Pletcher's Triple Crown Record Missing a Win

The deal is Pletcher expects his horses to win regularly at the highest level of the game, and, with that, the expectations of others rise.

"He's a bit of a victim of his own circumstances," said Walden, whose organization owns Any Given Saturday and Cowtown Cat. "I don't think [the criticism] is fair at all. I like what [Street Sense's trainer] Carl Nafzger said: When they all go in the gate, they're all 19-1. There is so much involved with winning the Derby and the big field and the whole atmosphere and the crowd and everything else. It's not an easy race to win."

Pletcher says people tend to forget that he hasn't sent out the favorites in the Triple Crown races, and that some of his horses aren't as good as their records might indicate because he has been able to perfectly pick their spots.

"You can't always go into races 3-5; sometimes you have to take a shot," he said. "That's why our record in the Triple Crown races isn't as good as in regular races. We do step out and take chances with a 30-1 shot like Bluegrass Cat [second last year]. These are the races we want to win."

Pletcher was particularly criticized for the preparation of two of his Derby horses, Circular Quay and Any Given Saturday, who many believed were his best.

After Circular Quay won the Louisiana Derby on March 10 in devastating fashion, Pletcher pointed the chestnut colt toward a run in the Wood Memorial four weeks later as a final prep before heading to Churchill Downs. But at the last minute, Pletcher decided Circular Quay wasn't ready to run in New York and instead would contest the Kentucky Derby off an eight-week layoff.

Any Given Saturday, meantime, who had recently lost in a photo finish to Street Sense in the Tampa Bay Derby, was deputized to take Circular Quay's place in the Wood and was soundly beaten.

No horse had ever won the Kentucky Derby off eight weeks rest, and Circular Quay finished a quiet sixth.

"What I've always said is our horses tend to run with more time between races when they run a really good race," Pletcher said. "They can come off a shorter race, off an ordinary race or a bad performance. It's hard to [run back well] off a good race. I don't think Circular Quay ran his 'A' race in the Derby, and in light of the way he's trained since then, he has me thinking maybe we'll run him back [in the Preakness]."

Pletcher's bad week in Kentucky would have been the high point in the careers of many other trainers. Along with getting five horses to the Kentucky Derby, he sent out Rags to Riches and Octave, the first- and second-place finishers in the prestigious Kentucky Oaks. From May 2 through May 13, Pletcher runners won 10 of 48 starts with eight seconds and 10 thirds -- excellent numbers.

"Nothing will change in his life by winning or losing the Kentucky Derby," said Pletcher's close friend, trainer Kiaran McLaughlin. "He's got a lovely family with three kids. It's just something we all strive to do, win big races. The Triple Crown has eluded him for now, but it won't for long. He does too good a job."