It’s Wiiiiiiiide Open

like this Curb. All right.

Sorry for the I really try to thought I slid it slower than

that. Like for the music.

Zach's not here. It's off.

Music. Music.

Off Mike Endoffo Louie Rebo Go. I'm a horse racing happy I Come

on, give me a blast. All right we're here.

And what is the this? Is your brain on water?

This is the calm before the storm it.

Is the calm before the storm, the week off if you will, in

horse? Racing, but we got, we got some

things that we got to talk about before we get to that number one

very special person to me celebrate his birthday recently.

Oh, and it's someone that I celebrate.

His entire catalogue. It's when that's a, that's a.

When his birthday A. Face joke I I that you should

have appreciated Michael Bolton. Yeah.

Yeah, I got you. You celebrated.

Yeah, I celebrated. Yeah, I do.

By the way, have you seen the What's this?

The guy who's the star of that movie?

Ron. Is it Ron?

It's not Ron Livingston. Man, I'm bad at the yeah.

Yeah, his new Netflix show Loudermilk is pretty freaking

funny. That is funny, yeah, it's very

funny, actually. And that you would actually

probably you'd probably appreciate it too.

It's in my yeah, it's in my wheelhouse.

That's yeah, but you know, when this day occurs, I wake up just

thinking about this person and I have, I've got so many gifts to

shower him with these gifts and I don't even know what happened

to him. Louie, they they disappeared.

So, Louie, happy birthday. Yeah, I I agree that the gifts

disappeared. How about that?

I am now closer to 50 than 35. How about that?

Look at you. How about that low 43 on a on a

on a Monday, now a Thursday how? There you go.

If it makes you feel any better, I'm closer to 93 than I am to 0.

Yeah, right. Yeah.

So, yeah, right. Hey, you deserve it.

Yeah. So, so you're I did get you an

Ari Solutions Derby Festival. How about that?

Holy crap. So that's everybody these are.

Nice man. Yeah, these are the.

People don't know, man. If you're from outside of our

area, man the The Old Derby Festival.

Pegasus pins. These are Pegasus pins.

Get you into a lot of events as part of the just.

I don't want to say free. That's not fair.

It's just. No, you have to buy the.

You have to buy the pins, but you get in, you get entry then

to a lot of events around town, different concerts and oh man,

just everything. It's fantastic Food festivals,

bourbon, tastings, all kinds of stuff.

Not affiliated with Churchill Downs by the way, but.

Partners. That's why we got the 1:50 on

there this year. So, full partners this year for

1:50, which is fantastic. Mike's family's been involved,

frankly, from multiple generations of this.

His grandmother was the chair of the Derby festival in prior

years. And so it's it's fun to watch

you get to do that work now, continue your family legacy with

the Kentucky Derby and with the festival itself.

And so I always, I mean in a geeky way.

I look forward to getting this every year.

Yeah, well, you got. You actually got two more coming

because I know you got the. Family.

No, no. It's all good.

But these are It's fantastic. If you're in Louisville, this is

a very easy way. There are gas stations, lots of

easy places to find them, to support the people around town

that make Derby. My big thing is this.

Like I just want that. Party before the two-minute

race. And really, they've really

simplified them. So like the the pins themselves,

these are the ones we buy for our office, but they work just

like the regular ones. But you know, if you get a gold

pin for example, then you could win the grand prize.

And really what I want to do though, just because they're

just so simple they got the KDF, Pegasus, the 1:50 on there.

Like people in Louisville should be wearing these pins as a sign

of unity and pride. For like, this is the time of

year when the world shines on Louisville, and this year more

than ever, because Derby 150 and with the two weeks later, is the

PGA and we're. Going to have a hell of a May.

It's going to be unbelievable and we for Thunder Over

Louisville, which is the big fireworks show.

If you're not from here, we have the largest fireworks show

outside of North America to kick off the festivities.

Within north. America, No.

You said outside of. Outside.

I'm sorry, Outside of China. I'm sorry, Outside of China.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, that was a big deal. Man.

And so, you know, we got a new designer for that show who's

promising that we're going to have the greatest finale of all

time do. People know there's like a four

hour air show and then the largest fireworks display

outside of China two weeks before the Derby.

Just 'cause we feel like it. Yeah, and we just party.

We party. And then another.

Fantastic man. Another event that I just want

to plug from from the one that I chair is this Bourbonville

event. Now the pin will not get you

into Bourbonville, but the tickets are stupid cheap, like

75 bucks and then 125 bucks for the VIP, right?

We're going to have 14 distilleries right now and

working on maybe getting a couple more.

We got a couple of vodkas. We got a couple wines there as

well and A and a brewery. So you got it's it's like the no

cigars this year. It is the largest cocktail party

though. About 1000 people.

This cocktail party eat and drink as much as you want for 75

bucks. That ain't bad.

It's. Banger, man.

So you can. Try a bunch of different stuff.

That's fun, right? It's a sample stuff.

It's great. So everybody and everyone of

these distillers will have like a signature cocktail that

they're going to share and they're going to have like, if

you just want to get the bourbon straight, you can get the

bourbon straight. I'm going to guess that's like a

Tuesday. It's a Thursday.

It's always a night. It's all, you know that It's

always the day of our show. It's The One Show I missed,

although interestingly enough, I think they're.

Should I call Kornacki? Is how is that?

How that? Works, no.

They're kind of coming around to like maybe they want to have the

podcast at the thing. It might not be this year, but

it might be next year. So they're like maybe us.

Little 151. Maybe the Bourbon Pursuit guys.

Maybe a little Bourbon Pursuit Happy Hour crossover.

That'd be a lot of fun. Not mad about that.

No, they don't know anything about that.

So the Bourbon Pursuit guys are listening.

What? The hell?

Throwing that in our lap. Here we go.

I need to hang out that Louis guy.

There we go. But yeah, I mean, just some good

stuff. We're smoking cigars today that

we got from our boy, Jay Shepherd.

We'll be out there in a couple weeks.

Week before Derby by the way we're I'm doing my Rabon show.

Rabon Co excuse me show out there, our guy, horse Racing

Nation Rob Flatter will join us for that show.

How about that? Sweet.

I mean, I might have to be there for that show, too.

Yeah, Jason and I go way back, you know.

By the way, I'll just throw it out there.

We've got a promo code going, Mike, for Mike's appearances on

the 11:50 show. If you mentioned ESPN, you

mentioned Louis mentioned Mike. Whatever, You get a Casa.

Oh boy, oh boy. I got to get the name right.

But you get a free cigar essentially, and visit his

website Jay Shepherd Cigars. Go visit him if you order and

he'll ship it for free. He'll include a CAS a Casa

Pasteur, which in Kentucky is worthwhile because Pasteur means

Shepherd SEC freshman of the year.

How about that? And Jay Shepherd.

And Jay Shepherd. Who's the father of Reed

Shepherd? Jay Shepherd.

Jeff Shepherd. So Father Reed Shepherd.

Not the same Jay Shepherd. Though different.

Jay Shepherd. Should we lie though, so that

people don't go? Absolutely.

If it was Jeff Shepherd's spot, though, his wife would run it,

right? Probably, yeah.

But Jay Shepherd. Who would you work security to

stop you from leaving and stealing?

Did you ever hear the story about How I Met?

Like, actual Jay Shepherd's wife?

Not Jeff Shepherd, but Jay Shepherd the cigar guy?

I. Actually don't know this story

by the way. Killer guy.

Great guy. Helps with all the charitable

stuff you and I have ever. But he helped with all the all

the every time we come to him with with we need some for a non

profit. He says what do you need?

Yeah, that's it. It's just what do you need?

Tell me. So it's he's fantastic.

One of the things. So when I was when I transferred

from Bellomin to Louisville, yes, I did go to U of L If you

follow me on the Kentucky Post Game Show, I.

There is a UU of L Basketball Yearbook.

To be fair, you're also you're also sponsored by Fish and

Wildlife. So OK.

And and no offence, City slicker.

I fish. I get a fishing license every

year. Oh.

Withdrawn. OK, Withdrawn.

Mainly because Rocco loves to go.

Fishing. There you go.

All my kids love fishing. My God.

Yeah, it's a good. State for fishing too.

It is great, great. We're lucky.

But I I had to take a a theater class for graduation credit and

she was our she was my TA instructor.

How about that? Yeah, so that's how this town.

Is not big enough. It is not.

It's not big enough, by the way. Bed races?

Yes. Worth going to?

Monday before the Derby. Probably my favorite event.

It's so absurdly awesome. It's on and you can't be there.

You can watch it on TV, you can stream it.

So it is something we I'm not telling.

People, they put beds together. Someone sits in the bed and a

bunch of people push it. It's it's it's awesome.

It's so this. Town's ridiculous the the the

events that I'm chairing this year are the bed races the

Bourbonville well so please come out to Bourbonville.

