Fastspeed,

With the exception of Mr. Mellon, I like your short list but not without some concerns.

Saarland – He was my early Derby pick back in September and everything about him: his looks, breeding, connections, running style, 2yo campaign – all scream "Derby Horse!" However, I absolutely hate the 2-race, Gothom/Wood campaign. Only 2 prep races and one of them just a 1-turn mile. Secretariat is about the only horse I can recall that parlayed the Gotham/Wood route to a Derby win and he had an earlier prep as a 3yo and he was, well... "Secretariat." Still, a good run in the Wood without winning (to help keep the odds up as HP pointed out) would make Saarland tempting. I will have a hard time not keying him since I have been touting him for 7 months now. Still, given the prep route, I think he is more likely to win the Belmont than the Derby.

Azillion – Right now his connections say he may skip the Derby. At 60-1 in Future Book 3, I had to take a shot on him and hope that he runs well enough in the Blue Grass to give them a serious case of "Derby Fever." If he goes in the Derby (assuming that his Blue Grass is not too bad or too good), he could be my key. He fits the profile nicely.

Perfect Drift – looks solid. It would have been nice to see him run somewhere other than TP this year but he does also have a good race at CD, which is encouraging. He fits the profile nicely although the 6-week break prior to the Derby is a concern. I posted the data on such horses and it is not real promising. From a recovery standpoint, the 6-week break looks great but I just don't know if you can get a young 3yo fit enough to get the Derby distance off such a long break. There may be a good reason why nobody had done it in recent history. I know that the European trainers do it all the time but those are turf races in which the early pace is normally very slow, which makes those races really more like sprints than Marathons. The Derby is run on dirt and usually under a very stressful early pace, which requires a much fitter horse to get the distance. Still at likely 20-1 or higher odds, he will be very tempting.

Essence of Dubai- Certainly has a better shot of winning than any previous Godolphin Derby entrant and yet he went off at surprisingly long odds in the Future Book 3. He also fits the profile but, like Saarland he had only 2 preps and like Perfect Drift he will have a 6-week break coming into the Derby. However, his second prep was very novel in that it was at the Derby distance. It is obvious that Godolphin is obsessed with winning the Derby "their way" and that they will keep experimenting until they finally get it right. Maybe this year, they have. Also, Godolphin tends to be a layoff outfit anyway and with all their quality stock, they probably ran him in several unofficial "training" races in addition to his 2 official preps. He is another horse that would be very tempting at a price.

I can envision the winner and maybe the exacta coming from these 4 horses and all could be at generous odds given 20 betting interests. This race looks wide open and I will have a hard time giving any horse much more than a 15-20 percent chance of winning the race so I will feel "lucky" to cash even if I think I have managed to zero in on the most likely winner.

Let's see what happens this weekend.


Chris