At 40-1, Maker became my underkey (part-backwheel) when Chad scratched his horse. I killed the race. Beware Maker’s young horses this time of year zooming forward. Especially at Turfway soon. It happens every Spring with him there. Here though, at Tampa, he scored a nice check but he apparently did not move forward.

During the week, everyone expected huge volcanic rain at Tampa last Saturday. Funny to turn to that race and see it sunny with a dry track. Did track maintenance scrape it beforehand? Was it speed-biased? The winner and Maker went 1-2 all around the track. Maker rail-all and the winner 2-path-all. The winner won by 2 lengths. Brian Lynch’s good horses tend to run pretty “straight” ThoroGraph’s (though 2nd off a layoff they can improve a bit), so I presume CLASSIC CAUSEWAY paired his Sam Davis. And if the winner paired, it makes sense that Maker paired too.

By the way, with no Baffert this year in the Derby, it's worth noting CLASSIC CAUSEWAY breaks really well from the gate. Does he break better than any west-coast-based Derby-bound speedballs? Asmussen's speedball at FG?