Good Magic can follow in Curlin's hoofprints with personal Triple Crown

Hall of Famer Curlin completed his personal Triple Crown as a sire when his son Golden Tempo won the Kentucky Derby earlier this month. Now, Curlin’s champion son Good Magic will try to keep the magic going as he looks to pull the same trick with Talkin in this Saturday’s Preakness Stakes.

Curlin added Golden Tempo’s Derby to a pair of Preakness Stakes victories with Exaggerator (2016) and Journalism (2025) and a Belmont Stakes win with Palace Malice (2013). The closest Curlin had previously come to siring a Kentucky Derby winner was a pair of runner-up finishes. Multiple Grade 1 winner Exaggerator was second in the Derby before turning the tables in the Preakness. Two years later, Eclipse Award champion juvenile Good Magic was second to Triple Crown winner Justify at Churchill Downs. He went on to take the Haskell Invitational that summer to be a Grade 1 winner at both 2 and 3.

Good Magic, now standing alongside his sire at Hill ‘n’ Dale in Kentucky, quickly announced himself as an heir to this stamina-laden sireline by throwing 2023 Kentucky Derby winner Mage in his first crop. Dornoch, winner of the 2024 Belmont Stakes, quickly followed. Good Magic missed the 2023 Preakness by a head with Grade 1-winning juvenile Blazing Sevens – Mage finished third – and now gets a shot in this year’s edition.

Talkin is trained by Danny Gargan, who also trained Dornoch, as well as Dubyuhnell and Society Man, additional graded stakes winners by the sire.

:: Get Preakness Betting Strategies for exclusive wagering insights, contender analysis, and more

“I’ve trained some,” Gargan said. “He’s the best one besides Dornoch.”

Overall, Good Magic is the sire of a dozen graded stakes winners to date. In addition to his classic winners, his best runners include Grade 1 Pacific Classic winner Mixto, second in the 2025 Dubai World Cup; and multiple Grade 1 winner Muth.

The Hell We Did has high expectations

The Hell We Did has one hell of a family to live up to. A victory in Saturday’s Preakness Stakes would make him the seventh stakes winner from as many starters out of the Peacock family’s remarkable New Mexico-bred mare Rose’s Desert, best known as the dam of Group 1 winner Senor Buscador.

“His mama’s been phenomenal,” trainer Todd Fincher said this week. “I trained her her whole career, too. She was a New Mexico-bred. [Her offspring are] all different. She’s had several foals, and I wouldn’t say two of them are alike. They all can run, that’s the only thing, but they’re all different personalities.”

Rose’s Desert, by Desert God, raced from ages 2 to 5. She won 10 of her 15 starts, was second in the other five, and earned a healthy $626,035. She won seven restricted stakes at Zia Park and Sunland Park in her home state, the richest of those coming in the 2011 Peppers Pride New Mexico Classic Cup Championship Fillies and Mares Stakes.

Now a homebred broodmare for the Peacock family, Rose’s Desert has had remarkable consistency, with several of her stakes winners venturing out into open company. Senor Buscador inherited her longevity, racing from ages 2 to 6 and earning more than $12.9 million. He was already a multiple graded stakes winner stateside, winning the Grade 3 Ack Ack in 2022 and the Grade 2 San Diego in 2023, followed by a third-place finish in the Grade 1 Awesome Again. He then went on a remarkable run through some of the world’s richest races with international travels in early 2024, finishing second in the Grade 1 Pegasus World Cup, winning the Group 1 Saudi Cup, and finishing third in the Group 1 Dubai World Cup.

Rose’s Desert also is the dam of Runaway Ghost, who won six stakes in California and New Mexico, highlighted by the Grade 3 Sunland Park Derby in 2018. Sheriff Brown was a four-time stakes winner at Sunland, Albuquerque, and Ruidoso; Our Irish Rose, a stakes winner at Ruidoso, ventured out to win the Memorial Day Sprint at Lone Star; and Rose A also is a stakes winner at Albuquerque.

Aye Candy picked up a pair of open stakes wins at Sunland earlier this year. Meanwhile, The Hell We Did was knocking at the door. Second in last year’s Zia Park Juvenile, he earned Preakness consideration by finishing second in the Grade 3 Lexington at Keeneland.

Next in the pipeline, Rose’s Desert has Eight Rose’s, a 2-year-old filly by leading sire Into Mischief, and a yearling colt by Uncle Mo. The mare, now 18, delivered a filly by Gun Runner on May 4 at Shawhan Place in Kentucky, where she is boarded.

:: Want to learn more about handicapping and wagering? Check out DRF's Handicapping 101 and Wagering 101 pages.