Brad Cox picked up his first Triple Crown victory with Very important Quality’s romp to victory in the Belmont Stakes on Saturday whereas waiting to be pleased a look at if he’ll be awarded one other from the Kentucky Derby.
Cox will seemingly be a Derby winner with Mandaloun if Bob Baffert-trained Medina Spirit is disqualified. But Cox was in a space to expertise this one with Very important Quality beating Hot Rod Charlie by one-and-a-quarter lengths.
Very important Quality, who went off as the 6-5 favourite, passed early chief Hot Rod Charlie around the final turn and held on to win the $1m chase.
“That was a long method around there a mile-a-half of but it completely was exciting,” Cox acknowledged. “It seemed esteem the horse on the inside, he nonetheless had bustle left. I knew it was going to be a fight down the lane.”
Preakness winner Rombauer was third and Identified Agenda fourth.
Very important Quality, a striking gray colt, finished fourth as a beaten favourite in the Kentucky Derby thanks to a tough day slip back and forth. Very important Quality confirmed in the Belmont why he has long been considered considered one of the important discontinue three-yr-olds in the country.
“In the Kentucky Derby we were so assured that we’re gonna win that chase,” acknowledged jockey Luis Saez, who won a Triple Crown chase for the main time. “He was ready for the chase. But we be pleased somewhat of downhearted begin … At the present time the main thing was try to wreck trim and the rest I know he’s gonna finish it.”
Backdooring his method to becoming the main Louisville-born trainer to win the Kentucky Derby wouldn’t enable Cox the same joy of victory as the Belmont, which the up-and-coming megastar will seemingly bear in mind as his first correct Triple Crown triumph. And Cox saw this coming. He predicted last summer season that Very important Quality would be his horse for the Belmont, and that proved correct in beating a complex field of seven assorted horses.
The chase was bustle and not using a horse trained by Baffert, who was banned by the Recent York Racing Association after Medina Spirit failed a publish-Derby drug test for the presence of a steroid. Churchill Downs suspended Baffert for two years after a second sample from the Derby came advantage certain for betamethasone, which is prohibited at any level on chase day in Kentucky, Maryland and Recent York.
Normalcy returned to the Belmont after a topsy-turvy 2020 that featured the chase leading off the Triple Crown at an empty racetrack.
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Very important Quality wins Belmont Stakes as banned Baffert stays in background