We got to cut. We've got about, we've probably

got about 200 tickets left. So it's like, yeah, yeah.

So get out there if you're in Louisville.

Because that means 7580% of the tickets.

Are gone. Go to bed races.

The VIP is almost sold out. So bed.

Races is easy too, because it's at the fairgrounds parking.

Super easy and it's a pen. It's hilarious.

And then the bed races the bourbonville for me and then I'm

chairing the therapy event that during Festival us, I'll do our

show. I'm guessing we're going to be

on 11:50 that day and then I've got to go over and host.

We'll be, yeah. So our plan is, is the same as

last year as of now. We'll be backside Monday,

Tuesday, Wednesday, 11:50. You'll be with me.

We'll figure that out. I don't know if thistle's coming

in or not. I'll be really honest.

I have no idea. I had that conversation with one

Daniel Issel, Daniel Paul Issel and I, and then we'll move on.

We'll meet at 3/22 for Thirrby Oaks and and Derby.

So we'll be up there. I'll hang around Thursday and

Friday if you want to come out and I'll I'll be doing drivetime

as well on those. Days I'm probably.

I might be able to get you into the Thursday thing if you want

to do it. OK, I'll probably want to go to

sleep. OK, that's fair too.

That's fair too. Because we're going to.

We're probably just so people in Louisville know our annual Derby

are. We doing chefs cut.

I think we're going to a bigger spot this year.

Oh, I know where we're going. Yeah.

And so I'm working on that. It would actually be the Tuesday

before Derby, and it would involve cigars.

It'll involve a bunch of different stuff, it'll be a lot

of fun. So, and my hope is by then too

actually we'll have vouchers for different AD WS and different

stuff that people can use for the Derby and that kind of

stuff. So Door Prize is great stuff.

Be watching for. That should be a lot of fun.

And let's just for one other thing that you and I like to

just do for fun, OK? Intercourse.

Well, no. Oh yes, yes.

Not with each other, but if you have like a group, or maybe like

in you want an office meeting or there's a nonprofit group, like

one year if COVID knocked it out, we were going to talk to

that like Letterman Society or whatever.

Oh, with, with, with Bruce. With the.

With the old high school. Yeah.

Flash. Flash, Thank you.

Yes, yeah, and and if you ever want to bring us out and just do

like a Derby, fun Derby preview, we're all about it.

So. Those are the best.

That's it really. It's fun for us to do that

stuff, so reach out. You can find us the course on

Twitter's probably The Best Place to Find Us Horse Happy

Hour or Ad Horse Happy Hour we. Had a DM this week asking where

the hell have you been? Well, that's how.

About that, No, no. You got fans, dog.

I do. They don't text.

What I'm missing? You know why, 'cause I don't

miss the. There's something about.

Also, people are just like, oh, it's Louie.

Again, you can be on demand or in demand, Louie.

I've been streaming service people.

Yeah man, but it's good stuff. I'm really excited about Derby

season this year. I mean, I know that that we're

going to talk about this field later on today just because I

have. A top 11 for the Derby.

Yep. And a top six for the Oaks.

I know that's a little strange. Essentially a top ten and then

one to watch because Mage, this time last year, was 33rd in the

points. Wow.

OK. All right.

So that's just a reminder that you know, hey, we have seen 100.

And Mage has got a full brother. Who's already on my list?

Oh, it's got to be at the top close.

He's very close, yes. Yeah, but yes, that kind of

thing. But that was a reminder by the

way. Again second mention of this

podcast jerk ass Ron Flatter reminded me on Twitter that hey

reminder last year because I asked on Twitter just, you know

the the new odds came out in Vegas.

You know fixed odds for Derby futures and I said who do you

like essentially 13 through 25 forget the first side.

It's easy to say door knock or Sierra Leone or whatever.

Who do you like in that next group and and flatter's response

of course was I'm not going to play by your rules.

I'm just going to make up new ones.

Sure, I like. He is Ron Flatter.

Did he mention Brit Musburger? In a conversation I had with him

yesterday. Yes.

Damn it. How'd you damn it?

Did he? Did he even mention that he was

on the weakest link? No, that did not come up.

But he was. Yeah.

Oh, man, that's good stuff. All right, well, let's you know.

Millennials watching the show The Weakest Link is an old game

show that really didn't make it very long.

It was good, though. It was.

It was all right. Concept was good because the

woman who hosted. I'm so glad I broke out The

happy hour hat. Those are clean, man.

I love them. You've done you've done a couple

good things for us. By the way, I booked my trip for

Preakness so everyone here enjoy your no.

Well, or I don't you got you got a side PGA that isn't here very

often so. But I'm going.

I know the days I'm going, like I think I can make it work.

I think I can make both work. I'll be in town Thursday night

through Sunday and so if if you know if there's we, we had great

accommodation of Joe's last time and all that kind of stuff.

If anybody wants us to do like a Preakness preview Friday night,

I'm available at horsehappyhour@gmail.com.

Really happy to hang out. We've gotten to know the guys at

Bal in different places. It's been really fun.

We need to try expanding our our Maryland part of this show.

It's Maryland I love. To maybe go Friday night at the

seafood place and see if they want us to do a Preakness.

Talk to Joe. Yeah, I think.

It's a reasonable thing. I got.

I got this number and everything to figure it out.

There you go. Man, that's a great place to

smoke cigars, too. It's a great place for a lot of

stuff. It really.

Is it really is? OK, Tampa Bay Derby is really

what we got to talk about. Last 15 my prep man, we are.

We're there, right? I mean, we are on the precipice

of of the true final Derby. Preps of all of this, how many

points do I need to get in the Bluegrass?

How many points does this horse need to get in Arkansas,

Louisiana and the Florida Derby? Whatever.

But. Not beyond that.

We just had an unbelievable finish in this race and and

maybe you might have gotten a bet paid off.

I'm not really sure if the bets got paid off or not, so we'll

see what happened there. So let's take a look real quick

at the replay of the Tampa Bay Derby as they come to the top of

the stretch. Good money and no more time.

Thanks to Tampa Bay Downs for this replay.

Get a swing toward the three wide side.

Grandma, the first right to his outside final for a long time

now. No more time.

Pokes the nose in front. Good money tries to counter

domestic product. Branmo, the first Dylan with a

chance flying has hardened up the rail.

A wild finish here. A Titanic tussle in Tampa.

If that's any one of four here. They drive the wire.

No more time or domestic product.

It's between no more time and domestic product.

All right. There we go.

There was the the, the great finish.

Domestic product gets the win. Louis.

All right, so humble. Brad, go ahead and drink.

I interviewed Tyler Geffeleon the other day for our show

tomorrow, The Kentucky Racing Spotlight.

I am releasing those on this platform.

So if you haven't checked it out, tomorrow's going to be an

abbreviated edition of the show. It's just 1/2 hour because we

got to get to conference tournament coverage on on ESPN.

You Only. Got 1/2 hour on the air?

Yeah. Oh geez.

What? No, no, no, no.

No. Of of Kentucky Racing spotlight.

I get my 2 hour show tomorrow, but Kentucky Racing Spotlight is

essentially. Your 11:50 tomorrow. 11:50 is

good, but my 6th 6:00 show on Fridays that we release on this

platform is only going to be 1/2 hour tomorrow.

Because we love basketball. Oh, I I know the.

I know the pecking order here. I'm not saying it's OK College

basketball's the king. It's why when you fire a coach,

I'm doing radio till 1:00 in the morning on Tuesday, you know, on

the driveway. Oh, oh.

Yeah, you were doing the. Yeah, yeah.

A. 100%, Yeah. Yeah, So what?

You getting they've been talking about that for three?

1000 people watching that stream at 1:00 in the morning on a

Tuesday. What did you think of Josh

Hurd's comments, by the way? No, just your.

And click. There it is.

No. But I talked to Tyler.

When you talk to jocks about horses they ride, they often

will just use very generic statements.

Well, they want you listen to him talk about domestic product.

Yeah. And by the way, I'm going to say

the same thing I've said about every freaking prep to this

point. It was slow.

Very slow. This whole class is slow.

It's OK. This is going to be like a 2O32O

four kind of. Derby like they got a bunch of

white guys running. Monarchos would win this thing

by like 7 links. Well, Monarchos ran a sub

two-minute. Damn right he did.

That's a monaco's reference. You drink out there?

I yeah. The the thing he was, he paused.

He giggled. And then he said, this is a nice

horse, man. And so here's my dilemma.

It isn't Tyler Geffa Leone's fault that the the pace out

front was slow. He knew when to kick it in with

domestic product and win the race.

That's what a good jockey does, right?

Let's have your Castellano on one more time.

Yes. Yeah.

All right. So both of those guys sees and

jocks know when to make their move.

Sammy Camacho, really good job, by the way.

