Danza out of Belmont, to be freshened

ELMONT, N.Y. - Danza, the Arkansas Derby winner and third-place finisher in the Kentucky Derby, will not run in the June 7 Belmont Stakes, trainer Todd Pletcher said Tuesday.

Pletcher said he was not happy with the way Danza came out of his half-mile breeze in 49.49 seconds Sunday at Belmont Park.

“Not happy the way he’s doing, think he needs a little more time, lost a little bit of weight,” Pletcher said. “We’ll give him a little bit of a break.”

Pletcher said Danza would soon ship to Ocala, Fla., where he will be evaluated at Ocala Equine Hospital and then get some time off at the Payton Training Center, run by Jake Pletcher, Todd’s father.

“We’ll smoke him over down there,” Pletcher said. “He had some skin disease after the Derby, just doesn’t seem to be thriving. He had a couple of hard races close together, and I don’t see him being in peak form three weeks from now.”

Danza is owned by Eclipse Thoroughbred Partners, which issued a press release Tuesday.

“It’s disappointing to be knocked out of any race, let alone a classic, but the horse must always come first,” Aron Wellman, president of Eclipse, said in the release. “As soon as Todd expressed any concern over Danza’s condition, it was a no-brainer to take a step back and regroup. We’ll conduct thorough due diligence and leave no stone unturned to ensure Danza returns to 100 percent.”

Meanwhile, Pletcher confirmed that Javier Castellano would ride Commissioner, the Peter Pan Stakes runner-up, in the Belmont. Pletcher, who won last year’s Belmont with Palace Malice, also plans to run Intense Holiday, for whom he has not yet secured a jockey.