In state-branded derbies, Brad Cox is covering America’s map

Brad Cox was not even aware he holds the record.

“No, I didn’t know,” he said Thursday. “That’s funny.”

Brad Cox goes for 3rd straight Indiana Derby.

Not only does he have two Eclipse Awards as a champion trainer, but Cox also has had his hands on derby trophies bearing the names of 12 different states. The latest came 20 days ago, when Admiral Dennis took the inaugural running of the $200,000 Delaware Derby.

He did not know it at the time, but when Tappan Street won the Grade 1 Florida Derby on March 29, Cox broke the record by adding his 11th state. He had been in a tie at 10 with Bob Baffert, Todd Pletcher and the late D. Wayne Lukas.

“We’re just trying to put our horses in the right spot,” Cox said. “Yeah, sometimes it works out.”

Cox also won the Texas Derby on May 26 with Instant Replay, who goes again for him Saturday in the $300,000 Indiana Derby (G3) at Horseshoe Indianapolis. Since Cox already had the 2021 Texas Derby in his collection, and because he has won the last two runnings of the Indiana Derby and three overall, he already had those states colored in on his personal map.

Nevertheless, a 22nd victory in a state derby would be further proof his stable houses consistently competitive sophomore routers season after season. The shiniest object came with Mandaloun’s promotion to victory in the 2021 Kentucky Derby.

“It comes down to what level the horses can compete at,” Cox said. “If you’ve got a nice 3-year-old, your goal is to get to the Kentucky Derby, but after that, you’re going to march forward to the Preakness or the Belmont or the Haskell (G1). If you’re not, and you have a horse that’s won a couple races, there’s not a lot of options with two turns on the dirt. You have to be able to put them on a van and ship them where they need to be to be competitive in some of these races.”

This is the time of year to look for those stakes. Mo Plex won the Ohio Derby (G3) for Jeremiah Englehart last month on the first full day of summer, which is derby season across the eastern half of country. Saturday also brings the listed Iowa Derby at Prairie Meadows, where Cox got his state list started in 2018 with High North. The New York Derby for state-breds will be run July 14 at Finger Lakes. The West Virginia Derby (G3), which Dragoon Guard won last year for Cox, will be run Aug. 3 at Mountaineer. The Minnesota Derby for state-breds returns to Canterbury Park on Aug. 9.

“I feel like a lot of these racetracks do a good job of having these races and races on the undercard like Indiana,” Cox said. “Between Friday and Saturday, they offer a lot of different divisions. Boys on the dirt. Boys on the turf. Girls on the dirt and turf. Long. Olders. There’s a lot of options. Same thing with Iowa, where we have the Cornhusker (G3) on Saturday as well. It normally ends up being a nice weekend of racing, and that seems like what a lot of racetracks do with their premier races. They stack a lot of nice stakes around the main event.”

Of the 16 state derbies being run currently, New York has one of the four which Cox has not won. The others are Virginia, Minnesota and Jersey, the lone turf race in the bunch which arguably counts even with the truncated state name.

Even if he cannot add a 13th state to his résumé this weekend, Cox is upbeat about Instant Replay in the Indiana Derby. The Maximum Security colt was sold by Gary and Mary West this week to Qatar emir Tamim bin Hamad’s Wathnan Racing, one of Cox’s loyal clients. With Luan Machado riding him in a race for the first time, Instant Replay tries for his fourth win in five 2025 starts, this time against the likes of Rebel (G2) victor Coal Battle.

“(Instant Replay) is a horse that’s been very steady as a 3-year-old,” Cox said. “He’s really shown up and run well in his last five starts. I’m hoping he can improve again. This is a solid group of horses. It’s definitely a little bit tougher than the Texas Derby on paper, and he’s going to have to move forward a little bit, but he’s been training well, so I think he could.”

Cox’s name is atop a rich history for state derbies dating to 1864, when Norfolk won the Jersey Derby at Paterson. According to Pedigree Query’s exhaustive record of stakes histories, 32 states have had eponymous derbies.

Some were not around long. In Tennessee, it came and went before World War I. The Idaho-Bred Derby was one and done in 1984. There has not been a Washington Derby since 1936, but the race has carried on under different names, most recently the Muckleshoot Derby.

Thirteen such derbies have vanished since 1965. They included the California Derby, which began in 1873 and ended in 2023, the year before its final host Golden Gate Fields closed. Santa Anita since 2014 has hosted the black-type Cal Cup Derby, but since it began concurrently with the race in the north state, it is a stretch to count it.

The Illinois Derby, which was established in 1879, has been run only twice since 2018. Patriot Spirit won for Mike Campbell last spring in what was intended to be a revival, but money trouble kept the race from being run this year at Hawthorne.

The Michigan Derby, which was run from 1897 to 1972, was among the longest-running races of this type to have gone away since the mid-’60s. Derbies in Maryland, Arizona, South Dakota, Montana, Alabama, Massachusetts, Nebraska, Oregon, North Dakota and Colorado also disappeared in the last 60 years.

Even though he has become the state-derby dean in the last seven years, Cox will not be at Horseshoe Indy this holiday weekend. Instead he will look after his string at Saratoga, where Final Gambit is the morning-line favorite to win Friday in the Belmont Derby Invitational (G1). Win or lose, unless Belmont suddenly is admitted to the union, it will not count as a state derby.