BALTIMORE — Kent Desormeaux kept looking back, and no one was coming. Not even close, and once again it was Big Brown first and the rest nowhere. The Pimlico crowd of 112,222 roared, saluting greatness that is rarely seen.
It was hard to imagine that his Preakness triumph Saturday could be easier and more impressive than his Kentucky Derby runaway, but it was.
When Desormeaux turned the muscular bay colt loose leaving the far turn, the race was over instantly. Under a stranglehold through the final sixteenth of a mile, Big Brown cantered to a 5-length romp over 39-1 shot Macho Again, who beat 22-1 Icabad Crane by a half-length.
Big Brown’s margin could have been 15, but his rider was saving him for a shot at the first Triple Crown sweep since Affirmed in 1978.
“I asked him for his stride at the corner, and it was like deja vu from the Derby,” Desormeaux said. “It almost looked like a replay. He just set sail. I looked back between my legs, under my arms, and they were eight (lengths) back. I just stopped riding and reeled him in and made sure he didn’t pull himself up. What a lovely ride I had, an armchair ride with a big button. It was just the easiest win ever. Woo!”
Big Brown paid $2.40 after running 1 3/16 miles on a fast track in 1:54.80, although he wasn’t really running all the way.
After Big Brown broke a length slowly from post 6, Desormeaux had him on the rail in third, tracking front-running Gayego and Riley Tucker, entering the first turn.
“I was nervous as nuts the first quarter of a mile,” Desormeaux said. “He’s so strong, and at the start, he powered out with his back legs and slipped. He didn’t come out of the gate until his second stride, so Plan A and Plan B went out the window.”
Plan C worked out pretty well. As the field of 12 curled into the backstretch, Desormeaux moved out into the three-path, out of trouble, still tracking Gayego and Riley Tucker. “Going to the back side, once I saw Kent had him third on the outside, I knew it was over,” trainer Rick Dutrow said.
For the seventh time in the past 12 years, a horse will go for racing’s rarest trophy in Elmont. Big Brown is only the fourth horse to go to the Belmont Stakes undefeated, along with Majestic Prince (1969), Seattle Slew (1977) and Smarty Jones (2004). Can he finally get the job done where Silver Charm (1997), Real Quiet (‘98), Charismatic (‘99), War Emblem (2002), Funny Cide (‘03) and Smarty Jones all failed?
“It doesn’t look like he had to get down on his belly today,” Dutrow said. “So we should have a lot of horse left for three weeks from now.”
That’s when Big Brown will go for everlasting glory in the grueling, 1-mile “Test of the Champion.” Ten years ago, Desormeaux missed by a heartbreaking nose there when Victory Gallop caught Real Quiet in the final stride. Against all odds, the 38-year-old Cajun Hall of Famer has another chance at the ultimate prize.
“I just think this guy knows what he’s doing, and I’m happy to be his pilot,” Desormeaux said. “At the sixteenth pole, after knuckling on him with my elbows and whatnot for about 100 yards, I said, ‘That’s enough.’ … So he went back to the barn with a lot left in the tank, and I think I made Mr. Dutrow’s job easier.”
Dutrow was uncharacteristically nervous about bringing his superstar back in only two weeks for the first time, but he needn’t have worried.
“He’s a freak,” Dutrow said. “He’s a champ.”
And on June 7, he could become an immortal.
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