Grant me Grant Mote was the first, right?

Was that it? Grandma the first ran third.

By the way, I gave this race out 1243.

Look at you, man. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Good money. Finished fourth in this race.

To me, he's the most interesting horse in the Tampa Bay Derby.

Only his second time ever running Irad was Irad was on

that horse for a reason, 15 to one on the morning line.

Talked about him the other day. I could not figure out how well

he was going to run. He's only going to improve.

I'll be interested to watch because Chad Brown has talked

about some of his horses going to the Bluegrass.

I wonder if he'll keep good money because he ran well at

Tampa, if he'll move him to another place that's also warm

weather. Does that make sense?

Where he can kind of keep him without getting that winter coat

or having to worry, worry about a temperature shift or anything

like that? But I think a lot of these we're

setting up for two things to be really great, Mike, this year,

which is interesting. A bunch of horses aren't going

to make the Derby that are like right on the edge of being

really good three-year olds in this class.

So the pat de miles going to be awesome.

Yeah, we talked about that seven times, yeah.

The other one that's going to be awesome is the Preakness.

Yeah. And then you get a 10 furlong

Belmont at Saratoga where people want to leave their best 3 year

olds anyway. So all of the fields in this

Triple Crown I think are gonna be really good.

They may not be consecutive and contiguous, but I think they're

all gonna be. It's gonna be good racing.

And betting wise. Fantastic, yes.

Exactly, yes. Exactly.

We're probably not gonna see the all time greatest Derby.

I don't think there's a Triple Crown winner this year.

That's easy to say. But like at the same time at

what? At some point we just have to

think, OK, this three-year old class isn't very fast.

We do have all of the, you know, 100 races left, you know, 100

point races left to at least see there.

But at this point it's just not a fast class.

And that's OK. So at that point, what do you

look for? You look for connections, you

look for breeding, right? I mean, Major's full brother's

running on this. Thing Well and good money is a

good magic, which a good magic is proving that probably the

best. But you got a Sierra Leone, he's

got no speed to run at at this point.

He's going to need a rabbit to get in this field and tire some

of these horses out, otherwise he's going to be chasing like

10. So that's my question then can

Tyler likes domestic product and domestic product, you know, was

he stalking or was he closing? I don't.

I don't know and. That feels like he feels.

Stalking. It was probably stalking.

But he's pretty far back. He was a half second back at the

at the half mile, right, so at the half second horse racing.

Back on the stretch it is. So I I just wonder, because

there's not going to be any speed.

Can a closer win this race? Yeah, that, that's right.

That's a big question. Yeah, we'll.

I'll talk about that in my rankings and why Sierra Leone's

not on top because I love that horse.

I think he's fantastic. I think he's going to pick off a

bunch of races in his lifetime, but at the same time he's got to

close. Style matters, man.

And and this is, this is one of those years of all these these

slow horses, make it and that. Get out front, stay out front.

Justify style, authentic style, whatever might win might be that

kind of and I think. Honestly, I think what we want

to see is we want to see that iconic Kentucky Derby finish.

You know, at the end of the day, the most of the people in the

stands really don't know. And so if it's a close finish,

that's all they really and we could get because they're it's

almost like watching Daytona 500 when they've all got restrictor

plates and they're all just huddled up.

And I we could hit, we could see that first.

You know, the Derby's kind of interesting because you get like

the first pack and then there's like a break and maybe a couple

horses in that break and then there's another pack.

That first pack could have like 8-9, ten horses.

Yes, I expect twelve horses to fully be in it at the 8th pole.

I think it's setting up for that kind of thing.

So there you go. So do you.

Because of that, you know and I and I think we've even looked at

it the last couple years and we're kind of getting into this

conversation and not, you know, like in past years, I'm the

person who likes the trends. The trends have kind of gone out

of the have been tossed out the window.

They're just new trends, I would say.

Yeah, there probably are new trends.

They're just new trends. Like, you know, it used to be

that you had to race as a 2 year old, right?

Well, we've we've seen recently where someone who did not race

as a 2 year old win. We used to be race.

Really race and win as a 2 year old was really important, right?

Having, yeah, but having your feet underneath you crossing the

line for us as a 2 year old. Mattered.

It was more important though that you were undefeated as a

three-year old, that you won 100 point race and that's gone by

the wayside. I agree.

And so like, I don't, I don't think that that's we're

definitely not going to have an undefeated 3 year old.

Well, I'd be surprised we have an undefeated 3 year old win the

Derby this year. OK.

But yeah, I just, do you do you throw those things out or which,

which are the trends in that you think matter now?

I I. I, by the way, totally do not

prepare you for that. Question.

No, no, it's OK. I I still, I For me, the Derby

sets up as an individual race rather than one that's based on

trends altogether. I just think the trends are new,

like which paths to the Derby really matter.

California to me is a toss this year.

That's super unusual for me. You know that I, I, I hold the

Santa Anita Derby in incredibly high regard as far as it's

predictability for success in the magic Kentucky backward

stuff. No, it's because I think the

Southern California 3 year old crop just isn't very good this

year. It just isn't and and I and I

don't think anyone listening in LA or San Diego right now is

going, oh, Louis, no, I I think they all kind of agree with me.

Let's see if we get a text from Sherva.

Well, maybe I was going to say you mentioned flatter three

times. What are you doing, the

Beetlejuice? But no, I think I I I think it

sets up that we haven't seen the Derby winner win a big race yet.

OK. I think I'm going to give a top

10 today and maybe two of those hit the board in like top five.

Kind of. Are we?

Do you think that every winner's got to win 100 point race this

year? Good Magic?

No. OK.

I I think it's very possible. I think people will be surprised

who I have on top of my rankings, OK, because that horse

is going to have to win 100 point race to get into the to

the starting gate. OK, so there you go.

What about? There's been a little bit of

talk too about the Japanese crop.

Can we do that as part of the rankings?

OK, we'll do that. All right.

I'm getting a little ahead of my.

No, no, it's OK. I your questions aren't bad.

Let's just go in order with this stuff.

And I think, why am I the organized guy on this show?

That's ridiculous. The.

Well, you want to do the Derby first or the oaks first.

I don't care. Let's do the Oaks first.

OK? They race first.

Ladies first. I don't know.

Do you find the Oaks as interesting as the Derby this

year? It's less wide open to me right

now. I think there are a couple of

three-year old Phillies who are going to continue to develop

that are going to be on top. I have Tarifa on top for example

won her last race at at the fairgrounds in that Rachel

Alexandra which is a very good predictor of success.

Remember Brad Cox shipped W Omaha out of the fairgrounds to

run in the honeybee so she wouldn't run against Tarifa and

then boom, she wins the race. We talked about that with Dan

Illman when he was on last was that was the giveaway was that

he had this horse and he knew she was going to win.

So he had to move West Omaha to another spot.

I have her on top after that win because she does have three wins

in four starts. Her only loss though of course

is at Churchill Downs. Of course that happens, right?

But it was her first time against winners, right?

She goes down to the fairgrounds, gets a little bit

of a little bit of a breather, she gets about two months off,

comes back, wins, second off the layoff, wins the Rachel

Alexandra. I'll be interested to see,

though, where they go with her if she runs again before the the

Kentucky. Oaks.

OK, let's let's go on order since Tree was the tie for third

well. I'm giving my rankings.

You want OK, do you want me to go through the point system?

Just say if they're in your rankings or not.

I don't, OK? I want to give my rankings.

Well then I can't, like, set you up because I haven't, like, seen

your rankings. Oh, you want to go up?

They're on the show sheets. Cheese, OP.

They're. On a Google doc that I shared.

With you. All right, well, we're going to

start at the back, then the 5th. Well, I have 3 on top Spoiler

alert since I just talked about it.

Go ahead. I will stop the the your 5th

pick so far in the Oaks is Jinjin, who's actually in fifth

in points as well right now. 41 points.

Brad Cox trained Calumet Farm. Calumet knows their way around

some winners in Churchill Downs. Tell me what you like about

Jinjin. Long explanation here, and I

apologize in advance. She's been she's on the

aqueduct. Aqueduct aqueduct.

Excuse me, sorry. Long Island apologies.

And bill my guy from 11:50 if you're listening at aqueduct she

runs in the butcher. Now I have long complained about

the Kentucky oaks path through New York because they run the

the busanda in January over two turns and then they come back

and run the Bush over one, right.

So she wins over two she comes back over a mile runs out of

space. I I trust Brad Cox to get this

horse back up and going and win a race where so she runs third

in the butcher which is a listed stakes doesn't get a ton of

points. Did you say she's 5th?

Oh, that's good. OK, all right.

Because. She wants.

I mean, the point system doesn't really matter a whole lot

either. It doesn't really matter.

But well, not for who's best, but.

That is qualifying, Yeah, qualifying, but.

