Florida Derby 2021 Results: Known Agenda romps home
- Position
- Horse
- Win
- Place
- Show
Position
- 1.
- 2.
- 3.
Horse
- Known Agenda
- Soup and Sandwich
- Greatest Honour
Win
- $12.80
Place
- $6.60
- $8.60
Show
- $3.20
- $3.80
- $2.10
Going into the Florida Derby, Shug McGaughey's Greatest Honour looked like the most real Kentucky Derby of the bunch. Back-to-back wins on the Derby trail at Gulfstream meant he was one away from being the first horse to sweep the spring prep races at the Florida venue. Our turf-man gave him an A grade in his preview and our in-house handicapper thought he was the best Derby runner but could be tripped up by the expected slow pace.
Known Agenda was the Pick of our in-house handicapper believing in the combination of Irad Ortiz, Jr. and Todd Pletcher. Our editor was all aboard the Spielberg train believing his experience coupled with his showing in the slop at Oaklawn in the Southwest would lead to yet another win for legendary trainer Bob Baffert but the wide gate was concerning him going into the one-and-an-eighth mile race.
As the pools opened Greatest Honour quickly moved to odds-on as the bettors liked the Tapit colt's chance to finish the GP trifecta. The big market mover was Into Mischief colt Soup and Sandwich. The Mark Casse trained horse was the flavor of the month for many writers early in the week and got more than his fair share of column inches. The 20-1 M/L price seemed crazy long and the market agreed as a swift move into 10-1 followed. Known Agenda stuck at 5-1 with Collaborate coming in slightly to 5-1 and Spielberg drifting to 6-1.
Nova Rags broke from the inside gate and got to the front with Soup and Sandwich close-by with favorite Greatest Honour settling in tenth of 11 early on. Spielberg struggled being pushed wide from the gate and Collaborate never being in the mix.
It was Nova Rags who led halfway down the back stretch but Soup and Sandwich went around the outside with Known Agenda making his move around the final turn. Nova Rags dropped away leaving two to fight for the lead and it was known Agenda who drifted to the middle of track but keeping his foot down winning the Florida Derby with ease.
Soup and Sandwich lived up to the hype and is an outside Kentucky Derby shout should the 40 points gained today be enough to get into the field. Greatest Honour was already in and a third place finish shouldn't harm his chances as he was positioned badly early on and wasn't able to get any room until the final 400 yards.
Our in-house handicapper chalks up another win with this as Known Agenda comes back from disappointing runs at Aqueduct and Tampa Bay on the Road to the Kentucky Derby to ink his place in the starting gate at Churchill Downs on the first Saturday in May.
Known Agenda paid out $12.80 for the win with the trifrcta paying a tasty $147.20