Santa Anita Derby: A Preview of the Small Yet Competitive Field

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00:00for the santa anita derby preview this is going to go as race number 10 on saturday

00:05and alexa there are only five horses in this field and they created a new rule last year

00:11because they wanted to make sure that would where all these horses are trying to qualify

00:15that the playing field is as even as possible so if there aren't a lot of horses in some of

00:20these fields there are going to be less qualifying points offered so in this particular race we're

00:25going to be talking about since there are less than six starters there are 20 there's a 25 percent

00:31point reduction so that means the winner gets 75 points the runner-up gets 37 and a half

00:37third place finisher gets 18.75 uh because they just want to make it even if you're only facing

00:43small fields out on the west coast that's really not the same thing as having to beat 10 or 12

00:48other horses on the east coast or in the midwest so i think that's a very fair rule even being

00:53someone out here on the west coast who uh you know it's gonna maybe impact some of these horses

00:57negatively if they can't get enough points but i think that's very fair it's very fair and there's

01:03i think another tier as well like if it were less than five i think it cuts to half right so if one

01:09horse were to scratch out of this race um the points would reduce again so i do think it's a

01:14fair rule it makes a lot of sense obviously a horse winning against four others is much difference

01:19than beating 11 others so and what's really interesting about this race alexa is while it's

01:25not as big of a field as we talked about in the bluegrass or in the wood memorial there are three

01:32horses in this race where if they win they're going to be one of the top betting choices in

01:37the field because right now david aragona made journalism the favorite so if the race were run

01:43today he thinks journalism would be the horse with the shortest odds citizen bull was your

01:49two-year-old champion from last year and barnes has one of the highest speed figures and speed

01:55ratings that we've seen run this year so while it's not the biggest field in the world it's

01:59certainly a field with some quality and kind of an intriguing group to talk about yeah it's i was

02:05kind of thinking okay five horse field here we go gonna roll right through it and then i was like

02:09this is tough yeah because you picking a winner you can really make a case i think for for four

02:15of these five honestly as we go through the field and we start with journalism his win in the san

02:20felipe uh most recently on march the first that was the best race that any horse in this division

02:27has run any of the horses in florida or in kentucky or in california nobody has run a faster

02:34better race than journalism has so i'll give him a lot of credit for that but when we're talking

02:40about saturday can he run as good of a race or faster or does he probably regress a little bit

02:47because he ran such a big race last time i don't know i mean that race was simply dominant and

02:54and just didn't even need all of what journalism had in the tank so um since then trainer michael

03:01mccarthy's put in three maintenance works um and there's two other speedy horses in here so i

03:06think journalism is going to get a perfect trip on paper where he can just sit off and and close so

03:13journalism i'm sure will probably be the favorite you think yeah yeah he's and he's the horse to

03:19beat and he what was so impressive about him is he won that race in the san felipe and it was his

03:26first start of the year so he probably wasn't even at his best in that race yeah he can probably take

03:32a step forward off of that have a little bit more fitness built into him after that race and

03:38remember they're probably trying to point to peak and the first saturday in may so it's kind of a

03:46fun little like back and forth where your horse is going great you want him to keep going well

03:50you don't want to run your best race necessarily on saturday you want to still be able to run a

03:55little bit better than that uh he's going to be really really tough to hold off though he's a fun

03:59horse and i can absolutely understand why anyone thinks of him as the horse to beat right now in

04:05the san anita derby and in the kentucky derby but he's going to face some bob baffert runners uh

04:11right next door to him he's got citizen bull who was the two-year-old champion he won the

04:16breeder's cup juvenile and he most recently won the bob lewis that was his first start of the year

04:22so alexa it's kind of tough to knock what he's done he's four for five and he's won his last

04:27three races in a row yeah he's he's a champ as well i mean he's got enough points already for

04:33the derby and workouts have been really steady he had a bullet workout saturday morning which

04:39shows bob baffert has him you know cranked up and ready to go for this race so um he's gonna be

04:46tough as well

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