He's in right? And she's got 41 points.

If she if she gets any kind of placement, she's going to be in.

I I think her getting to stretch back out is going to be good.

The daughter of Hightail by the way.

You you you think her connections are hoping that that

that horse pops up because she's easily the most successful of

his horses. So that group is definitely

hoping that Jin Jin does what I just described.

Is it normal for Brad Cox to go through New York?

Oh, it is now. OK, it is now.

Yes, and we. And on the Derby side too.

Jin Jin Ran. The reason, the reason I like

that by the way, coming out of Aqueduct is because both Door

Knock and Sierra Leone came out of Aqueduct and won their preps

after that. I'm wondering if that whatever

that surface is at Aqueduct isn't getting 3 year olds ready

in the very best way for the next races.

So I'm going to lean on that a little bit in my rankings by.

The way the next horse you have is Todd for 3rd and points and

it is owned by Aaron Stones and trained by Wayne Lucas and we

got a lot of fun. Wayne Lucas, one of the oaks the

last time, and that's Lemon muffin.

Broker Maiden and the Honeybee. All right.

And just seem to figure it out. I love watching especially 3

year old Phillies figure it out and she figured it out in that

race. Will be interesting to watch.

Interviewed Keith Asmussen a couple.

Asmussen. Drink and a couple weeks ago.

Loves this horse. I'll be interested to see if he

gets to keep the mount in the oaks.

I'm sure every day that he sees the I don't know.

Even played. Oh well, oh, it's 'cause I got

the volume, yeah. That would do it.

Let's try it again, Asmussen. How about that?

Don't. Believe.

Don't stop believing. All right.

Sorry, Steve. Where you at?

Zach? Zach, I need you.

Lemon Muffin six runs, one win. It's integrated stakes.

She is an absolute wild card at this point.

But do we think Dewayne Lucas can win the?

Oaks. I mean, he is a newer.

Trainer, and he's building on track.

Record with that guy, whoever he is.

Very good for this guy. What is he, 22?

Yeah, no, it's more connections than anything else.

She's daughter collected Canadian frontier on the mom's

side. So again, interesting breeding

with this group, but she really leave to seem to love, excuse

me, the stretch out. And it's one of those that if

she does develop, she gets better.

I think that she can, absolutely.

Be in the equation. And by the way, I do love a

lemon muffin. I got nothing to guess.

If you. Muffins are shockingly high in

calories. Are they?

Are. Maybe that's why I'm fat.

Get you a scone? How about that?

What's going on? I will say that if you're in

Louisville around race day and you go, I'm I'm not a huge fan

of Hiney Brothers coffee, but I do love their lemon poppy seed

muffin and get it cold. That's the key there.

Make sure it's cold. Their baked goods don't miss.

They do not. Next up for Lemon Muffin is the

fantasy. By the way, she'll stand that

Arkansas path. Yeah.

OK. So that will takes us there.

And we got #3. Is she?

Backs it up, by the way. Yeah.

Because she was like, my favorite comment on Twitter

about her before that race or after the race was you couldn't

have picked that horse on a Ouija board.

That's a fantastic comment, whoever that was, God bless you.

So I agree. Before the race, you never would

have picked that horse. There's no chance you had.

You would have had to go on all to get her in the last.

All right, next horse you have is Jody's Pride.

Who is the leader in the clubhouse right now with points?

Oh, cool. What do you like about Jody's

Pride? Well, she won that butcher and

she was second in the Breeders Cup.

Juvenile Phillies, right? So she backed up a second place

finish at Santa Anita at Aqueduct.

Can you think of two places with more different surfaces?

Than. So that's I love that you know

that Yep she and and she wanted she wanted aqueduct before that

broke her maiden last August at Saratoga so she's won three or

excuse me at two different tracks and run really well at

Santa Anita. Love a horse that can travel

especially a young one and so I'll have her there connections

are the only reason she's in 3rd.

Jorge Abreu is the trainer here, Jose Luscano, the rider, we'll

see how she develops along. But this is a daughter of

American Pharaoh and we've seen it before, right at Churchill,

that guy, you might have heard of him and so scat daddy, but

scat daddy on the on the mom's side.

I mean, this is a really royally bred horse.

Will be interesting to watch her develop, but she absolutely

deserves spot on the top three. OK, Jody's Pride going to the

Gazelle next. That's the where they're

pointing Jody's pride contender then, for sure, then.

No question in the Gazelle is actually a good producer of oaks

horses, unlike the Wood Memorial.

Just FYI, the winner of the Breeders Cup, Juvenile Philly is

your second. Pick Yeah, she's 3 for three.

Lifetime has yet to run this year.

She did win that Breeders' Cup. Juvenile Phillies.

I think she's really, really really talented.

Obviously a Bill Mott trainee Daughter of justify.

Maybe the best. Maybe.

Maybe the best sire going right now Any less at least.

Good magic. Him and good magic and and

that's I mean the list is pretty short.

They have dropped American Pharaoh.

Stud fee voter really justifies as private.

Oh. My man, a quarter $1,000,000

earning $1000. I mean that's that kind.

Of a high class escort. So I have just FYI in the second

button. Also going to be joining none of

the Gazelle in the What's the race are we making?

Oh, the fantasy. Yes.

Yeah. All right, I'll.

Go on Arkansas, OK, I like it. Go on Arkansas.

I like that. Go on Arkansas.

All right. Interesting.

Who gets that mount? Yeah.

Yeah, because I think it was Junior Alvarado in the in the

the British Cup. So it'll be interesting to see

if he runs her back with him. I don't love the layoff, that's

why she's 2nd and not first. She was obvious champion 2 year

old, but I don't love the layoff at this point.

I want to give just a really kind of just before we get into

the Derby horses, let's talk of just about the schedule, about

how these hundred point races go.

Sure, it does matter. Obviously if you just race,

you're probably not going to go to Louisiana in two weeks, so

that is the OH in. Nine days or whatever.

Yeah, it's it's coming up so. We'll talk to Kevin Kilroy next

week. Oh.

I like Kevin Kilroy. Yeah, he's nicer.

Yeah, you know, we. He's wearing a hat right now.

I'm sure he is right. So am I.

I mean, right now for sure, I got showers in one, sleeps in

one. I can only confirm that because

we slept together when we were in LA.

Was he good? I slept with you too.

Not in LA. We got gas at South Central.

In the same house, dude. We looked at that map after we

got done. It was like, every rap song is

based on this neighborhood. How about that?

Oh, it was great. So on the weekend of the 23rd we

have the Japanese Fuku Fuku Ruyo the.

Fuku Rayo. Fuku Rayo, We have the Louisiana

Derby and the Jeff Ruby Stakes. So, and you love.

I mean, the Jeff Ruby Stakes is starting to become a legit

starting contender. It's.

Over You have to pay attention to the to the horses on that

track. I'll talk about one that'll be

in the Jeff Ruby Stakes that has no Derby points and that I think

is a contender. And that's.

Tennessee, right? Why did you do that?

Because of that's who the first horse we're talking about.

Oh, 'cause he's the wild card. Yeah, I was going to save him

for last, but hey, how about that?

I'm sorry. No, you just.

I put together a show sheet and then you're like, fuck off.

I'm going to do whatever. I.

Want you see, the horse on top is the one that's going to

surprise, and that's why I wanted to leave that for last.

OK, fair enough. Let's talk about Tennessee.

So talk about Tennessee and the Jeffrey.

So I interviewed Brad Cox a couple weeks ago.

Oh. You've mentioned that.

Humble brag drink? No, I'm just trying to get.

People thanks Dan Issel. That's not true.

Jenny Reese did that one, OK? And so I caught him off guard,

'cause I was like, hey, I'm sure everybody's asking you about all

these Derby horses you have. You've got this horse that I've

watched you run and an optional claimer and all these sorts of

things. His name is Tennessee is your

Ruby horse. And he did the old.

I caught him and he was like, yeah, he'll be in the Ruby.

And I was like, there it is. Tried him at Churchill in a

maiden special. Was that an all time moment?

I I literally opened the question with I'm an observer of

Brad Cox and then I said I think Tennessee's.

Did you say Brad? Of Brad Cox.

You didn't say just I'm an observer of Cox.

Well, I am an observer of Cox, OK?

Yeah, the they tried him in the highest level on his first run

at Churchill Downs in a maiden special weight.

Comes back at Turfway. Gets some time off, runs near

essentially at the end of October, comes back in January,

breaks his maiden. Comes back against winners for

the first time, going two turns at Turfway and wins.

So it was clear they were either going to run him in the

Battaglia or in the Ruby. They're going to run him in the

Ruby. And no one's got that yet.

By the way. That's kind of breaking news.

Like no one has him as a problem in the in the Ruby yet.

