Keen Ice Upsets American Pharoah in the Travers
Today at Saratoga, on August 29th, in the Travers, American Pharoah did not win. It has happened before to great horses. Great champions have lost. In 1973 Secretariat lost to Onion in the Whitney at Saratoga. Zenyatta was defeated by Blame in her final race in the 2010 Breeders’ Cup Classic. The ‘unconquerable, invincible, unbeatable’ Cigar had his 16 race win streak broken in the 1996 Pacific Classic by Dare and Go. Today, American Pharoah, the Triple Crown Champion, was beaten for the first time in 2015 by Keen Ice in the Travers.
American Pharoah went to the lead as usual, but Frosted stayed right on his hip. Coming around the final turn Frosted drew even with American Pharoah, but could not pass him. Frosted and Pharoah carved out moderate fractions of 24.28, 48.30, 1;11.48, and 1:35.08. Pharoah won the battle with Frosted, but was visibly tired as he approached the wire.
Bob Baffert did not see the usual American Pharoah out on the Saratoga oval, “You could tell he really wasn’t on his “A” game today, but he tried hard. He looked like he was done way early and he just kept fighting on. The winner ran a great race. Pharoah he dug in today he just didn’t bring his “A” game. I could tell by Victor’s body language. He could do it easy and he wasn’t really doing it as easy. His tank was not as full as we were hoping it would be. You get beat. You just got to suck it up.”
As American Pharoah and Frosted battled, Keen Ice sat well behind in sixth to begin. Javier Castellano, who was up on Keen Ice for the first time, slowly picked up horses and had his horse in third place, 4 ½ lengths behind the Triple Crown winner on the turn.
In the end, the Zayat Stables superstar put away Frosted but was unable to hold off the closing move of Keen Ice. Keen Ice won by ¾ of a length, going the ten-furlongs in 2:01.57
Castellano became the leading rider in Travers history with his fifth win in the Midsummer Derby. After the race he said, "I followed those two horses [American Pharoah and Frosted] and I just kept tracking and following with them. At some point when turning for home, I saw the horses slow down and start coming back to me so I knew that I had a chance to win the race. I expected this kind of effort from him today, after I worked him the one time last week. We had a good fit and I thought I had a real good chance to win the race. My horse ran a hard race and to beat American Pharoah, that's a good race."
For Keen Ice, this was only his second career victory and it gave trainer Dale Romans his first Travers win. Romans is known a trainer who is always willing to take a shot to win the biggest races. “[Owner] Jerry Crawford called me this morning and said, 'Let's put him in the race. We don't need to run second again in a Grade 1, let's try to win.' We put him in the race and Javier [Castellano] rode him perfect. He was never far out of it and turning for home you could almost tell he was going to win."
Keen Ice was sent off as the 16-1 fifth betting choice and paid $34.00, $6.50, $3.80. American Pharoah, who was the .35-1 favorite, paid $2.40 and $2.10. Frosted managed to hold on for third as the 7.60-1 third choice and paid $3.20 to show.
For his efforts, Keen Ice becomes a millionaire upping his career stats to 11: 2-1-3 with earnings of $1,490,395.
In the end a shocked and dazed Baffert wasn’t sure about American Pharoah’s future on the racetrack, “I don't know, I wanted to see how taxing this race was on him. This is something we have to sit and figure out, I'm not really used to being in this position with him, so it's sort of hard to digest right now.”