Watched by fans wearing yellow foam crowns instead of the Egyptian headdresses that greeted American Pharoah in 2015, Justify passed the Test of the Champion in emphatic fashion Saturday to earn a crown of his own.
With a white blaze, a sweeping stride and an unblemished record, Justify came to the site where Pharoah ended a 37-year Triple Crown drought and, guided by the same trainer, took his shot at history Saturday.
Ridden by 52-year-old ironman Mike Smith, Justify did not disappoint the captivated crowd as he went to the lead and stayed, despite a pack of nine contenders closing in behind him, to capture the 150th Belmont Stakes and become the 13th Triple Crown winner.
Justify completed the mile and a half on a fast track in 2 minutes, 28.18 seconds to become the second undefeated Triple Crown winner, along with Seattle Slew in 1977, and to reward his backers with $3.60 on a $2 bet to win. Gronkowski, in a bit of a surprise, finished second (and paid $13.80 to place), while Hofburg was third.
After the race, Smith and Justify went off by themselves around the clubhouse turn to have a quiet moment. Smith, who has earned the nickname Big Money Mike but had never won horse racing’s most coveted prize, was moved to tears.
He had to gather himself because he wanted to bring Justify back to the fans, who stood and cheered and snapped pictures as he took a victory lap past the expansive Belmont Park grandstand. It was not quite 2015, but that mattered little to Justify’s team.
“This horse ran a tremendous race,” Smith said while flashing a wide grin. “He’s so gifted; he was sent from heaven. I can’t even begin to describe my emotions right now.”
Bob Baffert, 65, Justify’s trainer, kept his composure as he walked to the winner’s circle, stopping to pat Ron Turcotte, the jockey for Secretariat, the ninth Triple Crown champion, on the back.
“American Pharoah will always be my first love, but, man, for this horse to do it,” Baffert said, adding later: “This horse never had a break. It was like getting a quarter horse ready to run week after week.”
Baffert grew up on a ranch in the border town Nogales, Arizona, and as a teenager, he rode many of his father’s quarter horses on the Arizona fair circuit. When he became a trainer, he gravitated toward quarter horses, where speed reigned and the prevailing thought was: You can’t win them if you don’t run them.
That background helped prepare Baffert when he became a thoroughbred trainer in the 1990s. He quickly found success and never wavered, not even with Justify, who did not race as a 2-year-old yet was on the verge of winning the Triple Crown.
Since Wednesday, when Justify pulled up to Barn 1 at Belmont Park, minus the police escort that American Pharoah had received, Baffert appeared at ease. Gone were the nerves from 2015, when the curse of 37 years and the hopes of many rested on his shoulders.
He nicknamed his crew Camp Justify, and the bucolic corner barn setting fit the bill. Owners, fans and even rival trainers stopped by to sneak a peek at the undefeated winner of the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness Stakes.
Save for a news helicopter circling during training hours, the scene was as mellow as could be — three years between Triple Crown attempts will have such an effect.
But it is said that history repeats, and it certainly seemed that way Saturday. The great Secretariat ended a 25-year drought in 1973 in record fashion. Then, four years later, Seattle Slew put his perfect stamp on the feat. The next year, the classic rivalry of Affirmed and Alydar reached its peak when Affirmed inched ahead by a head to become the last Triple Crown winner until Pharoah arrived.
But Justify found his own path. He conquered the slop on May 5 to become the first horse since 1882 to win a Kentucky Derby without having raced as a 2-year-old and followed that feat with a damp and daring Preakness victory through soupy fog on May 16 that sent him to New York with the crown on the line.
“Is he the next American Pharoah?” Baffert was asked throughout, and by the Belmont, he believed the answer was yes. (Although, for the record, he thinks Pharoah could beat Justify.)
Still, this was Justify’s sixth race since mid-February, and his previous two had come on sloppy tracks, surely taking a toll. He seemed to have recovered nicely from a hoof bruise after The Derby, but a mile-and-a-half race can expose even the most bulletproof of horses.
On Saturday, Justify wore China Horse Club’s red silks with yellow stars instead of his customary white silks with a green star that represent WinStar Farm — a matter of rotation among the owners. The switch did not matter one bit; Justify stepped into the gate and stood perfectly still. He broke cleanly and went straight to the lead.
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