Brown starts readying Blazing Sevens for first Kentucky Derby prep

Blazing Sevens, who appears to be trainer Chad Brown’s lone Kentucky Derby hope at this point, will make his 3-year-old debut in either the Risen Star Stakes at Fair Grounds on Feb. 18 or the Fountain of Youth at Gulfstream Park on March 4, Brown said Tuesday. Both races are Grade 2s with a purse of $400,000. The Fountain of Youth is run at 1 1/16 miles, a sixteenth shorter than the Risen Star.

Blazing Sevens, who won the Grade 1 Champagne and finished fourth in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile, returned to the work tab on Jan. 21 and has a pair of three-furlong workouts at the Payson Park training center in Indiantown, Fla.

A son of Good Magic owned by Rodeo Creek Racing, Blazing Sevens raced four times at 2, so he has a solid foundation under him.

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“I gave him some time off and you do that you put yourself behind the eight-ball” as far as the Derby is concerned, Brown said. “I want to get the whole season in him. I usually don’t go onto the trail with a deep bench of dirt colts. I protect what I have. If I can get there fine. That said, his couple of works have been good and he is on target to have two preps for the Derby if earns his way in.”

Brown has participated in six Kentucky Derbies, starting seven horses. He finished third last year with Zandon and second in 2018 with Good Magic.

New York a road less traveled

In 2004, Smarty Jones kicked off his 3-year-old season – which would include victories in the Kentucky Derby and Preakness – with a victory in the Count Fleet Stakes over Aqueduct’s inner track.

Neither the Count Fleet nor inner track still exist.

Now, it’s been 20 years since a traditional New York prep race has produced a Kentucky Derby winner.

In 2003, Empire Maker beat Funny Cide in the Wood Memorial, only for that result to be flipped in Louisville when the New York-bred gelding Funny Cide beat the royally bred Empire Maker in the Derby.

Since then, 40 horses that competed in the Wood Memorial have run in the Derby, with no horse crossing the finish line better than fourth. Tacitus, the 2019 Wood winner, finished fourth in the Derby but was elevated to third with the disqualification from first of Maximum Security.

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Last year, Wood winner Mo Donegal won the Belmont Stakes after finishing fifth in the Kentucky Derby and skipping the Preakness. Early Voting, second to Mo Donegal in the Wood, won the Preakness after he skipped the Kentucky Derby. Before the Wood, Early Voting won the Withers, which will have its next running on Saturday.

The Gotham, the lead-in to the Wood Memorial, has not been a harbinger of Derby success either. Since 1980, the Gotham has produced 47 Derby starters with second-place finishes by Easy Goer (1989) and Aptitude (2000) the best results.

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