Will exhausted Justify have enough left to win Triple Crown? | Preakness 2018

BALTIMORE -- If Transylvania had a race track, this was what it would have looked like. For six days, rain had turned its surface into the Okefenokee Swamp. Then, at approximately 4 p.m. the joint disappeared.

The enveloping fog didn't roll in. It positively swallowed Pimlico Race Track. North of tote board, the barns were invisible. Northern Parkway just behind them was invisible, and the Baltimore's City very existence had to be taken on faith.

Straining to see the horses come out of the starting gate was like watching the Preakness from the deck of the Titanic. Against such a backdrop a 3-year old chestnut colt named Justify went from the latest equine rookie star to one step away from horse-racing glory.

Justify had enough left to hold off several hard-charging challengers and win the Preakness on a sloppy, slippery track, and he will try to become the second Triple Crown champion in four years in the Belmont Stakes on June 9.

The drama heightened because nobody -- but actually nobody -- saw this entire race. Once they hit the backstretch, the cream of the Class of 2018 morphed from race horses into ghost riders of the night. For roughly half of the race, they were totally invisible to the close to 135,000 spectators.

At just that point, every single pilgrim in the joint knew that something tremendous was building. Justify and Good Magic, his closest rival in the Kentucky Derby two weeks ago, were running head to head, with little room between them.

And to all the live spectators they were invisible.

When they re-emerged, shortly before the quarter pole, Mike Smith, Justify's jockey had asked him the question all jocks ask their mounts must ask when the race is on the line -- and the big chestnut responded as though he'd been shot out of a cannon. Good Magic was not going to catch him. In point of fact, Good Magic had troubles of his own -- two of them, to be exact.

Bravazo, a Wayne Lukas horse, and Tenfold, a lightly raced newcomer, were closing on him. The match race battle between Justify and Good Magic was a dandy, but Justify was gone and uncatchable. In the end, Justify put away Bravazo by a length and a half with Tenfold another neck back. Good Magic faded to fourth.

It was impressive but hardly easy.

"I wasn't liking at all what I saw before they disappeared into the fog," Justify trainer Bob Baffert said. "Mike (Smith, the jockey) was hitting him left-handed very early and I knew we were in a fight. Then I finally saw them again and Bravazo was coming, and all I could do was pray that the end of the race track would come up fast.

"It was the hardest race of his life."

But then those white silks Smith wore were shining like a beacon against the gathering darkness, and Baffert recalled he thought that "this is what makes racing so great" ... when a horse in his position feels it all and lets loose and in that moment, he becomes all race horse.

So once again, we have a genuine contender for the Triple Crown three weeks from now at Belmont Park. Baffert believes it will happen. Justify is big enough and strong enough but with fresh newcomers on the battlefield and one or two survivors from Preakness, the run-up before that final struggle will every bit as dramatic as what happened here on this day.

"We will treat him the way we did after the Derby," Baffert said. "First, he has to come out strong the next day, and then he has to train every bit as strong as he has in the past. We will just let him dictate. He was blowing hard at the finish today. You can tell he was in a fight all the way.

"First, there was American Pharoah who won the Triple Crown for us. Now we head for this one with the same crew, starting with my assistant, the groom and the exercise rider.

"They were with Pharoah, and they know what they are doing. We try hard not to show it, but for all of use this is a pressure-packed situation. But this is a great horse. I really love him. I would put a Western saddle on him and ride him in the Rose Bowl parade if they would let me."

On June 9, we'll find out if he is all Baffert believes him to be.

Jerry Izenberg is Columnist Emeritus for The Star-Ledger. He can be reached at jizenberg@starledger.com.

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