Bear with me while I try to get this straight.
The four-legged stars of the 2021 Triple Crown were Essential Quality , Rombauer , and Medina Spirit, with Hot Rod Charlie and Mandaloun in key supporting roles.
Medina Spirit, Mandaloun, Hot Rod Charlie, and Essential Quality were separated by barely one length in that order at the end of the Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve (G1). Medina Spirit came back to finish third in the Preakness Stakes (G1) won by Rombauer. Mandaloun, Hot Rod Charlie, and Essential Quality passed. Rombauer came back to finish a distant third in the Belmont Stakes Presented by NYRA Bets (G1) to Essential Quality, who beat Hot Rod Charlie by 1 1/4 lengths at the end of the mile and one half June 5.
Mandaloun passed the Belmont to wait for later races. Medina Spirit stayed home in California not because his trainer, Bob Baffert, has been indefinitely banned from running in New York, but because he was tired and never would have run anyway, unless he had won the Preakness, because if you think the New York Racing Association would have missed a chance to sell a possible Triple Crown—even with a drug test looming—I've got a number of bridges for sale.
Flavien Prat rode Rombauer in the Preakness and Hot Rod Charlie in the Belmont and the Derby. Luis Saez rides Essential Quality all the time, the same Luis Saez who rode Maximum Security across the line first in the 2019 Kentucky Derby only to be disqualified for interference. The elevated winner was Country House , ridden by Flavien Prat. Bob Baffert ended up training Maximum Security as a 4-year-old, but that's a whole 'nother story.
Essential Quality was the first U.S. classic winner to carry the colors of the Godolphin stable of Sheikh Mohammed al Maktoum. He has been trying to win one of these since 1992, when he went partners with Allen Paulson on beaten Derby favorite Arazi. In 2006, Sheikh Mohammed won the Preakness with Bernardini, who carried his Darley stable colors, then three weeks later Jazil won the Belmont for Hamdan al Maktoum, Sheikh Mohammed's brother. If memories of those races are difficult to summon, don't fret. For better or worse, that classic season was all about Barbaro.
Jazil was trained by Kiaran McLaughlin, who also had Horse of the Year Invasor in his 2006 lineup. In March of 2020, McLaughlin retired after 26 years with Godolphin and the Maktoums to become a jockey agent—for Luis Saez.
"I'll miss that relationship with the owners," McLaughlin said at the time, "but hopefully we can win some big races for them."
Check that box.
Thoroughbred racing is like that—part extended family, part French farce—with even the most respectable protagonists rushing in and out of doors along a cramped, well lighted hallway. Brad Cox trains Essential Quality for Godolphin and Mandaloun for Juddmonte Farms, the two highest profile stables owned by interests from the Middle East. Bob Baffert trains Medina Spirit for Amr Zedan, a new and enthusiastic shooter from Saudi Arabia, but Baffert also has trained horses for Juddmonte and Godolphin. Doug O'Neill was Zedan's main trainer when he entered the sport, although now O'Neill must be content to train Hot Rod Charlie, whose ownership includes his nephew.
In terms of aesthetics, the Triple Crown races of 2021 provided something for everyone. The Derby offered its usual excuses—it would not be the Derby without them—but from the quarter pole to the finish the first four marched lockstep in a spread that would have done the Marine Corps proud. Two weeks later, the Preakness unfolded in a conventional two-horse early duel between Derby opponents that succumbed to fresh legs in the final sixteenth.
As for the 153rd Belmont, with its 12 unforgiving furlongs, it looked for a few moments as if it was going to end up with one of those wham-bang finishes that are oddly common for such a long journey. Twelve of the last 30 Belmonts at a mile and one half (excluding the nine-furlong compromise last year) have come down to less than a length at the end. Included among those are nose, head, and neck decisions won by Victory Gallop, Creator, Hansel, Lemon Drop Kid, Rags to Riches, Tonalist , and Union Rags .
Essential Quality and Hot Rod Charlie seemed intent on joining the list. From the five-sixteenths pole, where Rock Your World surrendered, to the sixteenth pole, when the result became apparent, it was punch and counterpunch between the leaders. Prat took a deep breath and let 'Charlie' coast the last few strides, while Saez and Essential Quality moved clear by just over a length. Pulling up, Prat reached over to bump fists with Saez, and just like that the universe tipped back toward balance.
It was another 11 1/4 lengths back to Rombauer, a gap that summoned echoes from Belmonts past, when Granville nosed out Mr. Bones, Native Dancer edged stubborn Jamie K., and Affirmed defied Alydar once again. In those epic bouts, the third horse finished eight, 10, and 13 lengths behind the leaders.
Going forth, it will be too much to ask that the five leading lads of the 2021 Triple Crown continue to cross swords, perhaps even gathering at Del Mar for a climactic, mile-and-a-quarter confrontation in the Longines Breeders' Cup Classic (G1) Nov. 6. Will the evidence presented by the Triple Crown hold up?
One conclusion, probably wrong, is that Essential Quality and Hot Rod Charlie have separated themselves from the rest of the division. But a mile and one half will do that to young horses who are used to competing over much less ground. As we know, unless they are banished to turf racing, they will never face 12 furlongs again.
Rombauer deserves another run at the top two in a race more befitting his Preakness form, while Mandaloun seems to come out only once in a blue moon. For spice, toss in Midnight Bourbon, if only for his good looks and his seconds in the Preakness and in the Twinspires.com Louisiana Derby (G2) to Hot Rod Charlie.
As for Medina Spirit, his next chapter will depend on the results of the courtroom dramas ahead over his troubled post-Derby test, as well as the banishments of Baffert by NYRA and Churchill Downs Inc. This will be a lousy distraction from the game on the field, and patience will be required as the wheels slowly grind. As equine law expert Bob Heleringer told The Paulick Report, "It has all the earmarks of what we in the legal profession sometimes call an annuity."
