Derby decision remains hot topic
Owner says horse did not deserve disqualification
The owner of disqualified Kentucky Derby winner Maximum Security on Sunday denied his horse had interfered with the declared winner and said it was unlikely the horse would run in the May 18 Preakness, the second leg of U.S. racing’s Triple Crown.
Gary West, in an interview with Daily Racing Form, added that he may need to appeal the Kentucky Derby decision to U.S. federal courts because of Kentucky regulations.
Maximum Security on Saturday became the first horse in the history of the 145-year-old race to be disqualified after crossing the line first.
Stewards ruled Maximum Security was guilty of a contact foul when he drifted out heading into the stretch and affected the progress of several horses. They awarded the win to long-shot Country House.
West denied Maximum Security had impeded the winner and said he was contemplating what to do next.
“I don’t think we came within 10 or 20 feet of the winner (Country House),” he said. “Certainly we did not bother the winner.”
As for appealing the decision, “the only recourse a person would have would
be to get it into the federal court system,” because of Kentucky regulations, West said, according to Daily Racing Form’s website http://www.drf.com.
“I don’t know we’re going to do (that). I want to see the video, I want to understand the facts. I want time to think about it.”
West said he had requested a meeting with stewards to go over the video but that the request was denied. He said he was told the first opportunity to review the video would be on Thursday, the next day of live racing at Churchill Downs.
Neither West nor the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission could be reached for comment. Stewards’ “findings of fact and determination shall be final and shall not be subject to appeal,” according to racing commission statues.
Maximum Security’s trainer, Jason Servis, was a no-show at Churchill Downs on Sunday. On Saturday night, Servis was numb, on Sunday morning he was simply forlorn. “For what it’s worth, I think my horse was the best horse,” Servis said via text message to Churchill Downs officials.
This is uncharted territory even in a sport that faces an uncertain future after a surge in fatalities at Santa Anita Park this winter — 23 over a threemonth span — left animal welfare activists and many in the general public questioning whether horse racing is too cruel and might be better off banned.
Even President Donald Trump weighed in Sunday, tweeting that the decision was “not a good one.” He wrote: “Only in these days of political correctness could such an overturn occur. The best horse did NOT win the Kentucky Derby not even close!”
Bill Mott, the trainer of Country House, who finished second but was officially named the 65-1 long-shot winner, was empathetic to West and Servis and all those horseplayers who had to rip up their winning Maximum Security tickets. But he continued to take the position of what is right is right, especially in these perilous times for the sport.
“I really believe that the call that was made yesterday really shows the integrity of sport,” Mott said. “It wasn’t an easy call, but if they let that go yesterday, I think it would have been much more talked about.”
Trainer Mark Casse, whose colt, War of Will, took the worst of the bumping and is lucky to have
bounced out of the race healthy, said, “As much as I want to win the Kentucky Derby, I feel like a lucky man today because I just got him out and jogged him and he’s perfect. The horse racing world should be happy War of Will is such an athlete because not every horse doesn’t go down there.”
Even though neither Casse nor Gaffalione filed an objection about the incident, Casse said he had known that Maximum Security was coming down.
“They had to take him down,” Casse said. “A lot of people said the best horse won, you know, maybe he did. But we would have liked the chance. Should he have come down? Absolutely. It doesn’t matter if it’s the Kentucky Derby or not. The horse put people’s lives in danger. He put jockeys’ lives in danger.”
So why didn’t Casse call foul? He and Servis are friends, he said. He respects the Wests. He loves the sport, and yes, there’s a code.
“If I claim foul, it ruins the biggest accomplishment in his life and the only thing that’s going to do is move me up to sixth,” he said. “Would you claim foul? No. Should Tyler have claimed foul? No. I stand by that.”