Well, there you go. Yeah, helps to helps to, I don't

know, talk to Brad Cox. What are what are people doing

in this industry? I really don't understand.

What are they doing. Why is no one talking anyways?

Tennessee's legit. He's legit.

This is a a son of justify smart strike on the mom's side.

You're going to have Luan Machado.

Which go ahead and laugh. It's fine at Turf way.

The guy's a baller. OK, Ruby matters.

And so and I I just. I trust Brad Cox to have this

course properly conditioned and ready for the for the for the

Derby. I just do.

And so he'll be my pick in the Ruby when we get there.

Almost certainly. I don't know the turf forces

that are going to come in from, you know, from New York or

Florida, whatever to try to, you know, pick up the points there,

pick up a check, etcetera. It is a $700,000 race.

Last thing I'll say by the way, Turfway, folks, Churchill, you

got to figure it out. The Battaglia can't be 3 weeks

before the Ruby. No one's going to do both, so

figure that out. Set them a month apart.

Whatever you got to do, I don't mind you moving the Ruby five

weeks before the Derby. I think that's reasonable.

Lots of trainers want that in the modern era.

That's why the Louisiana Derby still populate six weeks before

the Derby, right? And so or it's the five weeks,

whatever. And so get that Battaglia moved

back to the end of February if you want to make it, you know a

more serious part of the their Derby trail, in my opinion.

All right. So going on with that Ruby

state. So this is just, this is what

one site has right now because there's I look at this and

there's an agent here that I recognize Encino right now.

There's another Brad Cox horse that they could run the Ruby.

Do you think that's going to? Stick.

He can't because he won the Battaglia.

So that's a three-week layoff and and that's just not.

What you're we just mentioned a Gate Rd. from Quality Rd.

Agate Rd. would make a lot of sense because he's actually a

turf horse that they tried on the dirt on the Derby trail.

No question Turfway would be better for that horse than a

dirt route. The El Camino Real Derby winner?

Famously. Yep.

Is coming? Yep.

So I mean this is. I like that.

Oh. No, no, no, no, no.

That it's going to be a full field.

Yep, 12 or 14, actually. They've been capping them at 12.

I don't know if they'll go to 14 for the Ruby.

They should. And then that horse is coming

in. I love it, by the way.

I love that. Because if he doesn't, if he

doesn't win, what happens? I think it's a free spot of the

Preakness. Anyway.

Go try that stuff. I love.

I love that kind of stuff. So I love them taking a swing.

Love it. OK, we'll go down.

I kind of want to go through these races a little bit, but

we'll go through the to the next horse that you have.

The 10th place horse right now and Louis Derby Top 10 #10 is

catching freedom. We'll catching freedom.

Well, he's trained by a guy named Brad Cox.

We should mention him at some point during this.

We should You're a lover of Cox. I am third in the Risen Star 14

horse. You know in the in the 14th race

down there is an Oak Lawn horse. Before that one is race.

I did break his maiden at Churchill and I ran third.

Like I said in that Risen Star, I like the breeding on this one

as well. Constitution pioneer, the Nile

on the mom's side. So this one makes sense to me as

a long term sort of prospect. I don't think he's on anyone's

top of their board for a win at this point, but he's one that if

he wins 100 point prep, you're going to have to pay attention

just because of the breeding and the connections.

And going back again with that 100, this is interesting to me

just because the 100 point races, the way that they go is

you get 100. I got to imagine he's, he's a

probable for Louisiana Derby, yeah.

Who's that? Catching freedom?

Catching freedom. Hold on for a second.

Yes. OK, great.

He's in the Louisiana Derby right now, or that's where

they're they're pointing right there with the with the 100

point races, you get 100 points for first place, 50 points for

second, replace 25 points for 3rd place.

So he right now in the point system catching freedoms in 10th

place with 25 points. If for some weird reason he

doesn't finish top three, you know it probably comes in 4th

and gets 15 points. 40 points will probably get you in.

Every horse that runs second in these hundred point races is

ahead of them. Yeah, maybe not.

Like you, he's got to run third man.

It's an interesting thing because like if you could see,

you could see people missing the board.

You talked about new trends. This is Kerchel coming up with

new trends, realizing that second place horses win this

race now. I mean Risk Strike comes third

out of the Ruby Mage comes second out of the floor to

Derby. I mean those horses are winning

the Derby now. It's.

I mean, it's the hundred point winners aren't just not

dominating the Derby anymore. No, that's a that's an

adjustment by them that I applaud.

So one bad race here could cost you your spot.

Oh yeah, one. 100% so but that's.

But he could be a Pad de mile horse.

He could. This is what I'm talking about.

Like those races are set up to actually be kind of fire this

year. All right, so we're going to go

on to Louis's next horse, which is the 9th place in his top 10

track, Phantom. Yeah, so track Phantom comes in

here off a second place. Finish another.

Derby, Louisiana Derby. Won the La Compte Stakes before

that, and this is a horse trained by.

Steve. I did never notice I was going

to say it's on the loop. What am I talking about?

You have it in there as hi as ma send sound.

Yeah, not as Mussen. Like, as one.

Word AZNUHSEN 3 words, yeah. Sound.

That's great. Second place of the risen star.

One little cop before that. One.

The Gun Runner before that. So literally, if he doesn't

finish that and if he doesn't get run down by Sierra Leone,

we're talking about an undefeated this year horse,

including a run right before Christmas at fairgrounds.

You would love this horse if he were undefeated at this point of

three-year old, right? And so.

Although I'm not a big fan of Asmussen in the Derby, right?

So that's the other key here is that this is not usually where

where Asmussen's the best. Even with Gun Runner, it took

him till his four and five year old year to really be great.

Now, he handled Gun Runner beautifully.

He did. It's not a if.

That is not a slight by the way. It's just he wasn't ready till

he was 4 or. Five I love Asmussen.

When we saw him at the Preakness, like he looked like

he was having the shittiest day. And he didn't.

He didn't want to talk to us at all.

And I was like, he's like, he even kind of like said, hey, is

this going to be fun? It's like, listen man, it's.

Got to be fun. And by the time he left us, he

was smiling. He was loving, you know.

I think that's how most people feel about us, you know?

But this is a quality Rd. into mischief.

Again, we're getting into that breeding the things that matter.

Joel Rosario is going to get them out.

All things that I like and I trust.

And so yeah, he's in my top temperature all.

Right, we're going to go on now to the 8th place horse is Hayes.

What do you like about Hayes, Louis?

He won a race that I mean, he won He.

He won a race at Gulfstream. That's why he got out front.

He stayed out front. Paco Lopez knows how to raid on

the front. That's why I like him.

This is a year of slow horses. They give you the one that's

willing to be out front and can just get a lead and keep the

lead. So that's why I like Hades.

I'll be interested to see him in the Florida Derby.

How many points do because of his name, How many points does

he have? 20 He.

Has 20, yes. Dude, that horse finishes 30.

He's got 45 points. He's.

He's probably in the field, Yeah, right, if he's if.

That line could be somewhere between 4 and 45.

That's probably about right. So this.

Is interesting because Orseno is the probably Orseno is the is

the trainer here and and this is a guy who's got a couple horses

I mean his top horses all time you know he's had some grade one

winners perfect Sting Golden Missile Macho Uno.

He was trainer Macho Uno, Red bullet tap to music Imprimus was

one of his. It's just you know he's got 89

starts this year seven wins. He's not, he's not a huge, a

huge operation here, so interesting connections for this

one, but but a horse to watch for sure.

Hades is a gelding. So he's like you?

Yeah, so, you know, last gelding to won the Derby, Was it funny

side sounds right. No, it might be right, Yeah.

But that Florida Derby field's going to be legit.

I mean, it's going to be fierceness.

It's going to. It's going to be.

What's funny is none of these horses blow you away, but all

the fields are going to be fun, right?

Like, like trying to predict the races is going to be a blast.

Betting wise, it's going to be fantastic.

OK, the 7th is Dieter ministic. Dieter Ministic comes out second

race ever and wins the Gotham at Aqueduct.

Everyone knows how I feel about Aqueduct right now.

I'm leaning on these New York horses at this point.

Joel Rosario flew back to New York for this race from Florida,

essentially on an Aqueduct card with nothing else for him.

Rides for Christophe Lamont brings the horse off the layoff

from August. What's the third race in his

cycle going to be? The Kentucky Derby.

So he's actually set up form cycle wise to be very, very good

by the time we get there. Liam's map?

Spikestown on the dads or on the mom's side?

Excuse me, I don't love that but Lambs map already sired for

grade one winners and so can we add another one to this?

Possibly the Gotham being the grade three.

Of course. He won that.

I loved how this horse finished. Very deep track, wet day.

Had to make a move between two horses in his second race ever

off a massive layoff. Love all of that stuff, Really

trust Christophe Lamont Connections.

