Welcome to the first Saturday in February. Let the madness begin. For the next four months, true believers in the racing game will spend most of their time worshipping at the altar of the Triple Crown. All roads lead to Louisville, where a garland of roses and a white puff of smoke will announce the chosen one, then it will be on to Baltimore for validation. Beyond that, the faithful can only hope for a pilgrimage to New York, and the chance for another Triple Crown winner to save the sport anew.

Led by the likes of Eclipse Award winner Good Magic, fellow Eclipse finalists Bolt d’Oro and Solomini, and the unbeaten McKinzie, a total of 360 3-year-olds were announced on Thursday as early nominees to this year’s Triple Crown.

That number is a decline from last year, when 419 were nominated at the early stage, but is similar to the 368 nominated at this stage in 2016. There were 429 nominated at the early stage in 2015. The record is 450 in 2007, which followed a huge foal crop of 37,948 in 2004. The 2015 foal crop is estimated at 22,500.

ARCADIA, Calif. – For nearly two years, from late 2014 through the summer of 2016, trainer Keith Desormeaux enjoyed the finest stretch of his career, winning four Grade 1, seven-figure races.

The stable had one of the most prominent 3-year-olds of 2016 in Exaggerator, who won the $1,000,690 Santa Anita Derby, $1.5 million Preakness, and $1,015,000 Haskell Invitational. Two years earlier, Texas Red won the $1.84 million Breeders’ Cup Juvenile at Santa Anita.

“That was a nice run,” Desormeaux reflected recently. “I hope it’s not the end. I’m optimistic.”

The unbeaten 3-year-old colt Mask, considered a top prospect for the Kentucky Derby, has had a setback “that will require him to miss approximately two weeks of training,” trainer Chad Brown said Tuesday.

Brown said the timing of the setback, details of which he did not want to disclose, would keep Mask out of his next scheduled start, the Grade 2, $400,000 Risen Star Stakes at Fair Grounds on Feb. 17.

Bolt d’Oro, the losing favorite in last year’s Breeders’ Cup Juvenile, and Good Magic, the winner of that race, have been assigned highweight of 126 pounds in the The Jockey Club’s Annual Top 2-Year-Old Rankings for 2017.

The ranking, which would be more familiar to racing fans as the Experimental Free Handicap, is an annual assessment of the previous year’s top colts and fillies, using an assigned handicap weight for a theoretical race at 1 1/16 miles on the dirt. In previous years, 126 pounds has been considered the standard for the highest assignment for a colt.

ARCADIA, Calif. – The most highly anticipated three-furlong workout of the California winter season will take place Saturday at Santa Anita, where Bolt d’Oro is scheduled for his first timed drill of 2018.

A pulled muscle in late December interrupted training for Bolt d’Oro, the Mick Ruis-owned and -trained colt who is a leading candidate for the Kentucky Derby after a 2-year-old campaign that included two Grade 1 wins and a third in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile.

Although the major players on the road to the Kentucky Derby seem a little more defined this year than in 2017, when eventual winner Always Dreaming was still a maiden in mid-January, I have no doubt that little-known 3-year-olds will vault into the Derby discussion in the coming weeks. Such is the norm with young colts at this stage of the year, when they are experiencing physical and mental development.

$147,000 Smarty Jones Stakes; one mile; Oaklawn Park; Jan. 15, 2018
(10 Derby qualifying points for a win, 4 for second, 2 for third, 1 for fourth)

Winner: Mourinho, by Super Saver
Trainer: Bob Baffert
Jockey: Drayden Van Dyke
Owner: Phoenix Thoroughbred III
Beyer Speed Figure: 99

Listed, $150,000 Jerome Stakes, one mile, Aqueduct, Jan. 13, 2018
(10 Derby qualifying points for a win, 4 for second, 2 for third, 1 for fourth)

Winner: Firenze Fire, by Poseidon’s Warrior
Trainer: Jason Servis
Jockey: Manny Franco
Owner: Mr. Amore Stable
Beyer Speed Figure: 85

Grade 3, $200,000 Lecomte Stakes, one mile, 70 yards, Fair Grounds, Jan. 13, 2018
(10 Derby qualifying points for a win, 4 for second, 2 for third, 1 for fourth)