Rich Strike joins Mott's barn, is put into light training

Rich Strike, upset winner of the 2022 Kentucky Derby who hasn’t raced in nearly 14 months, arrived at trainer Bill Mott’s Saratoga barn on Saturday to continue training toward a possible return to racing later this year.

“He looks pretty good, galloped him the last two days and he went quite well,” Mott said Monday from Saratoga.

Rich Strike, previously trained by Eric Reed, won the Kentucky Derby at odds of 80-1, the second-longest shot to win the historic race. He has gone winless in six starts since, his only race of 2023 being a fifth-place finish in the six-horse Alysheba Stakes at Churchill Downs in early May. Since then, he has been dealing with an upper suspensory injury for which he was treated with stem-cell therapy.

Rich Strike has been in and out of training at Margaux Farms and has undergone several checkups from Dr. Larry Bramlage at the Rood & Riddle Equine Hospital in Lexington, Ky. His most recent ultrasound was June 13, according to a post on owner Rick Dawson’s Facebook page. On Friday, Rich Strike vanned to Saratoga.

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“He certainly has more to do over the next couple [of] months with his training in order to be prepared to race at a high level,” Dawson wrote on his Facebook page. “Most importantly, he must stay sound & healthy throughout the training processes & if he races again, he must continue to stay sound & healthy.”

Mott said Dawson “realizes maybe we got a 50-50 chance of making it. If he stays sound, he should be good. There won’t be any in between.”

Mott said Rich Strike would have several more weeks of galloping before he would consider breezing him.

“He’s been cantering and galloping at the farm, but I’m sure we’re going to probably put a little more pressure on him than they have been,” Mott said.

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