There should be, should be. If he shows up in the Wood

Memorial, which is not going to be at Belmont, I'm going to feel

really different about him this year than I have about the Wood

Memorial in. Pass.

And right now, they're kind of. I think they're still trying to

figure it out. I don't think wood memorials are

for sure. Oh.

I agree he might go to bluegrass something like.

That could go to Bluegrass, could go to the Arkansas.

So just kind of keep an eye on like what path that Guidry

Maniski kind of takes. Kind of surprised, though, it

seems high for him to me. I agree.

But I'm, I'm betting on him in the same way that after Sierra

Leone came second in that in that got in the Oh my gosh,

Mike, help me. Why am I doing this now?

I don't know why. What was the race?

What was the race with him and Dornoch?

Not the risen star the. December 2nd.

Rebel. No.

The December 2nd one was the in new.

York. Good Lord, anyways.

It's not. The I I really, I really think

that that race is going to turn out to be an incredibly

incredible predictor of these things.

It's so deterministic. I'm really betting on.

I'm betting on him being great because of what I've seen in

Aqueduct. OK.

All right. And of course, we're not usually

high on the New York horses. So it's it again.

New trends we weren't high on. We weren't high on freaking

Turfway Park either, man. And it's just it's just a

different era. Now, OK, Mystic Dan is your 6th

pick. Mystic Dan is.

So tell us a little bit about Mystic Dan.

I don't like this horse, but I think he's going to win a bunch.

I what I do like is that he's trained by Kenny Mcpeak, which

means that he's going to run a lot because Mcpeak actually just

runs his horses. It's a really weird idea but but

it comes out wins the Southwest. Last time thought he did it

really impressively. He was.

He's probably the fastest prep to this point Now everyone's

going, oh, Louis was in the slop.

At some point I got to stop knocking horses for winning in

the slop. Plus it rains on Derby day.

That stuff happens. And so you know if we get a

sloppic track he might be the play here.

Mystic Dan ridden. Maybe the ride of the Derby prep

so far this year. Brian Hernandez skipping up the

rail in that rebel, excuse me, in the Southwest, in the Grade 3

in February, should see him. What in the Arkansas Derby is

there? On the on the 30th there you go

I then the 5th place horse that you have here with Ripoli and

fierceness. Fierceness.

It almost feels like something tells me this is the horse that

won the Breeders Cup. Juvenile did not fire early on

as a as a three-year old. It is one race.

And is one race we're going to see what happens in the Florida

Derby. I'm almost like looking like

because it's it's so much different than what we saw with

you know Forte and whatever else.

Like, is this horse going to kind of rebound?

And maybe this is this is Ripoli and Fletchers won, you know?

Again, second off the layoff in the Florida Derby.

He'll be third up in the Derby, that is to me.

It all makes sense. I trust the connections there,

obviously with Todd Pletcher and Ripoli and all those guys.

Ripoli's had a couple of horses. Just a couple.

And Todd Pletcher I've heard of before, not a lot.

It's like that Brad Cox guy we talked about the coach on that

stuff. Like these are new guys, but

whatever. You got to get used to the new

guys. Too will not run the preakness.

Fierceness, yeah, unless he wins the Derby.

Maybe. We'll see.

Yeah, we'll see. Because Pletcher is not a fan of

that. So we'll have to see another the

other Florida Derby horse that we mentioned before, That's your

4th place horse. This is a horse I also like.

A lot is Door Knock. Why do you like it?

I mean, I just really liked, you know, #1 Big Brown.

You gotta love the Big Brown. What's the puka?

So Big Brown. This is the full brother to good

magic or not to good magic to mage.

And so I I just kind of made so much last year.

I feel like I need to give door knock a little bit more respect,

but Dornox pretty much answered the call and he does he have a

high speed figure? No, but remember that was First

off the layoff for him in that race, right.

And so we had, we had been watching these races and

wondering where the hell these horses were that were coming off

layoffs. They all look terrible

fierceness amongst them, right. You know, we also had live talk

on one of the Oaks races as well at Gulfstream.

So no, I this horse actually came off the layoff really well.

I think it's sets up for him again to be third for 3rd in

form race when he gets to the Kentucky Derby itself.

I I'm not going to throw away all of the things that he did in

in his races just yet. OK, that's cryptic.

He did beat your third place horses, Sierra Leone.

Oh, Dornoch. Yeah, Well, yeah, of course.

He was in that Remsen, which was the race I was trying to come up

with. I was just talking about

Pierce's, by the way, Let's get to Dornoch.

Dornoch, though, is set up very, very well right now to be third

up in the Kentucky Derby and to run into that, you know, Florida

Derby against a very good field, get really good experience and

then by the time he gets to Louisville, I think he'll be in

really great form. All right.

And this is one that would follow trends, right?

The could be the Undefeated as a three-year old, all that kind of

stuff. So we'll see if Door Knock is

able to pull it off. And man, I don't know if it's

ever happened before they had the two full brothers, No.

Way. There's no chance.

There's no chance. And especially not back or back

years, no. Hell no.

I mean that's that would be good magic stud fee.

No if if they go back-to-back. It would be a gajillion.

Well, what's his broodmare worth then?

Oh, tell me what's? 8 million * 9, honestly.

Yeah, you got to be sure. Yeah.

No. And you know when you have.

The Monomoy girls on the track. She goes for seven.

When you got a broodmare, who's got, you know, Big Brown as the

as her daddy, you know, that just goes a long way.

So that's right. All right.

Sierra Leone is your third pick right now.

By the way, I know you love Gun Runner.

It needs to be said about major door knock that they didn't know

that when they paired those two together, right?

That was years ago, right? So it just so happened that both

of them are great. It's very unusual.

Yeah. All right.

So, Sierra Leone? Would be second if his running

style were different. OK, I don't love the closer this

year. I agree yet.

Yet we haven't found our rabbit yet.

There might be 1. We don't have one yet.

And so I I don't love that he's probably going to have to

navigate 15 freaking horses to win the Kentucky Derby and I

just don't like that. Can it be done?

Sure. Absolutely.

But and and and Tyler's probably going to be aboard this horse

those Churchill as well as Pat Day frankly.

I mean like he's that guy to level right now.

But the running style really bothers me.

Obviously nothing about the breeding bothers me.

Nothing about Chad Brown and Tyler got fully on bothers me.

I I think he'll be in the fold here.

He'll be a very serious horse when we get to that first

Saturday in May, but the running style is why he's in 3rd and not

second. For me is it.

Is it a scenario though where like Chad Brown takes one of his

speed horses and tries to point him at 100 point race that he

thinks he could hit second? I think that's actually going to

be out of the Cox barn on the track.

I'm winning lose or losing race. Yeah interestingly you know

that's that's that's fascinating.

OK, your second place horse who's you know probably going to

be like bet like no other just because of his name and he's a

good horse. What do we?

Do. By the way, real question next

three weeks. Timberlake's ready to go.

Yeah. It's going to be me.

We got that. And then Dusty.

Meg gets hired at you. Will we got all this, Meg?

We got Derby. We got Dusty.

We have Timberlake. It happens every year around

here. It's.

A lot of May bro A. Lot of May.

It's a lot of May. You think Dusty May's getting

the UFO job? Is that who your pick is?

Who I think will get or who I want to get it.

Well, I guess the IU connections is why you want Dusty May.

No, I don't want him here. I just think he'll get the job.

Would you rather him not get the job and be the next side coach

IU? I I I think he should take the

Ohio State job. OK.

I think he'd be freaking amazing at Ohio State.

Really good. Anyways, Timberlake wins, comes

out, he wins the Rebel, dude, It's that.

Look, look, this show is based in Louisville, KY We're going to

talk horses. Basketball is going to happen.

These are things, brother. It's OK.

It's got to happen. All right.

So Timberlake wins the race last out against Common Defense,

Northern Flame, Wood Core, Dynamatic Carbone, who I really

like, was this a great field is the question.

OK, OK, great. If we're going to start

splitting hairs about the fields in 50 point races, I don't know.

But a big field, he goes two turns, right?

You get Christian Torres aboard who's not the normal rider

because Florenz Rouge overseas on the on the on the Arabian

Peninsula, right? Yeah.

And so you get a backup jockey. He still wins pretty damn easily

in the Arkansas route, I trust as a good route.

Oaklawn seems to travel well off that dirt and so give me him in

my second spot. If we're going for horses that

actually kind of look fast, it would be him.

OK, I kind of teed this up earlier, didn't.

And that's an it's a mischief, by the way.

We haven't talked about him yet on this show and so this would

be the chance for into mischief to get one last Derby winner, I

think. I think he's about to be.

Are you going to be shocked when Timberlake's the morning line

favorite for the? Morning line favorite?

But let's not say morning line favorite.

Let's say he goes off as the favorite.

He's bet to the favorite. I would be surprised at that,

OK. Forever young.

