Triple Crown Nominees Named
A total of 357358 three-year-olds were nominated for this year’s Triple Crown races. Trainer Todd Pletcher leads the pack with 34 nominations. Last year Pletcher nominated 35 horses and none made it the Kentucky Derby, Preakness, or Belmont Stakes. Almost all the three-year-olds you’d expect to be nominated are on the list, including Declan’s Moon and Sweet Catomine. Oddly, Lost in the Fog isn’t. Did someone in the barn forget the nomination deadline? (Boston Globe)
Related: The number of horses nominated this year is down 20% from two years ago, and is the lowest number of nominations since 1996. “But the decline was expected, said Ed Seigenfeld, executive vice president of Triple Crown Productions. That’s because this year’s 3-year-olds were the hardest-hit of the two crops of Kentucky-born horses ravaged by the mysterious Mare Reproductive Loss Syndrome three years ago.” (Courier-Journal)
