While we eagerly await the 43rd edition of the Breeders’ Cup on Oct. 30-31 at Keeneland, let’s look back on what happened the first three times it hosted the championship weekend.
The track whose slogan is “Racing as It Was Meant to Be” didn't put on the big show until 2015. The 32nd Cup was memorable for Triple Crown hero American Pharoah’s runaway Breeders’ Cup Classic (G1) win.
Keeneland also hosted in 2020, when the stands were empty because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Two years later in Lexington, 2-5 favorite Flightline crushed the Classic by 8¼ lengths, the grand finale of a 6-for-6 career.
But since the Breeders’ Cup is as much about gambling as it is about earning Eclipse Awards, horseplayers remember shocking upsets and astronomical payoffs. The 2020 Mile delivered both, courtesy of Breeders’ Cup's leading trainer, Aidan O’Brien. The Irish all-time great leads the Cup in wins with 21, and none was as unexpected as this one.
He not only saddled 73-1 winner Order of Australia, but also trained second- and third-place finishers Circus Maximus (11-1) and Lope Y Fernandez (18-1). The $2 exacta paid $2,117.90, and the all-Aidan trifecta was worth $8,786. Big money!
Ireland’s Coolmore Group owned each horse and scooped up $1.56 million of the $1.84 million total purse. Co-owner Michael Tabor made his fortune as a bookmaker, so it’s safe to assume he also cashed a few tickets on his trio of longshots. Yes, the rich always get richer, and nowhere is that truer than in horse racing.
The past often is prologue, but let’s not get delusional and expect to unearth a 73-1 winner on Halloween weekend in Bluegrass country. But reviewing the Keeneland Breeders’ Cup results could offer a few wagering insights.
Keeneland no longer has the pronounced speed bias it had in the Nineties, but all things considered, frontrunners are still preferred. Oddly, closers did surprisingly well in the 42 Breeders’ Cup events, winning 13, significantly more than expected. Only five horses went wire to wire, which also contradicted Keeneland’s historical profile.
Favorites won 14 races (34.1%, slightly above the national average). Eleven of them went off at even-money or odds-on.
There were plenty of double-digit winners. Twenty-three paid more than $10, led by 73-1 Order of Australia and 42-1 Caravel (2022 Turf Sprint). Predictably, Europeans won 12 of the 19 turf races, led by O’Brien (six) and Godolphin’s Charlie Appleby (three). Among the Americans, Mark Casse and Brad Cox each had two.
So, what conclusions can we draw from this relatively small sample?
You should respect speed but shouldn’t rule out closers if the pace looks quick. That you shouldn’t be afraid to take on a short-priced favorite with an in-form contender. Although the Euros are very strong on grass, the Americans can occasionally beat them, often at juicy prices.
In the week leading up to the Breeders’ Cup, we’ll take a deeper dive into stats, including post positions, layoffs, and horses for course. Doing your homework can pay off on the test. Hopefully, all of you serious horseplayers are on the case.
Ed McNamara is an award-winning racing writer who has covered the sport since 1981 for The Bergen (N.J.) Record, Newsday, ESPN, Thorocap, and USRacing. He is the author of Cajun Racing: From the Bush Tracks to the Triple Crown and Racing Around the World, and a contributor to The Most Glorious Crown and The Racetracks of America. He has also written for racing publications in France and Italy.
