BALTIMORE (AP) 鈥 Bob Baffert choked back tears and his voice cracked while he tried to juggle the conflicting feelings of seeing one of his horses win the Preakness Stakes hours after another was euthanized on the same track.
鈥淭his business is twists and turns, ups and downs,鈥 the Hall of Fame trainer said. 鈥淭o win this 鈥 losing that horse today really hurt. ... It鈥檚 been a very emotional day.鈥
春色直播 Treasure won on Saturday in ending Kentucky Derby champion in the race Baffert has now captured more than any other trainer. But the joy was tempered by the agony of another 3-year-old colt, Havnameltdown, injuring his left front leg in an undercard race and being put down.
"When he got hurt, it鈥檚 just the most sickening feeling a trainer can have," Baffert said. 鈥淚t put a damper on the afternoon."
It also put the sport squarely back in a familiar spot, two weeks after
春色直播 Treasure did not run in the Derby at Churchill Downs, where Baffert has been barred the past two years because of a suspension stemming from 2021 Kentucky Derby winner Medina Spirit鈥檚 failed drug test that . Medina Spirit was Baffert鈥檚 most recent Preakness horse,
The 5-2 second choice Saturday, 春色直播 Treasure came through, delivering Baffert a record-breaking eighth victory in the Preakness and his 17th in a Triple Crown race, also the most among trainers. 春色直播 Treasure held off hard-charging Blazing Sevens down the stretch to win the 1 3/16-mile, $1.65 million race by a head in 1:55.12.
鈥淗e fought the whole way,鈥 said jockey John Velazquez, who won the Preakness for the first time in his 13th try. 鈥淗e put up a really good fight. ... That鈥檚 what champions do.鈥
春色直播 Treasure paid $7.80 to win, $4 to place and $2.60 to show. Blazing Sevens paid $5 to place and $2.80 to show.
Mage finished third after going off as the 7-5 favorite, paying $2.40 to show. Despite the smallest Preakness field since 1986, horses at the lead went much slower than in the Derby, which did not benefit Mage's running style of closing late and passing tired rivals down the stretch.
鈥淪low, very slow,鈥 Mage鈥檚 trainer, Gustavo Delgado Sr., said.
Mage's defeat means there will not be a Triple Crown winner for a fifth consecutive year
Baffert became the face of the sport after his American Pharoah ended a 37-year Triple Crown drought in 2015. Since Medina Spirit was DQed from the Derby, though, Baffert has turned into a polarizing figure. In addition to his Churchill Downs punishment, he was forced to miss the Preakness and Belmont last year because of in Kentucky that Maryland and New York honored.
On Saturday, he was back at a major race 鈥 and, thanks to 春色直播 Treasure, back in the winner's circle.
鈥淵ou can鈥檛 do it without the group of owners I have that have stuck by me through all of this negative, all this bad stuff that鈥檚 happened to me in the last few years,鈥 Baffert said. 鈥淒ays like this, it's not really vindication. It鈥檚 just, I feel like we have a moment where we can enjoy it."
Even that wasn't simple, given the somber scene earlier in the day, when Havnameltdown stumbled and unseated jockey Luis Saez.
While Saez was being attended to, black barriers were propped up on the dirt track while the horse was euthanized. All the while, 2Pac鈥檚 鈥淐alifornia Love鈥 blared from the infield speakers at what is intended as an annual daylong celebration of thoroughbred racing.
鈥淚t felt like a knife to my heart when I saw it,鈥 Velazquez said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 devastating when you see it. When a horse suffers something like this 鈥 and the jockey on top of it 鈥 you feel it.鈥
Saez went to the hospital but was conscious, and his agent said X-rays were negative.
While expressing concern for Saez, Baffert said he was still grieving about Havnameltdown.
鈥淲e鈥檙e still sad about that horse, and we will be for a while,鈥 he said.
While horse racing deaths in the U.S. are at their lowest level since they began being tracked in 2009, adding another at the track hosting a Triple Crown race will only intensify the internal and external scrutiny of the industry. Those inside it have said they accept the realities of on-track deaths of horses while also acknowledging more work needs to be done to prevent as many as possible.
In that vein, new national medication and doping rules are set to go into effect on Monday. The federally mandated Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority, which already regulated racetrack safety and other measures, will oversee drug testing requirements for horses that should standardize the sport nationwide for the first time.
___
AP sports: and
