Beware of Bravazo

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The New York Sun

It’s hard to remember a moment in thoroughbred racing quite like that at the Preakness when Justify thundered out of the fog at the top of the stretch. The excitement of the announcer offered a clue that something exciting seemed to be going on. What, though, was it? All the cameras caught was grayness with a vague apparition of shifting grayish colors until — suddenly — Justify burst out of the fog, whisker to whisker with a nag called Good Magic.

Well, abracadabra. Now you see him, now you don’t. The thing to feature in this race — at least by our oats — is the final furlong. As they enter that last eighth of a mile, it’s possible to discern through the soup three horses in the lead. Justify in front, followed by number five, Good Magic, followed by number six, Ten Fold. One can get a peek, too, of number two, Lone Sailor, who’d been way down wind. No sign, though, of number eight, Bravazo.

There are now four seconds left in the race. Suddenly, there emerges through the fog a dark form, entering the camera frame on the left. That’s Bravazo, accelerating like a runaway freight. In the last two seconds of the race, he hauls past Lone Sailor, Tenfold, and Good Magic like they’d stopped for groceries. He crosses the finish half a length off the lead. Bravazo would’ve left them all in the mud if he’d had, oh, say, another two and a half furlongs.

That extra two and a half furlongs, of course, is what the Belmont is all about. We’re just saying. It’s going to be something to watch. We’re obligated to note that none of these nags is in a league with Secretariat, who ran the Triple Crown twelve seconds faster than the most recent winner of the crown, American Pharoah. One has to look for drama where one can get it, though. So when the final leg of the Triple Crown is run at Belmont, beware, we say, of Bravazo.


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