Forget About Changing the Triple Crown Format

By Bob Hill,
TSV staff writer —-

Forget About Changing the Triple Crown Format

Last year after the Preakness was run I wrote an article that could have been entitled A Requiem for the Triple Crown. Trainers and owners are speaking clearly on a yearly basis on how little drawing power the Triple Crown now has. I’ll assume if you’re reading this far you already know the picture, so I’ll abstain from repeating it ad nauseum. My opinion last year was focused on changing the dates of the Preakness and Belmont in order to provide more time for three-year-old colts to recover between starts in Triple Crown races. This year, I provide a much more sober and realistic suggestion – leave the Triple Crown alone.

Pragmatism guides my thinking here. Getting multi-state jurisdictions to make the compromises necessary to reformat the timing of the Triple Crown is about as likely as Congress passing a bi-partisan bill that helps millions of Americans have a better life. Ain’t gonna happen! Let’s just enjoy the Preakness for the great race it can be on its own, even minus attachment to the Triple Crown mystique.

If we really have to have a named and marketed multi-race series of contests for three-year-old colts let’s invent a new one just like the whole Triple Crown idea was created and marketed 95 years ago. I would argue that there is nothing magical about a three-race series. Why could it not be four or five? There are exciting Grade 1 races contested at classic distances already on the books in July and August. All someone or some group needs to do is come up with an exciting name for the series of races, get one or more corporate sponsors to fund the bonus money for multiple wins, and turn the marketing machine loose on the idea. Would winning the Kentucky Derby, the Belmont Stakes, and the Travers Stakes by a single horse be seen as anything other than a championship trifecta. In the rare year when the connections of a three-year-old colt decide to attempt the Triple Crown we all have the thrill of watching. As is the case much more often (say this year for example) we could be heading into the Belmont Stakes with the chance of two different horses still vying for the crown of whatever we name this new idea. Sounds like a win-win to me, so that’s probably why it will have trouble getting traction. Thoroughbred racing has a hard time with win-win.