2024 Kentucky Derby Watch: Get to know the early contenders for the 150th Run for the Roses

There’s also the Todd Pletcher-trained Fierceness, last year’s 2-year-old champion and winner of the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile. Fierceness represents a chance at Derby redemption for Pletcher, who trained last year’s Derby favorite, Forte, who was scratched by the track veterinarian the morning of the race.

Fierceness finished third in the Grade 3 Holy Bull Stakes this month at Gulfstream Park.

Lexington’s Kenny McPeek also has a pair of horses that have already made a mark in qualifying with Common Defense (27 points and second in last Saturday’s Rebel Stakes) and Mystik Dan (21 points and a winner this month in the Grade 3 Southwest Stakes).

Five Kentucky Derby prep races are slated for this weekend

When the calendar shifts from February to March this weekend, it will bring about five more Kentucky Derby prep races.

Four of these — Grade 2 Fountain of Youth (Gulfstream Park), Grade 2 San Felipe (Santa Anita), Grade 3 Gotham (Aqueduct) and John Battaglia Memorial (Turfway) — are part of the American qualifying series and will be held Saturday.

The other, the 1-mile Patton Stakes in Ireland, was slated for Friday as part of the European series.

Both the Patton and John Battaglia Memorial offer qualifying points on a 20-10-6-4-2 scale. The other three races, all graded stakes, will use a 50-25-15-10-5 scale for their qualifying points.

In the Fountain of Youth, the horses to watch are Dornoch and Locked. Dornoch is a full brother to last year’s Kentucky Derby winner Mage, and was last seen winning the Grade 2 Remsen Stakes at Aqueduct in early December. That win gave Dornoch 10 Derby qualifying points.

Locked was supposed to make his season debut two weeks ago, but was scratched from the Grade 3 Sam F. Davis after spiking a temperature. Trained by Pletcher, Locked won the Grade 1 Breeders’ Futurity at Keeneland last fall, before going on to finish third his last time out in the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile.

Held at Santa Anita, the Grade 2 San Felipe Stakes runs the risk of being yet another Kentucky Derby prep race dominated by Baffert (qualifying points earned by Baffert trainees are vacated). Headlining the Baffert horses in this field is Muth, another top 3-year-old who has won three of four career starts at Santa Anita, including the Grade 2 San Vicente Stakes in January.

Among the non-Baffert contenders to watch is John Sadler’s Scatify, who finished third in the Robert B. Lewis Stakes at the same track.

In the Gotham, a wide-open field is notable for the presence of Just a Touch, a son of Triple Crown winner Justify trained by Louisville’s Brad Cox who won his career debut in January at Fair Grounds. (Last year’s Gotham winner, Raise Cain, went off at 23-1 odds).

With 50 qualifying points awarded to the winners of the Fountain of Youth, San Felipe and Gotham, all three races are essentially win-and-in opportunities to make the Kentucky Derby starting gate.

Epic Ride is the 5-2 morning-line favorite for the John Battaglia Memorial at Turfway, which boasts a full field of 12. Bolt At Midnight is the 4-1 second choice.