Classic Derby?
Last year’s 2-year-old champ hasn’t scared anybody from $1 million race.
HOT SPRINGS — To the extent Hall of Fame trainer Jack Van Berg’s opinion mat- ters, there may be a bit more hope for the trainers with entrants in today’s $1 million Arkansas Derby at Oaklawn Park than some think.
The 12-horse field appears heavy at the top with Florida shippers Classic Empire, last year’s top-ranked 2-year-old colt and winner of the 2016 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile raced at Santa Anita Park on Nov. 5, and Malagacy, the winner of Oaklawn’s Grade II Rebel Stakes four weeks ago trained by Todd Pletcher.
But Van Berg, who began his training career in the 1950s, said he entered six-race maiden One Dreamy Dude because he doesn’t perceive the Arkansas Derby field as an insurmountable mountain.
“There ain’t that much in it,” Van Berg said of the Arkansas Derby, the last piece of the Road to the Derby puzzle with its Grade I status and 100-40-20-10 point distribution. “Todd Pletcher’s horse won three, but there hadn’t been a real standout 3-yearold anywhere. The real good ones have got hurt. They’re falling by the wayside.”
Malagacy is undefeated in three starts, all as a 3-yearold. He broke his maiden Jan. 4 at 5½ furlongs at Gulfstream Park in Hallandale, Fla. Malagacy won by 7 lengths at 6½ furlongs in 1:16.55 on Feb. 12, before heading to Arkansas
for the Rebel, his first race around two turns and outside Florida.
Malagacy’s 2-length victory in the Rebel was enough to convince Pletcher that he had another potential Kentucky Derby contender.
“Look, all races are hard to win,” Pletcher said of the chestnut son of Shackleford. “To win three in a row is hard to do, but to win your first three at three different distances at two different tracks is really difficult. A lot of it is about his own natural ability and his own professionalism, to show speed and rate at the same time. The thing I’ve always said is that I’m not sure how far he wants to go.”
Classic Empire is the 8-5 morning-line favorite, but a lot of that respect is out of regard for what the son of Pioneerof the Nile did as a 2-year-old, and 2-year-old champions have not done well in past Arkansas Derbies, especially those who won the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile.
Three winners of the Eclipse Award for 2-year-old males have raced in the Arkansas Derby. Only American Pharoah, in 2015, won. Favorite Trick finished third in 1998 and Answer Lively fourth in 1999.
Favorite Trick and Answer Lively, unlike American Pharoah, each also won the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile and are the only winners of that race to run in the Arkansas Derby.
Malagacy and Classic Empire are joined by Untrapped (third in the Rebel); Sonneteer (second in the Rebel) and Petrov (fourth in the Rebel) as the horses considered at the next level behind the top two.
Sunland Park Derby runner-up Conquest Mo Money is listed at 15-1 on the morning line, but it should be noted that Irap, the fourth-place finisher at Sunland Park, won last Saturday’s Grade II Blue Grass Stakes at Keeneland Race Course in Lexington, Ky. Conquest Mo Money finished 4½ lengths ahead of Irap at Sunland.
Randy Morse, trainer of Silver Dust, fifth in the Rebel, 3½ lengths behind Malagacy, said his colt, a son of Tapit out of the Hard Spun mare Filare L’Oro, will probably improve with the extra 16th of a mile in the 9-furlong Arkansas Derby.
Morse said success for his entrant would likely require a step up similar to the one Silver Dust made in his last start. Silver Dust went from fourth, 12½ lengths back in the Southwest, to 3¼ lengths back in the Rebel.
“He moved forward after his first race,” Morse said of Silver Dust’s performance in the Rebel, “and if he moves forward that much again, we might have a chance.”
Trainer Chris Hartman did not seem bothered that his entrant, Grandpa’s Dream, was listed at 30-1 on the morning line.
Hartman said he understands he and his colt are in deep. Hartman said Grandpa’s Dream, by Shackleford out of a Bernardini mare, has the benefit of his breeding and an owner — Wayne Scherr — with a bucket list that includes participation in the Kentucky Derby.
“My owner really wants to run in this race,” Hartman said. “He has the big Derby on his bucket list, and he’s going to have to run to get that. It’s just basically Derby fever. The horse has been training outstanding. I couldn’t tell him no, and he wanted to go, so we went. He’s going to have to make a big leap forward. Generally, you don’t go from maiden specials to a million-dollar race, but they are young horses, and sometimes they do what they have to do.”
Van Berg was with One Dreamy Dude’s owner Mike
Waters early Friday morning and said Waters had asked him if he had gone nuts when Van Berg told him he wanted to go in the Arkansas Derby.
Van Berg, 80, trained Alysheba to victory in the 1987 Kentucky Derby. He told Waters, a Seattle businessman, that if he’s going to get another shot, it will have to come soon.
“Jack told me last summer that he thought this colt was the best 2-year-old he’d had since Alysheba,” Waters said. “I figured, who am I to question a Hall of Fame trainer.”
Van Berg also said he believes a change of riders to Geovanni Franco will help.
“Nobody’s given him a good ride yet, except once,” Van Berg said.
The closest One Dreamy Dude has come to winning was when he was beaten a nose in a Feb. 4 maiden special weight. He was beaten 1¼ lengths in his next start, Feb. 20, and the winner of that race, Blueridge Traveler, finished second in the Grade III Spiral Stakes, a Kentucky
Derby prep.
Petrov trainer Ron Moquett said trainers frequently have unrealistic hopes. He remembers when his trainee Far Right faced eventual Triple Crown winner American Pharoah in the 2015 Arkansas Derby.
“As somebody who faced American Pharoah, I went in facing him thinking there was a shot I could beat him,” Moquett said. “We are all optimistic, sometimes by job necessity.”
Moquett said luck might have to fall into place for most entrants.
“We know we have a horse with enough talent,” he said. “We just need to get the right breaks and everything to go the right direction.”
“This race definitely has a lot of quality to it,” Hartman said. “I think this race is extremely competitive. There are just a lot of extremely nice horses in this race. It’s a hell of a race, and the horse that wins it will have to be considered in the Derby.”