Daily Racing Form National Digital Edition
Triple Crown nominations led by Cox, Pletcher, Baffert
Horses from the barns of Brad Cox, Todd Pletcher, and Bob Baffert make up 28 percent of the 369 horses made early nominees to this year’s Triple Crown.
The 369 nominees, which includes a record 37 horses based in Japan, represents an 18.2 percent increase from the 312 nominated last year.
The list was released Tuesday afternoon by Churchill Downs, which hosts the first leg of the Triple Crown, the $3 million Kentucky Derby, on May 6. The other races in the series are the $1.5 million Preakness at Pimlico on May 20 and the $1.5 million Belmont Stakes at Belmont Park on June 10.
The first deadline to nominate to the Triple Crown, for a fee of $600, passed on Jan. 28. There is a second nomination deadline, March 27, at which time it would cost $6,000 to nominate to all three races. A horse could be supplemented to one of the Triple Crown races for a sizeable sum, for example, $200,000 for the Kentucky Derby.
Cox’s 38 nominees lead all trainers and top the 26 he had last year. His group includes Instant Coffee, the Kentucky Jockey Club and Lecomte winner; Victory Formation, undefeated winner of the Smarty Jones; and Verifying, the Grade 1 Champagne runner-up and recent allowance winner at Oaklawn Park. Cox is the trainer of the recorginized 2021 Kentucky Derby winner, Mandaloun. Cox won the Belmont that year with Essential Quality.
Pletcher, a two-time Kentucky Derby winner and four-time Belmont Stakes winner, has 36 nominees, down from 42 a year ago. Pletcher’s group is led by Forte, last year’s 2-yearold champion and three-time Grade 1 winner, and includes Tapit Trice, an impressive allowance winner last weekend at Gulfstream Park, and Julia Shining, one of just two fillies among the early nominees. Hoosier Philly, trained by Tom Amoss, is the other.
There are 29 horses nominated from the barn of Baffert, who has won 16 Triple Crown races, including six Kentucky Derbies. His strong contingent this year is led by Arabian Knight, winner of the Southwest Stakes; two-time Grade 1 winner Cave Rock; and stakes winners Reincarnate and Newgate.
Baffert is currently banned from running horses in this year’s Kentucky Derby, owing to a suspension by Churchill Downs stemming from the positive post-race test of Medina Spirit, who crossed the wire first but was disqualified from the 2021 Derby.
On the nomination sheet where the trainer’s name is listed, it reads TBD for the Baffert nominees. That’s because those horses, under Churchill’s rules, must be moved to another trainer by Feb. 28 in order to be eligible to accrue Derby points in designated points-scoring races.
Baffert is currently fighting that ban, a hearing for which was held over two days last week.
Baffert is clear to run horses in his name in both the Preakness and Belmont Stakes.
Last year, Baffert had two of his Kentucky Derby horses, Taiba and Messier, transferred to Tim Yakteen prior to their final Derby preps.
Following Baffert, the next highest number of Triple Crown nominees come from trainers Steve Asmussen (13), Kenny McPeek (13), and Chad Brown (12). Japanese-based trainer Hideyuki Mori, who ran Ski Captain in the 1995 Kentucky Derby and France Go De Ina in the 2021 Preakness and Belmont Stakes, has 12 Triple Crown nominees.
Spendthrift Farm is the leading owner with 19 nominees, either owned wholly or in partnership.
Churchill Downs awards 18 spots in the Derby starting gate to horses who earn the most points in designated prep races in North America. Churchill also holds one spot for the horse that earns the most points in designated races in Japan and Europe.
Dermo Sotogake and Continuar, the two top point earners in the Japanese series, comprise two of 37 Japanese-bases horses nominated to the Triple Crown. Continuar is one of two Triple Crown nominees trained by Yoshito Yahagi, who won two Breeders’ Cup races at Del Mar in 2021.
Aidan O’Brien has nominated three horses to the Triple Crown, including Victoria Road, winner of the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf.