Nyquist might make it two Crowns in a row

Although he fell behind briefly around the final turn Saturday and slipped momentarily into second place, Nyquist came back to the front to pick up a first place win in the 142nd Kentucky Derby, finishing ahead of Exaggerator and making my first place finish pick yet another good one.

Okay – that doesn’t really say much about my horse racing expertise since Nyquist was the odds on favorite, but I’ll take the claim anyway.

My other pick last week, Suddenbreakingnews, didn’t finish in the money, but ran a very, very respectable race nonetheless, and was just out of a photo-finish for third place.

Full disclosure, before the day was over, I had actually placed three bets, also placing a small wager on Mor Spirit, a Bob Baffert horse that had veteran and two-time Derby winner Gary Stevens up.

Mor Spirit didn’t even come close with his 10th place finish, so with Nyquist paying $6.60 on a $2 bet, I still pocketed a little change, but not more than I could spend on a single trip through a drive-through window at a fast food chain restaurant.

So, going forward, can Nyquist take his now 8-0 record to the 10-0 mark and pick up a Triple Crown this year?

He’s a good horse who ran against a so-so field this past Saturday, but he did it in a style that proved he doesn’t much like looking at the rear-end of competitors when he gets near the finish line. You have to go back to the 2003 and Funny Cide’s 2:01.19 run to find a time better than Saturday’s Nyquist run of 2:01.31.

Can he win the Triple Crown? Of course the odds say no, because only once has the Triple Crown been won in back to back years and you have to go to the back to back years of 1977 and 1978 when Seattle Slew and Affirmed pulled off that feat.

But, why not? If Nyquist does, in fact, win the Preakness Stakes and then the Belmont, that would make it a double, back to back win.

Says here, go ahead and drop that wager now – this is the year for another Triple Crown win!