Notes - Feb 27

- Another workout for Street Sense, this one a six furlong move in 1:13.60 at Palm Meadows. An anonymous commenter speculates that there's something wrong with him, but I think he's OK, and that Nafzger, who does his own thing, is just doing what he thinks the colt needs at this point. I wrote rather definitively a few weeks ago that he won't win the Derby, and I wanted to clarify that remark, and add that I fervently hope that he doesn't win. If he does, we may not have much to talk about in Derby trail seasons to come. I know that Sunny's Halo didn't start a trend when he won off two preps, but, as was pointed out by Gary West the other day, he had raced 11 times at age two; and besides, the "less is more" approach is one that is far more in vogue just in general now.

As far as him winning the Derby, look, he could win, but what I was trying to say is that I don't feel that his win in the Juvenile, in which the seas parted for him on the rail while others encountered severe trouble and wide trips, doesn't make him any more likely to be standing in the winner's circle on May 5 than any of a dozen other contenders, in my opinion. And that's with or without there really being a strong rail bias on BC day, something that has not really been clearly confirmed or not by the subsequent performances of the horses that ran that day. In fact, the history of the Juvenile-Derby "curse" makes it even less likely to me that he'll win, in part because I think it's very much on the mind of Nafzger, and causing him to take this approach of only two preps.

Meanwhile, Stormello is hopping a Fed Ex flight to Gulfstream for the Fountain of Youth, and I hope Bill Currin saved the tracking number somewhere in case he gets lost. "Hello, yes, I sent a horse and it didn't show up. It did, really? Do you know who signed for it? WHO? TODD WHO???"

- Robert Yates' report in the Arkansas Democrat Gazette today contradicts our Lenny's report of whispering that Hard Spun will come to the Big A for the Gotham. According to trainer Larry Jones, who indeed had some disparaging things to say about the Oaklawn surface after the Southwest, the colt has bounced back well physically since returning to the track, and is on target to face Teuflesberg in the March 17 Rebel. For some reason, I actually think a little higher of this colt in defeat, and I'm giving him another shot. I'll buy the excuse of the rail bias, and I was impressed by the wide move he made on the turn.