Mystik Dan, the horse that won the Kentucky Derby by a margin in the race’s closest finish in more than a half-century, will still head to the Preakness next weekend, keeping alive the chance for another Triple Crown winner.
Trainer Kenny McPeek announced the decision Saturday after speaking with owners and weighing the pros and cons of racing his horse again during a short two-week turnaround. He initially raised concerns about that time frame after Mystik Dan ran poorly under the same conditions in November.
But he liked what he saw at practice enough to take a chance.
“All systems go,” McPeek said Saturday. “The horse is doing fantastic.”
The possibility that Mystik Dan, who finished just ahead of Sierra Leone and Forever Young in the one-mile race at Churchill Downs last weekend thanks to a perfect ride down the track from jockey Brian Hernandez Jr., will not be going to the Preakness next Saturday raised questions about the status of the prestigious race. Twice in the last four years the Derby winner has not played – a product of different circumstances.
But the lure of heading to Baltimore was too great to pass up for McPeek, who won the pandemic-delayed 2020 Preakness with the filly Swiss Skydiver, who defeated Derby champion Authentic.
No one has won both the Derby and Preakness since the last Triple Crown champion, Justify in 2018 for Hall of Famer Bob Baffert. If Mystik Dan were to do this, it would be a first: a Triple Crown on the line at Saratoga Race Course, where the Belmont will be held for the next two years while the race’s old home on Long Island is demolished and rebuilt as part of a massive $455 million reconstruction project.
But Mystik Dan might not be the Preakness favorite. That distinction likely belongs to Muth, one of two horses brought by Baffert, who was once again barred from entering horses in the Derby due to a ban on him by Churchill Downs caused by Medina Spirit failing a drug test after coming first had finished in the race. in 2021.
The only other Derby horse expected to run in the Preakness is 17th-place Just Steel, trained by 88-year-old Hall of Famer D Wayne Lukas.