Chris Berman voice: “Allow me to be the first to wish you a Happy Preakness Week, Baltimore.”
It’s an emotional week here in town because the 150th running of the Preakness will be the final edition run at the “Old Pimlico.” The facility has existed for 155 years and has been in need of an overhaul for … 100 of them?
It’s finally happening. Like, actually happening. Not rumors that it’s happening but actually it’s all going to fall apart next month and we’re going to spend the next four years talking about how Preakness is moving to Florida. Happening for real. There’s going to be a new Pimlico. It’s real.
What a celebration this should be. With the facility finally set to be fixed, there’s nothing but smooth sailing now ahead for the second leg of the Triple Cro … oh, damn it.
You see kids, you’ll have to ask your parents about the “Triple Crown.” In the past, a horse that won the Kentucky Derby would then attempt to win the Preakness and Belmont in hopes of achieving a sort of horse racing immortality. Between 1919 and 1978, 11 horses actually did it! Then we spent 37 years wondering if the format was too difficult and needed to be changed. Adults had gone their entire lives without experiencing a Triple Crown winner. But then, magically, it turned out it actually could be done! American Pharoah and Justify accomplished the feat in 2015 and 2018, respectively, breathing life back into the sport.
Sadly, however, the Triple Crown died. We don’t know exactly when it died or who killed it or why, but the instead of the two modern Triple Crown winners proving the achievement was possible, it instead inspired many in the industry to give up and completely stop trying. So we’ve got that going for us.
Perhaps it sounds like bitterness since this year’s Kentucky Derby winner Sovereignty is passing on running in the Preakness. And while yes, it most certainly kneecaps the significance of this year’s Preakness, it’s bigger than that. Before the decision was official, trainer Bill Mott had said that it wouldn’t be a difficult decision to skip the race. A number of industry insiders I talked to this week suggested to me it wasn’t just Mott and that other trainers may have made the same decision had their horse won the Derby.
Many people who care about the sport have decried the decision, pointing out how harmful it is to the sport on the whole. Sovereignty is owned by Godolphin, the stables owned by Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the ruler of Dubai and vice president and prime minister of the UAE. The criticism directed his way must be particularly cutting since he’s only worth $4 billion.
That’s the problem, right? How do you convince the wealthiest people on the face of the planet that the allure and significance of pursuing a Triple Crown should be the driving factor in the decisions they make about their investments? It has always been a lot to ask horses to turn around and run again in two weeks after the Derby.
The easy thing to say is to move the dates back in order to encourage horses to participate. This debate came up in the years before American Pharoah’s breakthrough and was almost always met with pushback from purists who suggested it would ruin the history and significance of the Triple Crown.
Not everyone agrees. NBC horse racing analyst Randy Moss suggests that lengthening the time between Triple Crown races isn’t what would cheapen the value of the Triple Crown. He says that what’s happening right now is what’s cheapening the Triple Crown.
“The longest tradition in the Triple Crown, and what the Triple Crown is supposed to be all about, is pitting the best 3-year-olds against each other in all three races, OK? That’s no longer happening,” Moss told me.
Just three Derby horses (American Promise, Journalism and Sandman) will run in the Preakness. That’s down from five when American Pharoah ended the Triple Crown drought in 2015. In 1989 — the year of the legendary Sunday Silence-Easy Goer duel — six of the top eight finishers in Louisville ran 14 days later in Baltimore. Pushing the date of the Preakness might not guarantee half of the Derby field running again. But it would almost certainly improve the field overall, perhaps nullifying the perception of the accomplishment losing luster.
So it’s simple, right? Just move the date back, right? The Maryland Jockey Club has actually hoped to move the Preakness date back for the past few years. The New York Racing Association has been less receptive about doing the same for the Belmont. Super healthy for the sport! Great stuff, guys!
You would think that the potential death of Triple Crown contenders would be enough to make the NYRA reconsider. The common belief among many in the industry (Moss included) is that the answer would be to run the Preakness the first weekend of June and then the Belmont the first weekend of July. Racing is typically held at Belmont surrounding the Fourth of July, so it would seem as though the dates should work.
As much as I enjoy tradition, I’ve changed my mind. It’s time. Not just for the health of the Preakness but for the health of the sport, the dates need to move. Hopefully this will be solved by the time of the first Preakness at the new Pimlico in 2027.
Photo Credit: Mitch Stringer/PressBox