Updated profiles, with post positions and track odds for the 20 3-year-olds entered for the 151st running of the $5 million Kentucky Derby (G1) at Churchill Downs is Saturday (May 3).
Looking for a sentimental favorite in this Derby? Then Lonnie Briley is your man. The 72-year-old native of Louisiana has never been in the big race, and he admits he'd never even considered it. Then the Coal Battle came along, and he's taken Briley to Churchill Downs.
Briley is dazzled by the place.
“When you look at the track, it kind of blows your mind," he told BloodHorse's Sean Collins. “It's a racetrack, but it's a little different than the ones I've been to.”
Briley, a country guy with a thick accent, seems like a gift from central casting. He's a hands-on horseman who came up the old-fashioned way, breeding and foaling mares while relentlessly studying pedigree and equine anatomy. He worked 12 years on the Louisiana farm of multiple Eclipse Award winner John Franks, and after Franks died in 2003, Briley began training on his own.
He races a 30-horse stable mainly at Delta Downs, Evangeline Downs, and the Fair Grounds in his home state. Coal Battle scored at Evangeline in his debut, the first of five victories in eight starts at six tracks. He entered the Derby picture at Oaklawn Park with easy wins in the Smarty Jones and the Rebel Stakes (G2), Briley's first graded stakes trophy. He regressed last time out with a distant third after making a strong but premature middle move in the Arkansas Derby (G1). It felt like the combination of a bounce from his career-best Rebel and not being fully cranked.
“I skipped work on him,” Briley said. “I needed four works, I got three, and it showed. But he ran a good race. He's a neat little horse, and he doesn't quit. He has a really quick turn of foot, and I think he'll get a mile and a quarter.”
Coal Battle lacks the speed figures and cachet of favorites Journalism and Sovereignty, but his closing style should be a plus if there's a strong pace. Not likely to win, but this is the Derby. If you like to lead with your heart, bet this longshot $2 across the board.
The writing team at US Racing is comprised of both full-time and part-time contributors with expertise in various aspects of the Sport of Kings.
