LOUISVILLE, Ky. – After starting a Kentucky Derby horse in 2016, 2017, and 2018, trainer Keith Desormeaux had to wait five years for his next Derby runner, Confidence Game. Desormeaux, come Derby Day, will have waited 10 weeks to run Confidence Game back after the colt won the Rebel Stakes at Oaklawn Park. And even with the Derby still a week away, Desormeaux couldn’t wait for people to stop asking about the unusually long break between final prep and Derby start. “When do you get to the point when you say, ‘Dude, I just answered this question five times?’ ” Desormeaux said Saturday to a radio man who had just missed a minor media scrum outside Desormeaux’s barn. Desormeaux was smiling while he said it, half playful, half perturbed. Desormeaux’s first Derby came in 2016 with a second-place finish from subsequent Preakness Stakes winner Exaggerator, who came to Louisville with a normal prep schedule, having won the Santa Anita Derby. The questions seven years ago were in the vein of, “Will you win?” This year, they’re, “Where you been?” :: KENTUCKY DERBY 2023: Derby Watch, point standings, prep schedule, news, and more Desormeaux marches to the beat of his own drummer. He isn’t second guessing his decision to sit tight. “It was 40 degrees when we won that Rebel,” he said. “We were there a few days, went to New Orleans, and it was 80 degrees in February for three or four days, and it just zapped him. I needed to let him recover. I knew I’d be giving him a couple easy weeks. Well, when I started building him up again the races that were offered were right at the same time we’re leaving New Orleans. Now, I got to think about logistics, him acclimating, will a race knock him down again to the point where I can’t get him strong enough for next week. I took all of that into consideration and chose the non-racing avenue.” Make no mistake: Confidence Game has done plenty of racing. He debuted last July and made starts in August, September, October, November, and January before his breakout Rebel win. Confidence Game was a front-running winner of a two-turn allowance race last fall at Churchill and in his trainer’s mind is plenty fit for the Derby. Confidence Game’s “race” was an April 14 workout from the gate clocked in 1:38.20 for one mile. Confidence Game went hard early in the drill and was traveling strongly for the better part of 1 1/4 miles. “I mean, I got to the bottom of him with that mile work from the gates,” Desormeaux said. “Fitness is not an issue.” James Graham has ridden Confidence Game in six of his seven starts. He will be aboard for the Derby, his third time in the race. Graham was aboard Confidence for the big drill and again Saturday when Confidence Game worked a sharp five furlongs in 59 seconds with a powerhouse gallop-out. The 15-day gap between works, Desormeaux, said, came about because the major workout was more like a race than a breeze. Confidence Game received plenty of recovery time, Desormeaux said, before getting serious again. :: DRF Kentucky Derby Package: Save on PPs, Clocker Reports, Betting Strategies, and more. Owned by the Don’t Tell My Wife Stables of Kirk Godby and Rob Slack, Confidence Game is a son of Candy Ride and the Malibu Moon mare Eblouissante, a sister to the great Zenyatta. Desormeaux found the horse at auction for a bargain price of $25,000. A Grade 2 winner with a slot in the Derby, Confidence Game already has far outrun his purchase price. Now he is running 1 1/4 miles 70 days after his most recent start. The colt’s trainer? He lost his father, Harris Desormeaux, 80, on April 22, and went back to Maurice, La., for a big funeral on April 25. There are weightier subjects floating about Keith Desormeaux’s mind than the Derby horse with a long layoff. The radio man finished up with Desormeaux and wandered off. A Louisville television guy with his cameraman came hot on his heels. Desormeaux was feeling frisky. “They’re all running for second!” he said. :: Want to learn more about handicapping and wagering? Check out DRF's Handicapping 101 and Wagering 101 pages.