I am not a racing fan. I can’t get engaged in a sport whose major competition is completed in two minutes.
But, whoa! These may be the two greatest minutes of horse-racing history!
On Friday morning, the horse Rich Strike was not in the starting line-up. When another horse dropped out, Rich Strike was a last-minute addition. The odds against him were 80-1.
He was supposed to trail the field.
I’ve watched three times and may see it a few more times.
Meet his owner and jockey here.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Amen, yes ma’am, indeed, what she said. Thank you, Diane. Here is an aerial view, starting on the far turn, of Rich Strike’s run for the ages. It’s even more striking from up high–where, miraculous as it was, it may have been ordained. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCk0P92uoXc
I needed that! Thanks for posting, D!
Funny, I needed it too.
There has got to be some profound quote about underdogs. I literally had tears in my eyes. The “little guy” won!
Horse racing was my dad’s passion. He had other passions but that was #1.
He didn’t own a horse or ride them. He bet on the races and spent hours every night with his best friends sitting around our kitchen table as they used the data from their vast collection of The Daily Racing Form to handicap the races for the next day. One time my dad picked 8 winners at Santa Anita in a row on the same day, but one of his friends forget to take the list with them. My dad didn’t go that day. He had to work.
It wasn’t until his friends got home that they realized they’d missed out big time.
I still remember when I was seven (one of the few from that age I still have), and he took me with him to Santa Anita because he was off work but my mother had to work. AT the time she had a job at The City of Hope in the hospitals laundry. Both of my parents never graduated from high school.
On that day, my dad gave me $2 to bet on a buggy race and my horse won. I then lost all of the winnings in the next three races and never bet on a horse race again.
When my dad was a teenager, he worked at Santa Anita mucking out horse stalls. I recall that he knew all the handicappers that sold lists outside the racetrack. He knew a lot of other gamblers, too, many colorful characters.
Wonderful memories!
I, too, watched this over and over!!!
Happy Mother’s Day, Diane!!!
If only it was a political portent!
I hope the horse wasn’t given a “speedball.” Sadly, doping is still a problem in racing. Medina Spirit, the Kentucky Derby winner trained by Bob Baffert that tested positive for betamethasone after winning the 2021 Triple Crown race, died in December while training at Santa Anita Park.
One of my friends–a Harvard Med School alum and a horse-racing fan for 60 years–speculates that Rich Strike’s post-race fractious behavior could be related to doping. G-d, I hope not.
The horse post-race acted as though he was ready to do it all over again!
My daughter won big on this horse!
He was a really bitey horse, too. His post-race selfie with the trophy is perfect.
Saw it live on TV. What a finish!
I loved watching the race, too. Right after the race, I kept rewinding to try to figure out at what point the winning horse was able to move up. I could mostly follow it, but then this morning I came across the aeriel view of the race where you could really see it! That horse had to maneuver around a horse blocking him on the inside and it was truly near impossible that once he did that he could make up so much ground in such a short distance. So fun to watch.
^^Just realized that Bill Rosenthal posted a link to the same aerial view I saw today in the first comment. Definitely worth watching.
Thanks for sharing. I missed it yesterday. It is totally one of the most exciting and shortest events. Goes to show…never count out the underdog!
It’s impossible to tell where the winner comes from since the camera doesn’t even show it. 🙂
There’s a different video from an aerial view that has a pointer to Rich Strike. The link is in the first reply to this post. Enjoy this year’s greatest 57 seconds in sports.
NBC Sports has a video of the Derby race taken from above, showing Rich Strike moving from the middle of the pack to win the race. It appears on Twitter but I have not seen an independent link.
My point was that, in fact, for the majority of the race, Rich Strike was so far behind (like the last three) that the camera didn’t even show him (or her?).