Watchmaker: Beyers tell a slowing story for Justify
We already know Justify is a very special horse. He sealed that deal when he became the first in 136 years to win the Kentucky Derby without having raced at 2, and only strengthened his case when he won the Preakness to now stand on the verge of becoming only the 13th to ever sweep the Triple Crown.
And we already know Justify is a fast horse. No 3-year-old so far this year has bettered the 107 Beyer Figure he earned winning the Santa Anita Derby. In fact, Justify currently owns three of the five highest 3-year-old Beyers this year at any distance.
The above is stated for context for what I’m going to note next.
As tremendous as Justify is, his Preakness was slow. It was historically slow. It was, to be precise, the slowest Preakness in terms of Beyer Figures since Preakness Beyers were first made available to the public in 1991.
Here is a table of Preakness winners since 1991 and their winning Beyers:
| HORSE (YEAR) | WINNING PREAKNESS BEYER FIGURE |
|---|---|
| Justify (2018) | 97 |
| Cloud Computing (2017) | 102 |
| Exaggerator (2016) | 101 |
| American Pharoah (2015) | 102 |
| California Chrome (2014) | 105 |
| Oxbow (2013) | 106 |
| I'll Have Another (2012) | 109 |
| Shackleford (2011) | 104 |
| Lookin At Lucky (2010) | 102 |
| Rachel Alexandra (2009) | 108 |
| Big Brown (2008) | 100 |
| Curlin (2007) | 111 |
| Bernardini (2006) | 113 |
| Afleet Alex (2005) | 112 |
| Smarty Jones (2004) | 118 |
| Funny Cide (2003) | 114 |
| War Emblem (2002) | 109 |
| Point Given (2001) | 111 |
| Red Bullet (2000) | 109 |
| Charismatic (1999) | 107 |
| Real Quiet (1998) | 111 |
| Silver Charm (1997) | 118 |
| Louis Quatorze (1996) | 112 |
| Timber Country (1995) | 106 |
| Tabasco Cat (1994) | 112 |
| Prairie Bayou (1993) | 98 |
| Pine Bluff (1992) | 104 |
| Hansel (1991) | 117 |
The 97 Beyer that Justify received for his Preakness performance fell just shy of Prairie Bayou’s previous low of 98 in 1993. It was also five points shy of the 102 American Pharoah got in his Triple Crown year of 2015, but I always considered that number a best guess under the circumstances. A wild storm before that race changed the track completely, and made generating a truly reliable number almost impossible.
Notably, Justify’s Preakness Beyer fell a staggering 21 points short of the best-ever published Preakness Beyers of 118 earned by Silver Charm in 1997, and Smarty Jones in 2004. Given the value of one length at the Preakness distance of 1 3/16 miles, that 21-point gap equals a difference of approximately 16 lengths. That’s a lot of lengths.
If you are wondering how Justify’s Derby and Preakness efforts stack up against the 10 others in the published Beyer Figure era who, like Justify, went into the Belmont Stakes with a shot to sweep the Triple Crown, I have you covered. I was wondering the same thing, and here is a table reflecting that data:
| HORSE (YEAR) | WINNING DERBY BEYER | WINNING PREAKNESS BEYER | BELMONT BEYER (FINISH) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Justify (2018) | 103 | 97 | ?? |
| American Pharoah (2015) | 105 | 102 | 105 (1st by 5 1/2) |
| California Chrome (2014) | 97 | 105 | 98 (4th, dead-heat, by 1 3/4) |
| I'll Have Another (2012) | 101 | 109 | Did not start |
| Big Brown (2008) | 109 | 100 | Eased |
| Smarty Jones (2004) | 107 | 118 | 100 (2nd by 1) |
| Funny Cide (2003) | 109 | 114 | 104 (3rd by 5) |
| War Emblem (2002) | 114 | 109 | 82 (8th by 19 1/2) |
| Charismatic (1999) | 108 | 107 | 107 (3rd by 1 1/2, broke down) |
| Real Quiet (1998) | 107 | 111 | 110 (2nd by a nose) |
| Silver Charm (1997) | 115 | 118 | 109 (2nd by 3/4) |
We are obviously dealing with a small sample size, but I found two things interesting. First, the only one of these 10 Kentucky Derby/Preakness winners since 1997 who improved Beyer-wise from the Preakness to the Belmont was the only one who completed the Triple Crown sweep – American Pharoah. However, as I noted above, you have to be careful with American Pharoah’s Preakness Beyer, and it’s best not to stake your life on his three-point improvement off the Preakness in the Belmont.
Of course, I’ll Have Another didn’t start in the 2012 Belmont, so we don’t know if he would have earned a lower Beyer in the Belmont like every other horse on this list except for Charismatic. Charismatic matched the 107 Beyer he got in the 1999 Preakness in the Belmont, but it’s easy to think that with a fair shake, he might have done better. Don’t forget, Charismatic suffered a career-ending injury finishing third in his Belmont and was pulled up just past the wire.
One other thing I found intriguing on the second table is how the two horses who tailed off the most significantly Beyer-wise from the Derby though the Preakness (I’m leaving out American Pharoah for reasons already noted twice), as Justify did going from a 103 at Churchill to that 97, are the two who performed the worst in the Belmont.
War Emblem in 2002 fell off five Beyer points from the Derby to the Preakness, and finished a distant eighth in the Belmont after stumbling at the start, getting an 82 Beyer. Big Brown fell off nine points from the Derby to the Preakness, and he was distanced, and eased in the Belmont.
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Now, if you still want to feel all warm and fuzzy about Justify’s prospects in the Belmont and for a sweep of the Triple Crown, go right ahead. There is plenty of reason to. Maybe Justify just needed to get a sub-par race out of his system, and it says a lot that he was able to win a race like the Preakness while delivering the weakest performance of his still-brief career, at least from a Beyer standpoint. And while history suggests Justify won’t run appreciably faster in the Belmont – take another look at that second table – no one in his class has yet run faster than he. Even if Justify doesn’t run especially fast in the Belmont, chances are no one else in the field is capable of running faster.
But you can literally see in the tables above why a lot of folks will be betting against him on Belmont Day.
** One thing is for certain, Justify’s path to a Triple Crown was made easier when it was announced Friday that Audible, winner of the Holy Bull and Florida Derby, a rallying third in the Kentucky Derby, and the one many considered to be Justify’s biggest threat in the Belmont, will not start.
Justify and Audible share common ownership and I don’t blame the owners for making the decision they did. I’d make the same decision if I were in their shoes, and I think every other sane person would, too. Sure, it’s not ideal that Justify won’t be facing the best competition available in the Belmont, but if he wins, the memory of that will quickly fade. And let’s not forget that Justify was clearly superior to Audible when they met for the first time in the Derby.
But I wish Audible’s connections would have said he was passing only because of common ownership instead of also saying Audible would be “freshened” for a summer campaign. I’d be worried about Audible if he really needed to be freshened up.
Here’s why: Audible was coming off a more-than-eight-week rest when he won the Holy Bull. He then had eight weeks between the Holy Bull and the Florida Derby, five weeks between that and the Kentucky Derby, and he would have had another five weeks into the Belmont.
Not exactly a demanding schedule.
