BALTIMORE – While the betting, handicapping and literary worlds may concede Saturday’s Preakness to the Kentucky Derby hero Barbaro, one camp fiercely refuses to give him an inch: the Brother Derek holdouts.
Don’t talk wonder horse to them. Their cry: Bring him on! Let’s have a fair, clean race and we’ll see who is best.
They have a point. Everything went right for Barbaro in the Derby, but everything went wrong for Brother Derek.
It started even before the race. Derek’s trainer, Dan Hendricks, now admits he blundered when he chose post 18 for the horse when he could have slotted him in post 3. He said, “We made that decision and we have to live with it.”
He and jockey Alex Solis mapped their strategy, figured the Derby pace would be blistering and so they would take back. Wrong – and wrong again. The pace was barely brisk and taking back was a serious tactical error.
Trapped deep off the track, Brother Derek went nine wide into the first turn, even wider down the backstretch, steadied twice, then fanned 13 wide on the home turn but still managed to get up for equal fourth with Jazil.
Solis has been kicking himself ever since. “I could have sent him,” he said later. “He ran an incredible race to finish fourth. It was just a nightmare trip. We went a mile and a half. He’ll redeem himself in the Preakness.”
Brother Derek will start from post 5 as the 3-1 second favorite on Saturday, just inside even-money Barbaro.
The day after the Derby, Hendricks sat in his wheelchair outside his Churchill Downs barn, gritting his teeth in memory of what happened. He would say only that Barbaro was the “best horse on [that] day.” He has been plotting his revenge ever since.
Although paralyzed from the armpits down from a motorcycle spill two years ago, Hendricks remains nothing if not competitive.
He has studied tapes of the Derby over and over. “It was the best race Brother Derek has run,” he said. “He took dirt, he took adversity, he went wide, he circled the field and he lost a shoe, but he still finished a creditable fourth.”
Hendricks tips his hat to Barbaro and the crew around him. “It was not demoralizing to be beaten by Barbaro. They did a helluva job with that horse. They had him ready for a peak performance, he put himself into the race and won easily. He came out of it the best horse.
“But I’m hoping with a clean trip [in the Preakness], I can outrun him, out dog-fight him. And if I outrun him, we’ll be top three-year-old again.”
Ho, ho, ho. Not only are they contemplating beating Barbaro, but they’re looking to vault back to their old top-of-the-pack rating. They are conceding nothing.
Indeed, Hendricks added, “If we run big in the Preakness, bring on the Belmont.”
What Brother Derek will need to win the Preakness is a skillful ride from Solis. The 42-year-old Panamanian-born jockey has compiled a spectacular record since settling in California. He has won nearly 4,500 races, 20 riding titles, $190 million in purses and is bidding this year to be elected to the Hall of Fame.
Few people in the racing business are more widely admired than Solis. Hendricks calls him “the most professional jockey in California.” He is renowned for his work ethic, his relentless fitness (he runs in the mountains three times a week) his reliability, sturdy character and family life.
But when it comes to the classics, he seems flat-out jinxed. He is 0-for-14 in the Derby, the longest losing streak of any jockey in Derby history. He is 0-for-5 in the Belmont Stakes and 1-for-4 in the Preakness.
But it was the Breeders’ Cup that drove him crazy. He had 31 losing rides, the longest losing streak of any jockey in Cup history, before he broke through in 2000 when he won the Sprint on Kona. He admits that he nearly fainted with shock – and relief – after Kona went under the wire.
Could history repeat itself Saturday? Solis rode Snow Chief, the 2-1 favorite in the 1986 Derby, only to finish a dismal 11th, but rebounded to win the Preakness in a 4-length romp.
This year, he finished off the board in the Derby with Brother Derek, the morning-line favorite. A rebound in the Preakness would zoom him, Hendricks – and Derek – to the mountaintop. It’s called vindication.
