Kentucky Derby: McLaughlin, Saez continue quest with Essential Quality

For most of his adult life at this time of the year, Kiaran McLaughlin was trying to get to the Kentucky Derby. The goal remains the same. The path, though, has changed.

It’s been nearly one year since McLaughlin decided to retire from training – a career that included wins in the Belmont Stakes, three Breeders’ Cup races, and numerous major stakes – to become the agent for jockey Luis Saez. A little more than two months out from this year’s Derby, Saez is riding the acknowledged favorite, Essential Quality, the Eclipse Award-winning 2-year-old male of 2020 who is scheduled to make his 3-year-old debut in the postponed Southwest Stakes, now set for Feb. 27.

“Things are going really well,” McLaughlin, 60, said in a phone interview from Wellington, Fla., earlier this week. “Luis is a pleasure to work with, a real go-getter, a positive person. He’ll ride 10 a day without complaining. He loves riding.”

The Southwest originally was scheduled for Feb. 15, but the deep freeze impacting Oaklawn Park has resulted in pushing the race back to where it now falls on the same day as the Fountain of Youth Stakes at Gulfstream. When it looked like the Southwest would be run on Feb. 15 or then Feb. 21, McLaughlin took the opportunity to get Saez on Fire At Will for the Fountain of Youth, a mount he’ll have to relinquish to stay with Essential Quality.

“It’s an unfortunate situation, but obviously we want to stay with that horse,” McLaughlin said.

Saez ended up on Essential Quality for his second start, the Breeders’ Futurity at Keeneland, because he was going to be in town for the weekend and both trainer Brad Cox and representatives of owner-breeder Godolphin Racing, one of McLaughlin’s longtime clients while he was training, reached out to McLaughlin. Essential Quality won that day, and five weeks later, at the same track and same distance, won the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile, giving Saez his first Breeders’ Cup victory. That’s not a mount one willingly relinquishes.

:: KENTUCKY DERBY 2021: Derby Watch, point standings, prep schedule, news, and more

Both McLaughlin, as a trainer, and Saez have never won the Derby, both enduring heartbreaks. McLaughlin finished second in the 2005 Derby with Closing Argument, who led in deep stretch at 71-1 and got nailed in the closing yards by 50-1 Giacomo.

“Usually when you have the lead at the eighth pole in the Derby you win, but Mike Smith nailed us,” McLaughlin said. “He ran well to be second.”

That was the closest McLaughlin came. He had seven subsequent starters through 2018, and finished fourth three times, with Jazil (in a dead heat) in 2006, Frosted in 2015, and Mohaymen in 2016.

Saez was disqualified in the 2019 Derby after finishing first with Maximum Security, the only time a horse has been disqualified from victory in the Derby for an on-track infraction. Saez has ridden in the Derby six other times, his best finish a seventh on Brody’s Cause in 2016. He has never won a Triple Crown race. Other than Maximum Security, the closest he’s come was finishing second with Bravazo in the 2018 Preakness, behind Justify.

This is McLaughlin’s second tour of duty as an agent. After first working his way up the training ladder in the D. Wayne Lukas organization and becoming a top assistant, he represented jockey Chris Antley in the early 1990s for nearly two years before returning to training. He had terrific success, including training the 2006 Horse of the Year, Invasor, who won that year’s Breeders’ Cup Classic and the 2007 Dubai World Cup. His list of major stakes wins includes – and this list is by no means exhaustive – the Coaching Club American Oaks, Donn, Met Mile, Ogden Phipps, Shadwell Turf Mile, Whitney, and Woodward, all of which he won multiple times, plus the Acorn, Alabama, Apple Blossom, Beldame, Cigar Mile, Pimlico Special, Stephen Foster, Test, Travers, and Vosburgh.

Having been an agent previously made this transition easier, McLaughlin said, though he admits he misses being around horses, and horsemen, each morning. Agents are not allowed in the stable areas at Gulfstream Park or the Palm Meadows training center.

“I miss going out and being around the horses, but I’m fortunate I had a lot of nice horses over the years,” McLaughlin said. He’s gratified that many of his former employees now work with his longtime friends Todd Pletcher or George Weaver, trainers who also are graduates of the University of Lukas.

And he still takes pride in seeing his former runners have an impact. Cavorting, whom McLaughlin trained for Stonestreet to Grade 1 victories in the Test, Phipps, and Personal Ensign – and four other stakes wins – is the dam of homebred Clairiere, who on Saturday won the Rachel Alexandra at Fair Grounds, a major prep toward the Kentucky Oaks.

“Very happy. Great to see that,” he said.

So while his role may have changed in the past year, McLaughlin is continuing to have a significant impact on the sport.