Horse Racing: The Sport of Kings

[KittenPokerCheater]

The longest of long shots wins! In the Derby, anything can happen.  And it's awesome when it does.

re: NYtimes
ETA: at the race time, the odds had gone up 80-1.  

Edited May 8, 2022 by KittenPokerCheater

[Crashcourse]

I never bet on any sports, but I'm always delighted when the long shot wins, and that was a loooooooong shot.  

I hope Rich Strike has a great dinner.  😋Also, the jockey (I think his last name was Leon) had a beautiful little daughter and wife. 

[Just Here]

^The Lexington Herald-Leader has a good write-up about the jockey, Sonny Leon.

Here's the last 50 seconds of the 2022 Kentucky Derby, with Rich Strike labeled (the video in the tweet may be geo-blocked for those outside the USA):

And the full race (via YouTube; again, may be geo-blocked for those outside of the USA):

[Irlandesa]

Yeah that was crazy.  And the odds weren't 30-1. They were 80-1 at race time.  I kind of wish I bet even though I don't either.

I don't follow racing so I found myself wondering why they weren't talking about that horse that was coming on strong and it's because they didn't expect him. It's amazing how he just kept going forward through the crowd. 

[proserpina65]

On 5/7/2022 at 7:17 PM, twoods said:

The crowd seemed shocked. A lot of people lost money today. Congrats to the winner!

This is where my habit of putting a couple of bucks on the longest shot in the race would've paid off.  If I actually bet on races, that is.

It was pretty exciting watching it.  I went from rooting for a couple of horses who weren't near the front (although Tawny Port did finish 7th) to saying any horse that wasn't trained by Baffert to "yay, that really long shot" all in the course of 2 minutes.

[JTMacc99]

On 5/8/2022 at 1:40 AM, Irlandesa said:

It's amazing how he just kept going forward through the crowd. 

I know I'm like a month late, but I'm just now catching up on things.

It was such a good ride by the jockey along with a little luck.  He kept his horse down on the railing, and as the other horses in front of him in the final turn and into the stretch started to fade, they all faded to the right and out of his way. He just kept storming up along the rail!

In hindsight, when the announcer excitedly let us know the pace after the first half mile, it should have clicked with me that the horses up front were going WAY too fast for a 1 1/4 race. 

Somebody off the pace was going to have a chance to run past a bunch of fading horses in the final 1/8 mile, but LOL, it was pretty unlikely it was going to be Rich Strike.