Endlessly to head small field in final El Camino Real Derby

Led by the two-time Grade 3 winner Endlessly, Saturday’s $100,000 El Camino Real Derby at Golden Gate Fields is expected to have a small field.

This is the last running of the El Camino Real Derby before the track’s scheduled closure in June, and the second-to-last scheduled stakes. The Grade 3 San Francisco Mile, run on turf with a purse of $175,000, is April 27. The track’s final day is June 9.

Endlessly, trained by Michael McCarthy for John and Jerry Amerman, has won 3 of 4 starts, and was eighth by 3 1/2 lengths behind Unquestionable in his most recent start in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf at Santa Anita in November.

Endlessly, who will race on a synthetic track and at 1 1/8 miles for the first time in the El Camino Real Derby, won consecutive one-mile turf races last summer and fall – the Del Mar Juvenile Turf and Zuma Beach Stakes at Santa Anita.

The winner of the El Camino Real Derby receives a berth to the Grade 1 Preakness Stakes at Pimlico on May 18.

In 2021, the McCarthy-trained Rombauer won the El Camino Real Derby and the Preakness Stakes.

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