BAFFERT SORTS DERBY HOPEFULS
Life is Good, Medina Spirit top choices in Grade II San Felipe
Bob Baffert has won the Kentucky Derby a recordtying six times. And he’s taken six different roads to get to that Churchill Downs winner’s circle.
But this year he’s going back to his 2020 playbook, except, of course, with the Kentucky Derby in May instead of September. Last year, Authentic’s first three races were a maiden race at Del Mar, the Sham Stakes at Santa Anita and the San Felipe, also at Santa Anita.
Life is Good, possibly the best of Baffert’s four Derby contenders this year, is taking the same path. Today the 3-year-old colt is the 4-5 morning-line favorite in the 11⁄16-mile Grade II San Felipe Stakes on Big ’Cap day in only his third race. The winner is all but assured a spot in the 20-horse Kentucky Derby on May 1.
Authentic finished second in the logical next step after the San Felipe, the Santa Anita Derby. That was followed by a win in July in the Haskell, something that won’t happen this year, and finally the Kentucky Derby in September.
Authentic and Life is Good have some of the same characteristics.
“We have really deep racetrack (at Santa Anita) and he just glides over the top of it,” Baffert said while watching his horses gallop Friday morning.
“Authentic was the same way. Some horses struggle with it, they can’t get through it. But he gets through it really well. He’s extremely quick. He’s fast.”
Both horses also have the same sire, Into Mischief.
Certainly, there is no magical path to win the Kentucky Derby. Baffert’s first winner was Silver Charm in 1997 and the San Felipe was his fifth race. Real Quiet made his 11th start in the San Felipe when he won the Derby in 1998. Baffert’s other three winners — War Emblem (2002), American Pharoah (2015) and Justify (2018) — did not run in the San Felipe.
“It depends when they are ready to run as to how many races they have,” Baffert said.
“If a horse has an issue, like Justify, you back them off and that’s why he was late to the party. Prep races are hard, which is why what Justify did (winning the Santa Anita Derby in his third start) was extraordinary.”
The goal for Life is Good today is for jockey Mike Smith to get the horse to relax early in the race and not burn himself out by the finish.
In the Sham Stakes, he took a 4-length lead into the stretch, which was whittled down to three-quarters of a length by the finish line.
“We’ve been working on him to shut it down on the backside, to relax a little bit,” Baffert said.
“As they get older, they start to figure it out, but with just two (races) it’s a little difficult. But there is nothing like racing to get them to learn how to relax.”
Baffert also has the second choice in today’s race, Medina Spirit, at 7-2. He won a maiden race at Los Alamitos, finished second to Life is Good in the Sham and then got an extra race in, winning the Robert B. Lewis Stakes.
“Medina Spirit is another horse that nobody talks about.” Baffert said. “He’s really tough and I really didn’t want to ship him out because he’s sort of lightbodied. Maybe his next prep I might ship him out.
“It’s not until you stretch them out to 11⁄8 (miles), and that’s when they start to separate. Because at 11⁄16 they are still all going to be right there. They are going to go fast early and then they stagger home while another horse comes from the back.”
Also given some attention in the seven-horse race is The Great One (4-1), who broke his maiden by 14 lengths in his fifth try, Dream Shake (5-1), an impressive maiden winner last month in his debut, and Roman Centurian (8-1), second in the Lewis.
Baffert’s other two Derby hopefuls are Spielberg, a $1-million purchase, who finished second last week in the Southwest Stakes at Oaklawn Park, and Concert Tour, who is undefeated in two starts including a win in the San Vicente.
Both colts seem to be looking at their Derby path through Arkansas. Baffert is considering the Arkansas Derby for Spielberg’s next race and Concert Tour runs next Saturday in the Rebel Stakes at Oaklawn.
“I think this is when you start getting excited, whether your horse belongs or not,” Baffert said.
For some, that question will be answered today.
