2021 Breeders' Cup Classic: Baffert looks for silver lining with Medina Spirit
DEL MAR, Calif. – When Medina Spirit came back to the winner’s circle after capturing the Awesome Again Stakes last month at Santa Anita, trainer Bob Baffert rushed to the track to pat the horse on the neck, and when speaking about him afterward, his voice caught.
“I get emotional talking about him because he gives his all,” Baffert said in a recent interview. “I love that about him. He’s tough. He’ll run hard.”
That bond has intensified over the past several months. Baffert and Medina Spirit will be forever linked owing to this year’s Kentucky Derby, in which Medina Spirit finished first but later tested for a therapeutic medication that is legal to use but is not permitted to be in a horse’s system on race day. He could wind up being disqualified.
In many quarters, no matter what happens for the rest of their careers – such as on Saturday, when Medina Spirit runs in the $6 million Breeders’ Cup Classic here at Del Mar – Medina Spirit and Baffert will have an asterisk next to their names. An investigation by the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission into what transpired at the Derby is ongoing.
“I just want people to wait until all the facts come out,” Baffert said this past weekend.
Minds already may be made up. Anything involving Baffert brings an almost Pavlovian response in racing. He has his defenders, most notably owners who have stuck with him, especially in recent months. He has his critics, most notably those who conflate overages of legal medications as the equivalent of what Jorge Navarro and Jason Servis were doing – using, or trying to use, something completely illegal – or that explanations for medication issues are the equivalent of “the dog ate my homework.” He’s well aware of the chatter.
“The narrative is we do things, and it kills me,” Baffert said. “I don’t want to be classified as doing that. I consider myself a very conservative trainer.”
The Medina Spirit situation is the lone potential medication violation Baffert has had in the past year. He has had nothing in California, nothing in New York, nor anywhere else he has raced.
The medication for which Medina Spirit was flagged, Betamethasone, is the same one for which the filly Gamine tested positive following the Kentucky Oaks in September 2020. Veterinary records that must be kept showed the medication was last given to Gamine via injection 18 days out; it has a recommended withdrawal time of 14 days. All horses don’t metabolize medications similarly. That doesn’t matter. Gamine was disqualified.
Baffert was insistent after the Derby that Medina Spirit had not been given Betamethasone. It took 48 hours after word got out that Medina Spirit had a positive test – and after Baffert went on several media outlets denying he had used the medication – for Baffert’s team to realize, Baffert said at the time, that a topical ointment used for a skin rash had that medication as one of its components. The packaging for the ointment, Otomax, lists Betamethasone as an ingredient.
“When word leaked out, we knew we didn’t do what was being said,” Baffert said recently. “It took a couple of days to figure it out. It turned into chaos.”
The ointment was used, according to Baffert, because “we were trying to do the right thing by taking care of the health of the horse.”
Gamine also had a violation for a legal medication, lidocaine, in Arkansas in spring 2020. That occurred on the same card on which Baffert-trained Charlatan tested positive for the same medication after winning a division of the Arkansas Derby. Baffert maintained that he did not use that drug. He and assistant Jim Barnes theorized at the time that Barnes, who was using a Salonpas patch for personal pain management, may have inadvertently caused cross contamination, perhaps with a tongue tie.
Baffert was suspended, and Charlatan and Gamine were disqualified, but all of the rulings were subsequently overturned by the Arkansas Racing Commission. Testimony by an expert witness at the hearing said that the metabolites from the lidocaine test results were indicative of post-racing introduction, which would not have involved Barnes.
“It wasn’t Jimmy,” Baffert said.
Three years ago, Justify – who subsequently won the Triple Crown – tested positive for scopolamine, a low-level regulated substance, after the Santa Anita Derby. The California Horse Racing Board, without doing so publicly, voted months later to not proceed with sanctions. The scopolamine cases of five other horses handled by four other trainers were similarly adjudicated, as the board believed there had been contamination with jimsonweed, which is found in hay and contains scopolamine. But the narrative became Baffert alone received a free pass.
Churchill Downs has barred Baffert from competing there for two years, most significantly in the Kentucky Derby, which Baffert at the moment has won a record seven times. The New York Racing Association is seeking to ban Baffert for “conduct detrimental to racing.” He has never had a positive test in New York, nor been sanctioned by authorities there.
The Breeders’ Cup considered banning Baffert as well for “conduct detrimental to racing.” According to the organization’s published rules, there was nothing Baffert had done regarding medication violations that was disqualifying. In addition, Baffert never has had a medication violation at a Breeders’ Cup, in which he first competed back in 1991 and in which he’s had 125 starters. He has been allowed to compete this year, but only with additional testing and security oversight.
“I welcome that,” Baffert said. “I want people to know that when we win, it’s because we have the best horse.”
There are trainers competing in this Breeders’ Cup who have more frequent and/or more-recent medication violations. None faced the possibility of not competing, let alone having it play out publicly.
In addition to Medina Spirit, Baffert has defending champ Gamine in the Filly and Mare Sprint, Eight Rings in the Dirt Mile, As Time Goes By and Private Mission in the Distaff, and three horses – Barossa, Corniche, and Pinehurst – in the Juvenile.
Two former trainees of his – Life Is Good, who is in the Dirt Mile, and Following Sea, who is in the Sprint – both have continued to display the brilliance they initially showed under Baffert for Todd Pletcher, who received both horses in the aftermath of the Derby.
As a Derby winner whose victory is in jeopardy, Medina Spirit will garner much attention this weekend. Even excising the Derby, Medina Spirit has proven to be an admirable, gritty racehorse. His overall record at the moment is five wins, three seconds, and a third in nine starts. His worst race came in the Preakness, in which he finished third.
“He’s not a two-weeks-later kind of horse,” Baffert said. “He’s not a little horse. He’s a lighter-framed horse.
“He’s never run a bad race. He’s a good horse. Every time he runs, he proves how good a horse he is. He’s thrilling to watch run. He has a lot of heart.”
After the Preakness, Baffert regrouped with Medina Spirit. Since returning to action, he’s won the Shared Belief at Del Mar, and then the Awesome Again. The Classic, with the likes of fellow 3-year-olds Essential Quality and Hot Rod Charlie, and older horses Knicks Go and Max Player, will be his toughest ontrack assignment yet.
That result will be known come Saturday evening. Still to come are the resolution of the offtrack challenges for the colt and his trainer.
–additional reporting by David Grening