Derby Radar: Greatest Honour overcomes bad start in win

It took a late run, but Greatest Honour earned an impressive victory in a 1 1/16 mile maiden race at Gulfstream Park on Saturday. It was the fourth try in a maiden race for the colt, with one previous race at 1 1/8 miles and the other two at seven furlongs.

Ridden by Luis Saez, Greatest Honor got off to a slow start and quickly fell behind the leaders. Several horses dueled for the lead early and things was further complicated when Dudes Got Game unseated Corey Lanerie after appearing to make contact with Greatest Honor.

The bump set the colt even further behind with just one horse beaten. But Greatest Honour continued to persevere and had gotten himself back into the mix around the far turn.

Dynamic One for trainer Todd Pletcher led partway through the turn, but Greatest Honour continued his furious run on the outside, taking the lead at the top of the stretch and never relenting.

Splits for the race were 24.29, 48.56, 1:13.05 and 1:37.48. The winning time was 1:43.86.

Trained by Shug McGaughey, Greatest Honour went off the 1-2 favorite and returned $3 for the win.

Dynamic One checked in second. Owned by Repole Stable, Phipps Stable and St. Elias Stable, he was a $750,000 auction purchase.  He is trained by Todd Pletcher, who earlier on the program had an impressive maiden winner in Amount.

Greatest Honour, a Courtlandt Farms homebred, is a son of Tapit out of Tiffany’s Honour, by Street Cry. A few months after his birth, Tiffany’s Honour was sold for $2.2 million in foal to Medaglia d’Oro and was shipped to Japan.

Greatest Honour had two third-place finishes in his two attempts at seven furlongs before running second in a 1 1/8 mile maiden race at Aqueduct on Nov. 8.