{"id":32587,"date":"2021-05-02T07:09:13","date_gmt":"2021-05-02T07:09:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/?p=32587"},"modified":"2021-05-02T07:09:13","modified_gmt":"2021-05-02T07:09:13","slug":"kentucky-derby-medina-spirit-wins-to-give-trainer-bob-baffert-record-seventh-victory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/?p=32587","title":{"rendered":"Kentucky Derby: Medina Spirit wins to give trainer Bob Baffert record seventh victory"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\"Jockey<\/span><\/span>
Jockey John Velazquez (left) and trainer Bob Baffert (right) won the Derby for the second year in a row<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Medina Spirit won the Kentucky Derby to give trainer Bob Baffert a record seventh victory in the race. <\/span><\/p>\n

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Jockey John Velazquez led Medina Spirit from the front and held off three challengers on the home straight to claim his fourth Derby win.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

It was Velazquez and Baffert’s second consecutive win together after <\/span>Authentic won the delayed 2020 edition<\/span><\/a> in September.<\/span><\/p>\n

“I cannot believe he won this race,” Baffert told NBC Sports.<\/span><\/p>\n

“This little horse, that’s him – he was all guts.”<\/span><\/p>\n

Mandaloun finished second, just ahead of Hot Rod Charlie, while 5-2 favourite Essential Quality was fourth in Louisville.<\/span><\/p>\n

American Baffert was unable to enter Life is Good, who likely would have been the race favourite, because of an injury sustained last month.<\/span><\/p>\n

“When I saw him on an easy lead, I kept waiting for these horses to come at him, but Johnny had him in the perfect spot,” said 68-year-old Baffert.<\/span><\/p>\n

“I’m the luckiest guy in the world. The record hasn’t sunk in yet. I’m so thrilled. You just never know if you are ever going to be back – it’s so difficult.”<\/span><\/p>\n

Baffert surpasses the record of Ben Jones, who won the Derby six times between 1938 and 1952.<\/span><\/p>\n

Puerto Rican Velazquez, 49, is now one win off the record of five victories shared by Eddie Arcaro and Bill Hartack.<\/span><\/p>\n

“What an incredible feeling – this doesn’t get old,” Velazquez said.<\/span><\/p>\n

“I said to Bob, ‘we’re going to put him on the lead and see what happens and I think he’s the horse to beat’. It worked out.”<\/span><\/p>\n

King Fury – named after British heavyweight boxing world champion Tyson Fury – was withdrawn before the race because of illness.<\/span><\/p>\n

The 147th edition of the Derby took place in front of a socially distanced crowd of 51,838 at Churchill Downs, reduced from the usual capacity of 150,000.<\/span><\/p>\n

Last year’s race took place behind closed doors and was moved to September because of the Covid-19 pandemic.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Banner<\/span><\/span>\"Footer<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n

Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jockey John Velazquez (left) and trainer Bob Baffert (right) won the Derby for the second year in a row Medina Spirit won the Kentucky Derby to give trainer Bob Baffert a record seventh victory in the race. Jockey John Velazquez led Medina Spirit from the front and held off three […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":32588,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32587","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hindi-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/118295925_medina_spirit_getty.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32587","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=32587"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32587\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/32588"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=32587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=32587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=32587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}