This is where he gets interesting.

Louis, this is your top pick. This is your surprise.

It's not a surprise. Do you know why?

Because Japan's doing a good job, man.

Number one. Number two, who told us about

the source before he won the Saudi?

Oh, shoot. Mr. Dannon.

That's right. So I watched the source very

closely in the boutique group Saudi Derby Grade 3, and he

wasn't just the best horse, he was easily the best horse.

That's a nice deep track there in Riyadh.

He's going to go to the UAE Derby, he's going to win it, and

then he's going to come here and we have to make a really serious

decision. Is he Mendelssohn?

Or is he this horse? This feels like the most

talented. Mendelssohn, The Japanese thing.

At some point, you and I are both of the same opinion.

They're going to get one. A Japanese horse is going to

pick off this race at some year. Yeah, I I think Forever Young

gives us the best chance of that happening to date.

Son of Real Steel, Congrats on the Mom's side.

So they have figured out their breeding program.

They have figured out their training program.

This horse is going to spend some time in the Arabian

Peninsula that he's going to ship over to Louisville.

I I think when he wins the UAE RB by 5-6 lengths, everyone's

going to have to pay attention and it and that's where we're

at. I I think that at some point

this under by the way, undefeated horse is going to

come over to Louisville. We're going to see the Japanese

thing finally pay off in an early year 3 year old race and

that's who I would pick today. If the Derby was Saturday, I

would pick for every young to win the Derby.

I am. I'm, you know, we're going to

get for every young. That path is pretty well

established. What I like watching right now

is how trainer start to pick their spots.

You know there's some up in the air about which race they want

to go to. The bluegrass is eerily in play

because you know even though that has not.

That field is going to be absolute scalding fire.

They should be, yes. My God.

I mean, I. There's a couple horses that are

kind of on the fence of if they're going to go there

somewhere else, and I think that's where you're going to

just start watching. Trainers try to figure out

what's their best shot to go get the points and put themselves in

position for Saturday, the 1st Saturday in May.

And then the other thing that I get fascinated by is then how

the jockeys start to sort out to you, right?

That's. Tyler's been on multiple

winners. Who does he choose?

You know who does? You know who does a You know

Velasquez choose? Who does I read end up on that

kind of thing for sure? And I think you pay attention to

that and I think because these, these jockeys want to want to

win the Kentucky Derby, Oh my goodness.

And they want to pick the horse that to me that's going to give

them the best shot. You know that's going to give

them the best shot to have those roses at the end of the day, So

just start paying attention to it, man.

Again, so after this episode, go ahead, download the Kentucky

racing spotlight. Listen to Tyler talk about

domestic product. Listen to him talk about the

Kentucky Derby itself. It's a it's a good interview and

he is very high in domestic product about that.

He's not my top ten, but it's he's very high on that horse.

But if he jumps on Sierra Leone for the Derby, that's a

giveaway. Yeah, you're right.

Yeah, absolutely. That's right.

All right. So that's so.

By the way, we're coming up on an hour, yeah.

Oh, we are. We're well, we talked.

We talked Derby festival for 10 minutes.

Is that OK? 100%.

All right, whatever. We're just going to talk stakes

races. If you want all of my picks for

Oak Lawn and for Turfway on Saturday, you got to go to

goldbookbets.com. I'll have all of my plays, all

of my top plays for the late sequences of both tracks, so

probably about 12 races. I'll have a pick five play at

Oaklawn, along with a couple of rolling pick threes.

We'll play the late pick four at Turfway.

Gold Book, bets.com. Get in now.

If you're on our e-mail list, you'll get a break.

It's free right now. All the preps are free.

We do it every Saturday when we get to Derby week and we get to

the Preakness and we get to the Belmont.

We'll have you set up as one package for the whole thing.

Get you all of our thoughts on those.

Well, in the first days we're going to talk about because it

is Whitmore Steaks, Dave, we're going to talk about the Race 7

at Down at Oaklawn Park. Our man Matt Dennerman is the

track announcer. By the way.

He's kind of big time on this now, right?

No, he turned me down for tomorrow.

The 'cause he's got something to do with all clown.

Oh, that guy's discovering he doesn't just get to like hang

out and go to the backside and hang out with horses and.

He's got a job now. He actually, he lives in a place

that really gives a shit about horse racing and he's got stuff

to do that's. Right.

And I will just say last week when I was in California, I got

to drive past Golden Gate Fields.

Now I also understand kind of why they decided to shut it

down. There is some prime real estate

and and I sent Louis a picture and I got no response.

I acted like it was my birthday. Jeez.

All right, who do you like when it's purple mound steaks, 6

furlongs. It's a Sprint on the dirt. 3

year old Phillies. So $200,000 here.

Nobody here going to run in the oaks, right?

None of these will be oaks horses.

Some of these are dropping out of the oaks trail and and they

you know try your horse over two turns.

If she doesn't like it you run her back in the in the sprints.

Running for 200 K by the way not the end of the world.

I do think some of the chalk is more interesting here.

Blue Squaw the two if you look at who Blue Squaw beat 2 back in

the mud in a maiden special, was a little horse called Lemon

Muffin. You may have heard her as part

of my Oaks trail. Top ten or top five I guess.

Came back ran second by a nose. Literally.

We had a Bang Bang photo finish between Blue Squaw and extreme

Diva last time out. Extreme Diva man undefeated this

year though the six horse on the outside Ramon Vasquez gets the

mount here. I don't think that's a downgrade

at all from Gallardo and so interested to see him aboard.

My third pick in that race is the three horse Brooklyn Drew

Broker Maiden, last out at Fairgrounds in a race that was

taken off of the turf. So this is a daughter of army

mule. I think they were thinking this

would be a turf sprinter and they were going to keep trying

her on the turf. They get taken off of the turf,

she wins by 5 1/2 lengths against.

I don't know, I don't know how good that field was for dirt,

but she was very comfortable. Ran that race in 104 and 2 / 5

1/2 furlongs. Super fast splits.

She's fast. If she likes the surface up

there, she's the second longest odds in the field.

I think you have to include her in a ticket, so I went 263 here

in the purple mountain. Now we're going on to the Grade

3 Whitmore stakes, which is, you know, you and I Whitmore.

What was this called before? Was it called Oaklawns?

It was the Oaklawn. Spot or something's.

Purse. That's well, that's what it was.

Inaugurally, at least, is the Hotspur.

Well, they had to change it in because he won the thing 38

times in a row. He's like Mage, but on the

breeding. Side Yeah, and Whitmore was, was

he the first Derby when we started doing this together?

No, he was in the 16 Derby with Nyquist, OK?

And he came last, Yes. Reminder, but he's had a great.

He had a great. Career as a sprinter.

A reminder, it's worth taking a shot in the Derby, because even

if it doesn't work, you can still have a Whitmore.

And. By the way, here's win in the

Breeders Cup. We were there.

We're very lucky in 2020. Yep.

It's the only time I've missed on a ticket.

It wasn't. That is I I stood up and

applauded and it was so cool. I came from off the pace.

That place was a parking lot that day and he came from off

the pace and a Sprint. It was cool.

It was. Just six furlongs on the dirt,

Whitmore, especially 4 year olds and up $250,000 race.

Do we have the next Whitmore in? This race we kind of do and

look, there are two horses in here that I think are

prohibitive favourites. Tejano Twist is the two never

miss the board. At this distance.

In 13 runs, 643 six wins at thirteen tries, 3 for six.

Never missed the board at Oakland Park.

At the distance right when it's not raining, this horse wins 9

of 22 times. We're going to have dry

conditions on Saturday. That's why I have Tejano Twist

on top, as does the morning Line maker.

Chris Landaros is going to get them out there again for Chris

Hartman, who's actually having a pretty sneaky good meet. 15 for

19 or 15 for 90. Excuse me, At Oakland right now.

Rivet is in here. Rivet Ravi.

I can't. I don't.

I don't it. It's an asthma.

How about that His son is riding picks up the mount here again

one last time in an allowance. Sub 110 allowance.

So we have a double at. Six for that's triple.

Triple asthma. That one and so didn't even do

the loop there. How about that?

Good job. I I think those two are the

likeleys outside chance. The six Horse Jackson Traveller,

of course, you know. Right is 6 years old now say it.

Again. Oh, yeah, yeah.

Oh no, this this race is not. That's a legit race.

This is a grade 3 for sure, like grade 3, good grade three grade

3. Plus, and I'm not going to be

surprised either if we start to see one of these horses kind of

climb the race and sneak into that breeders coach or Sprint

field. I think both Rivet, rivey,

whatever and Tejano twist. We'll be in the Breeders coach

front. Are capable of it.

OK. All right.

