Mo Donegal Might Be the Steed To Watch in the Run for the Roses — But Michael Minogue Is Baffled

As the first Saturday in May approaches, my friend Michael Minogue, a horse racing guru, is baffled: Why is it that all television analysts and track announcers say “DON-egal”? Haven’t they ever heard Bing Crosby singing “You’re as welcome as the flowers in May / To dear old Done-GAL”? Mo Donegal is one of more than 20 entries in horse racing’s biggest event, the Kentucky Derby, held each year on May’s first Saturday. The New York-based 3-year old, a Todd Pletcher trainee currently fetching 10-to-1 odds, is named after an Irish county pronounced with a stress on the last syllable.The dandy hat-and-Julep crowd will gather at Churchill Downs on May 7 for the 147th Run for the Roses. They all hope that this year’s Derby — the first leg of the Triple Crown — will revive the prestige of a sport that has lately suffered some of its worst scandals. The 2019 winner, Maximum Security, was disqualified for interference with other horses. The disqualification, following an agonizing 22-minute review, enriched anyone who bet to win on the horse that placed, a 65-to-1 contraption of muscle and sinew named Country House. Yet many others felt cheated out of a winning ticket. A year later, with Covid raging, the Derby was moved to September from May, awkwardly reshuffling the Triple Crown’s order. The 2020 winner, Authentic, led fans to reconsider his trainer, Bob Baffert.The white-haired, California-based Mr. Baffert has long had a love-hate relation with racing fans. Many considered him too arrogant to be admired. Yet, with Authentic, Mr. Baffert marked his sixth Derby win, tying for a record. Even his biggest detractors were now forced to take a second look. Then came last year’s travesty.In 2021 Mr. Baffert’s Medina Spirit crossed the finish line first. Once the race was over, though, the horse tested positive for betamethasone, a banned steroid, and several months later Mr. Baffert’s record seventh Derby win was voided.Worse, Medina Spirit in December died of a heart attack during a workout at Santa Anita. Mr. Baffert, who at first denied doping any of his horses, became the most reviled personality in the business. He was soon banned from racing in California, as well as Kentucky, Maryland, and New York, the latter three the states where the triple crown races take place. “If Baffert is guilty, his legacy is completely ruined and he should lose his license,” a veteran race broadcaster in Britain and Ireland, Paul Alster, says. There, as in the rest of Europe, doping is mostly a thing of the past, he says, adding that testing is so rigorous that “I just can’t imagine anyone doing it.” Racing was once America’s favorite sport. Laura Hillenbrand’s biography of Seabiscuit details how the horse raised spirits during the Depression years. Damon Runion’s stories about Broadway’s guys and dolls contained endless racing-themed ditties. In mid-1987, I interviewed one of the most admired trainers in the business, Woody Stephens, whose trainees had won the Derby twice and the Preakness once. Most notably, that year he’d just emerged from an astounding string of five straight Belmont Stakes wins. The Kentucky-born Stephens, who smoked cigarettes for decades, was attached to an oxygen tank when we talked on a misty morning at his Belmont stable. Yet, as Mr. Minogue says, “There’s no way he would cheat by drugging a horse.”Like all racing fans, Mr. Minogue — who grew up at Floral Park, some 10 furlongs from the Belmont track — is now geared up for horse racing’s revival. I tag along with him yearly to watch the Belmont Stakes.Years ago, as we started off to the track, Mr. Minogue’s mother, Mary, shouted after us, “Put $2 on the Irish horse for me.” None of the sages of the rail paid much attention that year to Go And Go, a 9-to-1 Irish import. Yet, he handsomely won the mile and a half race.The Minogue matriarch — a librarian by trade who always remembered to leave a bottle of aspirin on the table for her beer-loving sons as they’d arrived home late after long nights of pre-race handicapping — was the only family member to collect some winnings that year. Hence the lesson for this year’s Baffert-less racing season: You don’t need to know much about horses to enjoy the revival of one of the sports of kings.This year’s early Derby favorite is Steve Assmusen’s Epicenter. Chad Brown’s Zandon also excites early bettors. Some interesting longshots are Brad Cox’s Cyberknife and Mr. Brown’s Early Voting. So revisit your mint julep recipes, get your favorite spring hat on, and prepare once more for the most exciting two minutes in sport. And if you’re convinced that the New York-based Irish-named Mo Donegal will win, please remember to pronounce his name correctly.

Mo Donegal Might Be the Steed To Watch in the Run for the Roses — But Michael Minogue Is Baffled

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