If you’ve been watching experts and commentators appearing on television from their homes, their increased attention to decor might look familiar: In the early days of lockdown, they, like many of us, sat in front of blank white walls, while now their homes frequently display prominent artwork.
“Cinderella has nothing on these people,” said Claude Taylor, who created the Room Rater Twitter account with his fiancée, Jessie Bahrey. “I don’t think art is even something people thought of in April.”
Room Rater scores speakers’ setups on a 10point scale for details like lighting and camera level. Good artwork can boost a score. For example, Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson scored a 10/10 for appearing on “Morning Joe” in front of artwork by his wife, Avis.
It seems many Americans who are stuck staring at their walls have decided the pandemic gives them a good reason to pretty them up.
My first hint at an uptick in art spending came last summer. When businesses shuttered and laid off em
ployees in March, we braced for my artist husband’s sales to plummet. For a while they did. But then, his numbers didn’t just return to normal. They spiked.
I thought it might be an anomaly. My husband, John Tebeau, illustrates beloved bars; maybe people were buying his bar art because they missed their favorite watering holes?
But then friends who work at a framing shop said they were as busy last fall as at Christmas. Artists we know said they, too, were selling more than usual.
Online arts marketplace Etsy confirmed the trend. Comparing March-December 2020 to the same nine months in 2019, Etsy reported:
• a 95 percent increase in searches for wall art.
• an 80 percent increase in searches for stained glass window or wall hangings.
• a 46 percent increase in searches for sculptures.
Etsy doesn’t release data on actual sales. It’s fair to assume at least some of those searches were daydreams that never led to purchases, if my own time scrolling through listings for upstate houses I have no intention of buying is any indication.
Adobe Analytics does track purchases online, and those numbers are even more dramatic: Average daily sales of “art goods,” which includes sculptures, artworks and frames, increased 134 percent between the pre-COVID-19 months of 2020 and last fall. Comparing September and October 2019 to the same two months in 2020, average online daily sales increased 109 percent. Adobe’s analysis of e-commerce sales includes 80 of the 100 largest online retailers in the U.S.
Atiba T. Edwards has just the combination of experience to explain what’s happening. He worked in banking for several years and is also the co-founder of the arts nonprofit FOKUS, which offers arts education, hosts art events and publishes an online magazine.
Edwards noted that many people who kept working during the lockdown suddenly weren’t spending money on travel, going out to restaurants or movies, or getting babysitters. They
were probably home more than ever before, so they might have redirected some of that discretionary income to art.
Edwards is an example himself. He loves and appreciates art, but in the before times, he left his Brooklyn apartment early in the morning, went to work as chief operating officer of the Brooklyn Children’s Museum, then got home late after coaching basketball or going to an art event. Now he works more at home, and misses seeing art at work and elsewhere.
“I have hung six pieces in the last three months,” he said.
Edwards has worked with hundreds of artists as executive director of FOKUS, trying to create accessible art experiences in nontraditional spaces. He believes the traditional art show or gallery experience feels intimidating to someone who doesn’t feel knowledgeable about art, while social media algorithms can serve up artists to peruse with no pressure to buy.
Higher unemployment rates caused by the pandemic mean many people, of course, don’t have the money
to buy art now.
But for some of those still working, buying art can also be an attempt to help support others.
“I had people reaching out to buy a piece of art to save my gallery,” said Eden Stein, owner of Secession Art and Design in San Francisco, which sells the works of about 70 creators. “That money not only supported my family, it supported the artists and their communities.”
Stein said making art sales during the pandemic has felt a little like a wedding reception: She has reconnected with friends and clients from throughout the gallery’s 13-year history.
Typically, Stein would host two or three events a month, while foot traffic to nearby restaurants and a music venue next door would also bring in new visitors. Instead, for the last year, she’s talked to many buyers by phone or arranged visits by appointment.
“This year has been really personal.” Stein said. “If you can’t hug people, selling a piece of artwork feels a little like that.”