The Preakness Stakes will have a Triple Crown possibility on the line when Kentucky Derby winner Mystik Dan runs in the field of nine horses on Saturday in the 149th rendition of the race.
Mystik Dan is coming off winning the Derby by a nose in that race's closest finish since 1947. Bob Baffert-trained Muth and Imagination and Brad Cox's Catching Freedom appear to be the most formidable challenges in the second leg of horse racing's Triple Crown.
Muth, who was ineligible to run in the Derby because of Churchill Downs' ban on Baffert, opened as the 8-5 favourite. Mystik Dan (the 5-2 second choice) is the first Derby winner since 2012 not to be favoured in the Preakness. Imagination and Catching Freedom are each 6-1.
The purse was upped this year to US$2 million from US$1.5 million, with the winner also taking home the Woodlawn Vase.
Horse racing continues to try to find solutions to a spate of deaths that stunned the sport last year, including one trained by Baffert who died at Pimlico hours before National Treasure gave him a record-breaking eighth Preakness victory.
The sport is at a crossroads because of safety questions and with reforms already underway, and Pimlico and Belmont Park are being torn down and rebuilt in the coming years as state-of-the-art facilities. And while racing is trying to adapt to the modern era with smaller tracks, viewership is still strong for the big days, including the biggest TV audience for the Kentucky Derby in 35 years.
Those viewers watching from afar or at Churchill Downs saw jockey Brian Hernandez Jr. deliver a flawless, rail-skimming ride to get Mystik Dan to the finish line just ahead of Sierra Leone and Forever Young. He will look for a second victory in a Triple Crown race back aboard in the Preakness.
