Kentucky Derby 2026: Sizing up the 2 contenders from Japan

As in springs past, there are sounds at Churchill Downs that reliably say that Kentucky Derby 2026 is right around the corner.

There is the chirping of birds in the morning. And the rumble of horses training. And the repeating of the phrase, “Eventually, Japan is going to win the Derby.”

Undefeated Danon Bourbon and group-stakes winner Wonder Dean represent that assumption this year. With their wins on opposite sides of Asia on March 28, they clinched their opportunities to make that ritual prediction a reality and rewrite Japan’s 0-for-10 record in America’s biggest race.

Las Vegas futures bettors suggest 3-for-3 Danon Bourbon, who won the 1 1/8-mile Fukuryu Stakes at Nakayama, is more likely to break through. At Kyoto in both his 1 1/8-mile debut Oct. 26 and in a 1 3/16-mile allowance test Feb. 15, he won by open lengths for billionaire owner Masahiro Noda’s Danox Company. The Kentucky-bred Maxfield colt is best-priced at 20-1 in the Derby futures market.

“The Derby was on their radar even just after his maiden win,” said Kate Hunter, the Japan-based liaison for the Triple Crown who travels with the horses and their teams. “They weren’t looking at Dubai. They were always looking at the Japan road if they were going to come over here.”

Danon Bourbon, who will be paired with his regular rider, Atsura Nishimura, ran a stalking trip to win the Fukuryu. He punctuated his victory by going the last three furlongs in 35.8 seconds. Absent track biases, the raw ranking of finishing times in final prep races shows Danon Bourbon was faster than anyone else in the Derby field.

“The Fukuryu was just kind of a culmination of all of the faith they had in the horse the whole time going around,” Hunter told Horse Racing Nation on Wednesday night. “He’s been a real professional in everything that he’s done, so that kind of mentality will definitely help him out in the Derby.”

Lower-quality competition in his three races are a reason bettors might pass on Danon Bourbon. Even his superlative finish in the Fukuryu comes with a warning about the track being listed as, ahem, muddy.

“It wasn’t mud,” Hunter said. “In Japan, with a little bit of rain, it actually makes the track faster, and it’s not American stuff. It’s pure sand. With the amount of rain that they had, it had a chance to dry out a little bit. That’s the kind of surface you would want to see them run on if they’re going to be able to come over to the United States and run OK.”

Manabu Ikezoe, Danon Bourbon’s trainer, comes from an accomplished racing family. Kaneo, his father, made his mark as a jockey and a trainer. Kenichi, his brother, rode hall-of-fame champion Orfèvre in Japan. Now Manabu, 44, gets the spotlight. He is due to arrive in Kentucky next week to supervise the final buildup for Danon Bourbon.

“He’ll probably have his Japanese style of slower breeze next week,” Hunter said. “They’re planning on Wednesday.”

First, though, Danon Bourbon has to finish his journey from Japan. He arrived Tuesday morning at Chicago Import Quarantine in West Dundee, Ill. That is where he had to spend 42 hours, as did 4-year-old graded-stakes winner T O Elvis, who will be entered in the seven-furlong Churchill Downs (G1) on the Derby undercard. The two colts were flown from Tokyo to Anchorage, Alaska, and then to Chicago. They will be released Thursday evening for an overnight van ride that will end at Churchill Downs around dawn Friday.

“It’s possible they’ll get out on the track Friday morning,” said Hunter, who spoke by phone from Chicagoland. “They’re considering it as an option.”

Hunter, a native of Nashville, has been back in America since late March. She traveled from Dubai with Wonder Dean right after the Japan-bred Dee Majesty colt won at 8-1 odds in the UAE Derby (G2). Wonder Dean, with whom Hunter arrived at Churchill Downs on April 1, is best-priced in Nevada at 40-1 to win the Kentucky Derby.

Bred and owned by Yoshinari Yamamoto, Wonder Dean broke his maiden on second asking in Japan last year. The Dee Majesty colt, whose grandsire was legendary stallion Deep Impact, was 1-for-4 when he made his 3-year-old debut Feb. 14, finishing fourth at 12-1 in the Saudi Derby (G3).

In the UAE Derby, Middle East-based Six Speed set a torrid pace that Wonder Dean successfully chased in Meydan. Six Speed held on for second and got his own invitation for a rematch in Kentucky. Wonder Dean earned the 2 1/2-length win with jockey Cristian Demuro. In Kentucky, Forever Young’s regular rider, Ryusei Sakai, will become his seventh jockey in as many starts.

The energy it took to win the UAE Derby was a big reason Wonder Dean took it easy with his early training at Churchill Downs.

“He’s been starting off slow, not doing too much,” Hunter said. “He’s just trying to build himself back up again because it was a hard race and well won. He’ll have his first proper, timed breeze on Friday.”

Since his trainer Daisuke Takayanagi has not yet arrived in Louisville, Wonder Dean has been looked after this month by two other traveling lads.

“The groom, Takuya Nakano, flew in from Dubai with him and has been here with him ever since,” Hunter said. “He’s the one who rides out every day. We also have another guy, Yutoku Magai, that’s over here helping. He’s kind of the semi-translator, semi-assistant groom. In Saudi and Dubai, you’ve got local grooms that they basically loan you for free who will hold the horse and clean up the stall for you and all that stuff. Here you need extra staff.”

Takayanagi will arrive on familiar ground. He trained T O Password to a fifth-place finish in Kentucky Derby 2024. That was the same race in which UAE Derby winner Forever Young finished third, just two noses behind winner Mystik Dan and a nose behind second-place Sierra Leone in what politely might be called a physical stretch run. Wonder Dean is the fifth consecutive Japan horse to have won the UAE Derby. He will try to end the race’s 0-for-21 drought in Kentucky.

Space was at a premium when Wonder Dean arrived three weeks ago at Churchill Downs. Instead of the quarantine center that has been in operation for six years on the eastern edge of the track property, he is housed in an older fenced barn near the middle of the backstretch.

“There was a little scheduling conflict with potential imports, so they didn’t really have room for us (at the quarantine center) at first,” Hunter said. “But it ended up being OK, because the horse gets kind of lonely. By being able to put him over in a regular barn facing a barn full of other horses, it proved to be good for him mentally. So we’ve just decided we’re all settled in over there, so we might as well stay. The only thing is we had a private bathroom and break room over there. The new quarantine barns are pretty posh.”

But they do not have four-leaf clovers, something that Hunter said has been in good supply at barn 17. That is where Rich Strike was assigned in 2022 when he pulled off his 80-1 Derby surprise.

“There’s so many. Every day, if you start digging through there, you’ll find at least three or four. You’d be able to find one if you dig through for maybe about three or four minutes,” Hunter said. “Given the number of four-leaf clovers we found over there, I figured out how Rich Strike won.”