainer is Nick Zito, above. Zito has five horses in the field and is looking for his third victory.
Trainer Nick Zito has the favorite for the Kentucky Derby again, this time with Bellamy Road, owned by Yankees boss George Steinbrenner. Bellamy Road was made the 5-2 favorite for Saturday's richest Derby ever, and drew the No. 16 post yesterday.
The No. 16 post has worked well in the last decade, producing three Derby winners — Thunder Gulch in 1995, Charismatic in 1999 and Monarchos in 2001. A full field of 20 3-year-olds was entered for the 1 ¼-mile race, with Afleet Alex the second choice at 9-2. Bandini was the third choice at 6-1. Bellamy Road is one of five Zito horses in the field, equaling the record by Hall of Famer D. Wayne Lukas in 1996. Lukas won that year with Grindstone.
Zito's other horses are High Fly at 8-1, leaving from the No. 11 post; Noble Causeway at 12-1 (No. 4 post); Sun King at 15-1 (No. 3); and Andromeda's Hero at 50-1 (No. 2). Asked how long it took to decide which horse would leave from which gate, Zito said: "Five minutes, a minute for each horse. I wanted Bellamy Road on the outside, and I think we got everything we wanted."
Last year, Zito's The Cliff's Edge was the slight favorite, but Smarty Jones ended up as the top choice.
It's unlikely the favorite's role will change this year, not after Bellamy Road's last two races, a 17 ½-length romp in the Wood Memorial on April 9 and a 15 ¾-length rout in an allowance race a month earlier. Bellamy Road will be ridden by Javier Castellano.
This is the richest Derby, with a purse of $2,399,600. If all 20 start, the winner's share is a record $1,639,600. The last time 20 horses started the Derby was 1984. That year a rule was made to cap the field at 20, and since then the maximum has yet to be reached. Last year 20 were entered but St Averil and Wimbledon were late scratches.
Steinbrenner's Derby record is 0 for 5. His first starter, Steve's Friend, was fifth in 1977. Eternal Prince was 12th in 1985, Diligence (1996) and Concerto (1997) each finished ninth and Blue Burner was 11th in 2002.
Lukas, a four-time Derby winner, and Bob Baffert, a three-time winner, both have 50-1 longshots. Lukas trains Going Wild and Baffert has Sort It Out.
Zito, playing to his Kentucky audience in the selection event in Churchill Downs' Triple Crown Room, compared having a fourth of the field to making college basketball's Final Four. "No matter how you look at it, we've made it," he said. "Now we've just got to see if we can get it done."
In 1998, the track instituted a two-tiered format to determine post positions that is supposed to infuse an element of strategy into the time-honored "luck of the draw." Under this system, a traditional draw is held to determine the order in which entrants' representatives pick their positions in the starting gate.
With the 10th selection, Zito took what might seem to be an unusual post for the front-running Bellamy Road, because conventional wisdom suggests being closer to the rail is the best option for a horse that runs on or near the lead. But Zito said he didn't want to risk the long-striding Bellamy Road getting blocked or bumped as horses fight to secure a good position out of the gate. He said he hopes Bellamy Road will settle behind horses if the pace is too fast, and the best way to do that is from the outside. "I've said all week I wanted to be on the outside with that horse," he said. "He's a big, huge horse. He's like a big cat. ... Sixteen, he's way outside and he'll get a clear run."
The auxiliary gate used to be shunned, but it has come into fashion while serving as a launching pad for five of the past 10 Derby winners. With the first pick, trainer Todd Pletcher picked post 15 for Bandini, marking the first time the No. 1 choice has been used to select the auxiliary gate.
Here are the morning line odds and post positions for the 131st running of the Kentucky Derby : http://www.derbypost.com/tipsheet.html
Kentucky Derby favorite Bellamy Road, with exercise rider Carlos Correa up, works out along the backstretch at Churchill Downs. Bellamy Road's trainer is Nick Zito, above. Zito has five horses in the field and is looking for his third victory.
Trainer Nick Zito has the favorite for the Kentucky Derby again, this time with Bellamy Road, owned by Yankees boss George Steinbrenner. Bellamy Road was made the 5-2 favorite for Saturday's richest Derby ever, and drew the No. 16 post yesterday.
The No. 16 post has worked well in the last decade, producing three Derby winners — Thunder Gulch in 1995, Charismatic in 1999 and Monarchos in 2001. A full field of 20 3-year-olds was entered for the 1 ¼-mile race, with Afleet Alex the second choice at 9-2. Bandini was the third choice at 6-1. Bellamy Road is one of five Zito horses in the field, equaling the record by Hall of Famer D. Wayne Lukas in 1996. Lukas won that year with Grindstone.
Zito's other horses are High Fly at 8-1, leaving from the No. 11 post; Noble Causeway at 12-1 (No. 4 post); Sun King at 15-1 (No. 3); and Andromeda's Hero at 50-1 (No. 2). Asked how long it took to decide which horse would leave from which gate, Zito said: "Five minutes, a minute for each horse. I wanted Bellamy Road on the outside, and I think we got everything we wanted."
Last year, Zito's The Cliff's Edge was the slight favorite, but Smarty Jones ended up as the top choice.
It's unlikely the favorite's role will change this year, not after Bellamy Road's last two races, a 17 ½-length romp in the Wood Memorial on April 9 and a 15 ¾-length rout in an allowance race a month earlier. Bellamy Road will be ridden by Javier Castellano.
This is the richest Derby, with a purse of $2,399,600. If all 20 start, the winner's share is a record $1,639,600. The last time 20 horses started the Derby was 1984. That year a rule was made to cap the field at 20, and since then the maximum has yet to be reached. Last year 20 were entered but St Averil and Wimbledon were late scratches.
Steinbrenner's Derby record is 0 for 5. His first starter, Steve's Friend, was fifth in 1977. Eternal Prince was 12th in 1985, Diligence (1996) and Concerto (1997) each finished ninth and Blue Burner was 11th in 2002.
Lukas, a four-time Derby winner, and Bob Baffert, a three-time winner, both have 50-1 longshots. Lukas trains Going Wild and Baffert has Sort It Out.
Zito, playing to his Kentucky audience in the selection event in Churchill Downs' Triple Crown Room, compared having a fourth of the field to making college basketball's Final Four. "No matter how you look at it, we've made it," he said. "Now we've just got to see if we can get it done."
In 1998, the track instituted a two-tiered format to determine post positions that is supposed to infuse an element of strategy into the time-honored "luck of the draw." Under this system, a traditional draw is held to determine the order in which entrants' representatives pick their positions in the starting gate.
With the 10th selection, Zito took what might seem to be an unusual post for the front-running Bellamy Road, because conventional wisdom suggests being closer to the rail is the best option for a horse that runs on or near the lead. But Zito said he didn't want to risk the long-striding Bellamy Road getting blocked or bumped as horses fight to secure a good position out of the gate. He said he hopes Bellamy Road will settle behind horses if the pace is too fast, and the best way to do that is from the outside. "I've said all week I wanted to be on the outside with that horse," he said. "He's a big, huge horse. He's like a big cat. ... Sixteen, he's way outside and he'll get a clear run."
The auxiliary gate used to be shunned, but it has come into fashion while serving as a launching pad for five of the past 10 Derby winners. With the first pick, trainer Todd Pletcher picked post 15 for Bandini, marking the first time the No. 1 choice has been used to select the auxiliary gate.
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