Logistical Change May Leave the Fastest Horse Out of the Kentucky Derby

The Kentucky Derby is unlike any other horse race in North America. Folks at Churchill Downs will use flowery language to describe why. Strip away the pomp and circumstance and it’s quite simple: The size of the field.

The Kentucky Derby is the only dirt race in the world with 20 horses in the starting gate. It’s beautiful chaos when they break. Some of that chaos was diminished by creating a starting gate that is used only once a year, but I digress. It’s a large field that creates long shots.

There are plenty of opportunities for the best three-year-olds to make the starting gate, but one of the best may be on the outside looking in, thanks to a change in how they determine who makes the cut.

How a Horse Reaches the Starting Gate

For years, the Kentucky Derby field was based on career earnings in graded stakes races. It made sense in theory but presented too many problems. Horses could rack up big wins as 2-year-olds in sprints or on the turf and still get into the Kentucky Derby.

In 2012, the “Road to Kentucky Derby” point system was established to create a clear pathway for horses to reach the starting gate. This year, 36 races dished out points to horses who came in the top five. They are weighted based on the time and pedigree of the race. A two-year-old can earn 10 points in the fall, but needs to bolster its resume by winning up to 50 points in the Blue Grass Stakes.

This year, they made a tweak to the system. In races with fields of five or fewer horses, the number of points is cut in half. That could keep one of the fastest three-year-olds out of the Kentucky Derby.

How Baeza could be left out of the Kentucky Derby

That tweak in the system punishes the California horses. The fields at Santa Anita have been shrinking over the years. It just so happens that they made this tweak right before the state produced some of its most talented racers.

In the Santa Anita Derby, Journalism had to battle to come from behind and beat Baeza by a half-length. Baeza earned a Beyer speed figure of 101 in the second-place finish. It’s the second-fastest of any of this year’s Kentucky Derby entrants, but it happened in a field of five, only earning 37.5 Kentucky Derby points.

Baeza is now No. 22* on the leaderboard, four spots behind Madakeet Road, the last horse in the Kentucky Derby field as of today. (Between the writing of this post and its publishing, River Thames has opted out to prepare for the Preakness, moving Baeza one spot closer to the starting gate.)

“All we can do is watch the leaderboard and how it changes over the next week, trainer John Shirreffs said recently.

If they did not tweak the points system, Baeza would have 50 points, enough to be in the Kentucky Derby field. One projection currently has Baeza finishing in fourth against the Kentucky Derby competition. Instead, this late-bloomer, who did not win its first race until February, may be stuck on the undercard, or have to wait until the Preakness.