Belmont Stakes Looks Like 9 Horse Field But May Be a Match Race

It looks like Big Brown will face eight other horses when he tries to become the twelfth horse in history to win the Triple Crown. The Belmont Stakes, which will be held late Saturday Afternoon, currently has Anak Nakal, Big Brown, Casino Drive, Da’ Tara, Denis of Cork, Icabad Crane, Macho Again, Ready’s Echo, and Tale of Ekati in Big Browns way to racing immortality.

Big Brown has already decimated much of the Belmont field and Rick Dutrow Jr thinks that the race is a shoo-in for his super horse telling reporters late last week:

"I feel like it's actually a foregone conclusion," he said. "To me, I just see the horses he's in with, and I see our horse, so I expect him to win this race."

History, however, is against Dutrow and his bold claims. There has been a number of near misses in the past decade in the Triple Crown and Big Brown has yet to face Casino Drive who has already won on the Belmont track and is the brother of the previous two winners of the Belmont Jazil and filly Rags to Riches. Dutrow is dismissing Casino Drive, who flew in from Japan to win the Grade II Peter Pan Stakes last month, and dominated the field by five lengths. Dutrow said of the 5-1 morning line horse that will be ridden by Edgar Prado who has played spoiler in two other Triple Crown bids:

"This Japanese horse has got so much to prove," he said. "I don't know if he is on top of his game training. I'm getting different kinds of reports from people that think they know. I would not depend on that horse to be second."

Kent Desormeaux, who saddled Casino Drive to victory in the Peter Pan will take his regular mount of Big Brown in the Belmont, had nothing but nice things to say about the presumable second choice after his easy victory last month. Following the win, Desormeaux said:

"I certainly understand how Jazil and Rags to Riches won the Belmont. Yeah, he can run a lot. It's going to be fun. He's a phenomenal talent, and we've got our hands full with this one. It's going to be ultimately exciting for all of the fans. He's got that stride."

Here are videos the two horses that will face off in the Belmont Stakes. First, is the impressive stateside debut of Casino Drive at Belmont last month followed by Big Brown's romp in the Preakness Stakes.