Thoroughbred Racing

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Justify’s Top Foe at the Preakness? Maybe His Own Hind Leg

By Melissa Hoppert

May 18, 2018
BALTIMORE — It was certainly an odd turn of events. About 13 hours after Justify had splashed to victory in the Kentucky Derby, becoming the first horse since 1882 to win the race without having competed as a 2-year-old, he was trotted out of Barn 33 at Churchill Downs to mug for the cameras and soak up the glory. Instead he was agitated and unable to put much weight on his left hind leg.

His Hall of Fame trainer, Bob Baffert, did not notice anything wrong with his leg at the time, nor did the assembled crowd of news media and onlookers, but video of the appearance found its way onto social media and soon speculation swirled: Was Justify lame?

Those questions quickly reached Baffert, who was on his way back to California, and he said Justify was dealing with a minor case of “scratches,” a skin irritation that is common among horses who encounter wet surfaces. It did not become apparent, he said, until Justify stepped onto the gravel outside the barn, and if he had known, he would have kept him inside.


Kentucky Derby 2018 Justify, the morning after the Derby.CreditVideo by HorseRacingNation
Not everyone was satisfied. Two days after the Derby, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals called for an independent examination. By the next day, Kentucky Horse Racing Commission veterinarians had examined the horse, and while they found no evidence of lameness, they also found no sign of a rash, and said he had a bruised heel instead.

On May 10, Justify returned to the racetrack looking like his old self, exiting his barn on a freshly laid path of soft shavings and wearing a three-quarter shoe to relieve pressure. Dr. Mary Scollay, who helped examine the horse for the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission, said she was satisfied with his progress, and while she did not treat him, a combination of rest, antibiotics and anti-inflammatories had likely helped him heal.

Yet as Saturday’s Preakness Stakes approaches and rain continues to pelt the Baltimore area, some may be left to wonder: Is the 1-2 morning-line favorite vulnerable?

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Mike Smith rode Justify to a commanding victory in the Kentucky Derby.CreditRob Carr/Getty Images
The racing gods can be generous, but they can also be cruel. No horse — and no owner — is immune to the ups and downs. When Justify was a yearling, X-rays revealed he had osteochondritis dissecans in the stifle joint, meaning the bone did not develop properly.

He had surgery and came out well, his breeder Tanya Gunther said. The recovery period generally includes a few weeks in a stall, a few weeks in a small paddock, then they are turned out, said Dr. Liz Santschi, an equine surgery professor at Kansas State and a consultant for the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission. “It depends on how big the lesions are and where, but most horses with stifle OCD can go ahead and be the great athletes that they are,” she said.

But some buyers at the 2016 Keeneland September Sale were turned off by his medical history, including Coolmore Farm, who stood Justify’s sire, Scat Daddy. WinStar Farm and China Horse Club did not seem to mind: They shelled out $500,000 for the horse then known simply as Hip 50.

Still Justify did not race as a 2-year-old, something Elliott Walden, president and chief executive of WinStar, attributed to a pulled muscle in his hindquarter that sidelined him for 60 days. In late August, he was sent to Rodolphe Brisset’s barn at Keeneland, where he would get a taste of the racetrack before being sent to Baffert in California.

“When he came to me, he was 2, and he was already pretty tall, pretty big, a little bit immature,” said Brisset, who trains the Preakness contender Quip. “I would be lying if I said we knew how good he would be. We didn’t have any idea.”

Scat Daddy had his own cruel run-ins with fate, first on the racetrack, then at the stud farm. He won the Fountain of Youth and the Florida Derby then sustained a tendon injury in the Kentucky Derby and was retired. He found success as a stallion, primarily producing prominent turf horses while shuttling from Coolmore’s Ashford Stud in Kentucky to Australia and Chile. His fee had risen from $10,000 to $100,000, but he died suddenly in 2015 at 11 of a suspected cardiac event after collapsing while leaving his paddock.

His co-owner James Scatuorchio, for whom Scat Daddy was named, recalled “the bad phone call.”

“Obviously you felt bad for everyone involved, but we just lost a horse that could have been around for a long while, being very successful as a stallion, producing talented sons and daughters, that’s the stuff you can’t avoid in our industry,” he said.

Scat Daddy’s legacy, however, continues to grow, even on dirt. From his penultimate crop, he sent four horses to the Derby, including Justify.


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Justify, above, physically resembles the mare Stage Magic. CreditRob Carr/Getty Images
When Gunther was around 7, she would do pedigrees by hand, said her father, John, who owns Glennwood Farm. She became an investment banker but could not shake her love of horses, so she returned to run the farm. Her background helped her plan matings for their mares.

“I like to do a lot of analysis and try to spot trends and identify stallions on the rise, and Scat Daddy was one of those,” she said. “The mating with Stage Magic was a good match on paper, and I really liked the idea of trying to solidify those good genes.”

While Justify may have inherited Scat Daddy’s long stride, he looks like Stage Magic, who is chestnut with a blaze. She was not as successful on the racetrack as Scat Daddy, but “she always tried very hard,” Gunther said.

For Justify, confidence came naturally. “You could tell from an early age, and I’m not just saying this in hindsight, that he was always the top dog in our group of colts,” she said. “He had this presence, and the look in his eye, and the physicality of a good, strong horse with a mind around it too. And he knew it.”

He has always been big — over 1,000 pounds in August of his yearling year, Gunther said — and now he stands about 17 hands tall.

“I didn’t realize until the Derby how big he was,” Scatuorchio said, adding that he talked to Todd Pletcher, the trainer of Scat Daddy, after the Derby and he said of Justify: “I saw him schooling, and that horse has muscles where I didn’t know horses could get muscles. He is a specimen.”

On Saturday, Justify will step onto the Pimlico track with a full shoe and an adhesive reinforcement on his left hind hoof as he takes aim at the second jewel of the Triple Crown. The Gunthers will be in England for another race, but they will be watching. They know it will not be easy. But if he wins, setting up a rematch with another horse they bred, Vino Rosso, they will travel to New York to hopefully see history (or a Vino Rosso victory).

For now, Tanya said, “I just want them to all come home safe.”

“It’s a big endeavor trying to get them to the yearling sale well and good,” she continued. “You can have an idea, then you wait 11 months for them to be born, and then you hope that it’s a nice foal. Then you try to keep them alive and well and healthy and prospering. It’s not easy, and kind of an overlooked part of it sometimes.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/18/sports/justify-preakness.html?