It’s Justify’s race to lose at Preakness

BALTIMORE Opposing trainers at the Preakness always want to see the Kentucky Derby winner up-close and then set their sights on trying to beat that horse.

This year, they can see Justify. They just don’t know if they can beat him.

There’s such a sense of awe about Justify and an aura around the heavy favourite that it’s clear it’ll take something significant to beat him. Watching Justify hold off Good Magic in the Derby impressed trainer Chad Brown enough to calm his expectations.

“I was very impressed with (Justify) how well he ran from gate to finish,” Brown said. “I’m confident my horse will run well, but I’m also very aware what a tall order this is to try and turn the tables on a horse like him.”

Turning the tables on Justify and cutting short his Triple Crown bid won’t be easy. The consensus around Pimlico Race Course is if Justify simply runs his race, he’ll win the Preakness and head to the Belmont Stakes on June 9 with the chance to give trainer Bob Baffert another Triple Crown victory — his second in four years after American Pharoah captured it in 2015.

Justify will have to regress back to the pack for any of the other seven horses to finish first.

“If he runs his race, if he shows up — I think every trainer, that’s all we hope for,” Baffert said. “I feel good. Right now I feel confident that he’s going to show up.”

Only a handful of things could reasonably derail Justify, a 1-2 morning-line favourite who is 4-0 and has won his four starts by a combined 21 1/2 lengths. He showed something more by running such an impressive race in the mud at Churchill Downs in the Derby on May 5. It has rained all week in Baltimore, and more on Saturday should make for another sloppy track.

The other concerns are if Justify’s bruised heel gets irritated from a couple of days working out in mud and how the surface might complicate the start.

Drawing the same post No. 7 he won the Derby puts Justify in an advantageous spot.

If anything goes wrong, Brown’s Good Magic and new challenger Quip are best-positioned to take advantage of any misstep by Justify. Good Magic ran pretty much his best and came up 2 1/2 lengths short in the Derby.