I thought he wasn't going to run and it was going to be a disaster, but Cornelio said he had plenty of horse and he was just cruising. He knew more about him than I did. It's hard to tell through binoculars. He manages to handle things smoothly and he's an absolute pleasure to train. |
I'm glad he ran a good race. [Prado] had to get into him a little bit, which was good because I think he needed a wake-up call. |
I'm just happy he showed some life this time. The biggest thing is that he proved he could still run hard from the start and finish strong. |
It was a little slower than I wanted him to go, but we just wanted him to stretch his legs. Everything is on go, as long as everything goes well. I'd like to see how he comes out of the workout tomorrow and gallop him on Wednesday before we enter him. |
It was only his second start since July, and he had to fight hard. I'd have rather seen him not get hit and win by five, but I'm happy. |
It was probably too much pressure on him. I wish I had a more definitive answer. Maybe he's just not as good as he was. |
Last year was a lost year for him, and we're lucky anything worse didn't happen. |
Probably good judgment and good sense would say not to run, but there is only one Kentucky Derby. |
Probably with good judgment and good sense, you wouldn't do it. But there again, they're only 3 once, and there's only one Derby. It's hard to deny them that when they've done nothing wrong in 2006. |
Richie said he started to idle, and then Richie panicked and cracked him. You really don't want to hit him any more than you have to. He got him running again, but I think it caught him off guard. |
So far so good -- he's done everything we've asked of him. We've had a couple of setbacks. We wanted to run in the Wood. That was our perfect plan, but it wasn't to be. We considered the Blue Grass [April 15], but he needed another week and another breeze. So we decided it was best to wait for this race. We have to win here to make it to the Derby. |
This is going to be a big jump for him. I usually don't like to do this sort of thing, but he's got such a good psyche about him. He does things with such ease. Mentally, it's like he's done it 100 times. |
Too many things can happen to start getting excited. |
We'll probably run, but first let's see how he comes out of this. |