They're not of the class that we saw the last couple of years in

that race. It's been very good I mean

frankly that class and on the on the on the Philly Mare side too

but I I'm interested Jackson traveller bringing them back in

graded company here has been running in black types and that

sort of thing was very good at Sunderland last time this is a

very Asmussen thing right for ran into the park there it is

ran into king cotton in the slop in Oakland hated it comes back

eight for 21 lifetime though on dry dirt six and seven wins and

seconds in 20 tries at the distance.

And you get flavoring at 12 to one you.

Get Flavia and Pratt You get Flavian Pratt do you?

Look at that. When he puts Flavian on this

horse and puts his son on the other horse, That Jackson

traveler really is his pick. I think there's something there,

yeah. That's a horse that is fully

capable. The other thing is they move

that horse to Oaklawn in like December.

They've they've been training him at Oaklawn to get ready for

races outside of there. So I think they've been pointing

to this one with him for a long time, one last time, like I said

in the Sunland in that Thomas Memorial interested to see him.

I just think at 12 to one you can take a flyer there at least

all. Right.

We'll set out to turf way. How about that?

And let's talk about the Queen. 6 Furlongs on the synthetic

Phillies and Marriage, 4 year old.

By the way, someone who's never been on this pod, but I've

gotten to know through the 11:50 show and then through the

Spotlight show is is is Caitlyn free?

Yeah, man, she's OK. Let me we follow each other on

Twitter, I think. I know.

But let me gush for a second because a couple of years ago, I

wasn't. I wasn't convicted.

I wasn't. Yeah.

OK. No, I wasn't.

I'll say it out loud. I wasn't.

Kaitlyn, come on the show. No, I know she would, but she

works at night, Turfway. We'll go there.

Or. We need to go.

We actually need to do a show there.

Well, I'm going, I'll be, I'll be up on the Friday before the

brewby. But anyways, yeah, on 22nd.

But anyways, the look, she is dynamite and she's become a

terrific handicapper. She's obviously very good on on

screen, just fun to watch people in our generation of this,

whatever we do, coming up like she doesn't, she's doing a great

job. Just a shout out to her.

She's been fantastic. She's so kind to me, she's

fantastic. Anyways, and.

That's unusual. People are usually not kind to

Louis, so they just shit on him all the time.

Text me at like 11:40 on my birthday.

Happy birthday. I wanted me to be the last thing

that just. I was asleep, so it is what I

miss. Yeah, I'm an old man now about

sleep. Well, you know, now you turn 43.

It's over, man. All.

Right. So tell me about the Queen who's

going to win? The same.

So this is an interesting race because BG warriors in here and

she shot out of a cannon. Last out 1 by 5 1/2 lengths in

the wishing well, which was back in January.

If you just wanted to go class and be skinny, use her.

I'm going to use Victorious on top the seven here again, 2

seconds slower last out than this horse but is in form.

Coming off of a touch of a layoff here is going to get

about 5 weeks between races rather than the like.

Boy at this point Fiji War is looking at seven.

OK, seven kind of weeks off. That's a terrible, terrible

angle for Hugo Andrade, who has the favorite BG warrior here.

He's won for his last 27 doing that.

So he's going victorious, huh? So I'm going to go with

Victorious on top here. I do think BG Warriors got an

obvious shot here, so 76 on top. Look outside though to the 12, I

think Honeypants is an interesting horse here with Luan

Machado was leading rider in December.

Has anyone ever called you honeypants?

With what kind of reasons here you asked.

In the last 10 years. Oh, for sure, Jonathan Thomas

trains. This horse won a Grade 3 on the

downhill course at Santa Anita last out of January.

Moves Barnes from Filled Amato to Jonathan Thomas.

What's funny is I was thinking, oh, why would they?

Why would they move that horse? It was running a grade three

company in California. Oh, that's $25,000 less than a

listed stakes on a random Saturday in March in Turfway

Park. Oh, right, that the.

Cost of living. Oh, and the and the.

Barn cost and all that stuff. Yeah, right.

That this horse though been all over the country, won all over

the country. Probably four wins total

interestingly enough. But on the synthetic grand

second only time trying the synthetic.

It's been a minute. It's been a minute but.

Does the synthetic? Oh yeah.

But Turf Descent is a good angle for Jonathan Thomas wins at 15%,

doing that first time with Trainer recently around 20%.

And so, yeah, Luan Machado gets them out here in sprints at

Turfway Park. It's OK to be on the outside.

That has actually worked out pretty recently, especially this

year. And so I'm not swayed by the 12

spot there. But yeah, 76 and 12 there.

Again, Gold Book, bets.com. I'll have all my plays, all that

stuff up there, totally free for you.

Y'all, it's about to get fun and we are like in this area.

You're going into March Madness and just a little note about

next week. We should be good to go.

And and for some odd reason the Kentucky game would interfere

with our normal show and I got to be on the airport.

Oh yeah, we might have to move the time for this show or Louis

will be by himself. Which one would you want to do?

Can we move it? Isaac's going to be really mad.

Shout out to Isaac. OK.

Sorry, Isaac. Hold it down to Main, buddy.

That guy got engaged in our hat. Oh, the show hat.

How about that? What's up?

Yeah, that's what I'm talking about.

That's our guy. That's our guy.

So we got a lot of basketball going on.

We got a lot of horse racing going on.

I mean, this is this is when these fields really start to

take shape. Enjoy it and.

By the way, I'll start in there. Yeah, I'll start for the 100

pointers especially. I'll start cutting the segments

from the 11:50 show, putting them on this platform so people

can listen to that. We've been talking to Matthew

DeSantis from Naira. We've been talking to obviously

on this show. Brian Dido's been a great

resource for us down at Gulf St. Park.

He's awesome. He's really become a nice

addition to the show. And I think next week I'm gonna

try for Kornacki on Thursday all.

Right, man, Yeah. 'Cause we haven't had Stephen

about a month and we're due. Yeah, I need to be on the show

with Kornacki for sure, so we'll find out, you know.

That happened once, right? But he was in his car.

No, he was in, yeah. I think he was in his car, yeah.

By the way, commitment to the show.

Steve Kornacki pulled over in a rental car on his way back from

Lowell, MA to Manhattan to do the show.

Yeah, and you just don't show up.

I mean, Steve Kornacki's more committed to the horse racing

happy hour than Mike and helpful needs to be said.

Oh, maybe. You can pay the same.

Amount at least. So yeah man, we're just we're

just loving it. So just.

By the way, other thing, last thing got our thumbs up from the

good folks in Indianapolis. We will be up again for the

Indiana Derby as part of our coverage, so that's Saturday

after July. 4th I'm not doing it man, I bet.

Unless I'm unless I get to do my paddock pick where I was, one

for one with big fudge. Big Fudge Baby Drake.

Rachel, Rachel put me back in the paddock pick.

Let's go. Just judging by the back and

forth, I think we're doing some last.

Yeah, I know, but. We'll see.

Paula Duca. Right man.

Paul's. We can get Paul on.

Actually pretty soon too. I.

Agree with that. Yeah, we'll we'll get Paul back

on for that show and hopefully special guest Andy Sweeney, how

about that? Oh, well, I want Andy to do

that. The station's.

Going to be out there, I told him.

I told him bring your wife, bring your son.

They got a jungle gym. They got all kinds of fun stuff

there. You haven't been by there.

Early. We'll get there early for Andy.

Oh, get on his show. Yeah.

Oh yeah, now it's on a Saturday, sure, but his station comes out.

We always do a spot on his show or on the.

Station right with JM, that's right.

And so with the fan up there in Indianapolis.

Appreciate, by the way, the only station in Indianapolis that

takes. Dockage has been nice to you,

and you're like the only person dockage is ever nice.

He loves. He loves me.

It's funny. Do you know why?

Cuz I actually don't talk to him.

Yeah, that's probably it. He doesn't actually know what I

think about anything. There you go.

But I just want to tell people, if you're, you know, we have

listeners Chicago and Detroit and different places, that's an

easy trip. The hotels are not expensive and

the day of racing's fantastic. It really.

It that pick five is so. Fun.

It actually is getting better every year.

I agree out there it's getting better and deeper and like

quality horses, quality trainers, you and look.

At Kerchill, can't figure out their turf.

Horse those turf, spread those turf that might be good.

Yeah. Ivar was up there.

Yes, Ivar. I mean, like, yeah, no, it's a

good day. It was a.

Great day. Even if Louis hit the pick four

and I didn't, or pick three or whatever, and he was rooting

against me, pick 5. Speaking of which, I got to

check my. I got a pretty big battery going

on right now. Yeah, you do.

You know that a Texas A&M Ole Miss game.

I don't want to jinx it, even though it's probably over.

Yeah. So yeah, we can look.

All right, we're going to pay the tab.

We're going to get out of here. This has been, I don't even know

which sound is here for the for the final.

We're going to just go with what is this.

This has been the horse racing happy hour.

That