After months of action on the Road to the Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve, all the prep races have been contested and the field is more or less set for the 150^th running of the Derby May 4 at Churchill Downs.

Click image to purchase shirt.

The Kentucky Derby is held at a challenging distance of 1 ¼ miles. For the 20 lightly raced 3-year-olds who comprise the field in a typical year, it’s a distance longer than any they’ve negotiated before. Determining which horses will thrive at 1 ¼ miles involves a blend of traditional handicapping, pedigree analysis, intuition … and analyzing how fast each horse finished in their final prep race.

To be specific, reviewing how fast each Kentucky Derby contender ran the last three-eighths of a mile of their final prep race has been a productive pursuit, and for an obvious reason. Horses who are able to finish fast are more likely to handle 1 ¼ miles than horses who were tiring (and slowing down) at the conclusion of shorter races. Many final-round Kentucky Derby prep races are held over 1 1/8 miles, so the last three-eighths of a mile represents one-third of the race. But some preps are slightly longer or shorter.

National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame Joe Hirsch Media Roll of Honor inductee Jennie Rees popularized this approach to handicapping the Derby. Rees noted that a strong finish involves sprinting the final three-eighths of a mile in :38 seconds or less and the final eighth of a mile in :13 seconds or less.

Much of the time, Derby contenders are able to qualify on both metrics or neither; it’s less common for a horse to crack one time barrier and not the other. Clearly both closing fractions are important; however, the final three-eighths fraction alone has been a terrific indicator of win-worthy Derby contenders, with nine of the last 12 Kentucky Derby winners (and 19 of the last 26) finishing the final three furlongs of their final prep race in less than :38 seconds.

(Please note: Although Medina Spirit was disqualified from his Kentucky Derby victory due to a positive post-race drug test, he remains the winner for betting purposes. Since Medina Spirit is the horse bettors had to identify to cash Kentucky Derby wagers, we have included Medina Spirit’s data accordingly.)

It’s important to note finishing fractions can be affected by many factors, such as the speed of a racetrack on any given day (some are slower than others) and the early pace of the race (it’s easier to finish fast if you’ve gone slow early on). But on the whole, the :38-or-less rule is an excellent guide to identifying the strongest Kentucky Derby contenders.

To that end, we’ve compiled a chart listing the finishing times for 24 potential 2024 Kentucky Derby contenders, ranked in order of how fast they ran the final three-eighths of a mile of their final prep. Here are a few points to keep in mind:

1. For the Arkansas Derby, Jeff Ruby Steaks, Santa Anita Derby, Toyota Blue Grass Stakes, Wood Memorial Stakes Presented by Resorts World Casino, Stonestreet Lexington Stakes, and Lambholm South Tampa Bay Derby, we have used data from Equibase GPS charts to determine the listed times. Unlike traditional timers, which only record the fraction posted by the leader at each point in a race, the GPS charts provide individual times for every horse in the field.
2. Finishing fractions for the Twinspires.com Louisiana Derby and UAE Derby Sponsored by Atlantis The Royal have been calculating by hand-timing the video replay of the race and, in the case of the Louisiana Derby, by analyzing data in the regular result chart. We have used the estimation that six lengths is equal to one second, which means if a horse finishes six lengths behind the winner of a race, that horse is deemed to have run one second slower.
3. The UAE Derby and the Fukuryu Stakes in Japan are respectively contested over metric distances of 1,900 meters (slightly shorter than 1 3/16 miles) and 1,800 meters (slightly shorter than 1 1/8 miles). The raw times for the metric distances have been converted to projected times based on yards, making them comparable with the rest of the data in our chart.

Many of the horses scheduled to contest the 2024 Kentucky Derby exit fast-finishing performances. The list is led by Domestic Product, who unleashed freakishly fast closing fractions of :35.01 and :11.77 to win the Grade 3 Tampa Bay Derby by a neck over graded stakes winner No More Time. But the Tampa Bay Derby was contested over 1 1/16 miles rather than 1 1/8 miles (the shorter the distance, the easier it is to finish fast), and the early pace fractions were incredibly slow – :25.25, :51.14, and 1:16.21. Domestic Product did well to rally from fifth place behind the slow pace, but his fast finishing fractions are owed in large part to the glacial early pace, which allowed each of the top five finishers to run their final three furlongs in under :36.

Fierceness (Lauren King/Coglianese Photo)

There are also caveats surrounding four-time stakes winner Endlessly, an accomplished turf horse who successful switched to Turfway Park’s all-weather Tapeta Footings track to win the Grade 3 Jeff Ruby Steaks with strong closing fractions of :36.49 and :12.22. For starters, the closing fractions aren’t as readily comparable since the Jeff Ruby took place on Tapeta instead of dirt. For another, Endlessly has yet to race on dirt, so it’s difficult to predict if he can reproduce his fast finish at Churchill Downs.

This brings us to four of the strongest Kentucky Derby contenders: Catching Freedom, who finished in :36.58 and :12.05 to win the Grade 2 Louisiana Derby; Forever Young, whose projected times of :36.63 and :12.70 from his Group 2 UAE Derby win in Dubai stack up well against the performances of his American counterparts; Fierceness, who closed in :36.91 and :12.59 to dominate the Grade 1 Florida Derby by 13 ½ lengths; and Honor Marie, who came home in :37.01 and :12.17 to finish second in the Louisiana Derby.

Any way you slice it, these performances are impressive. Fierceness in particular deserves credit because he managed to finish fast after setting decent early fractions of :24.06, :47.50, and 1:11.31 in the Florida Derby, whereas Catching Freedom, Forever Young, and Honor Marie let other horses do the early work before finishing fast. The performance of Fierceness is reminiscent of Always Dreaming, who tracked fractions of :23.28, :47.08, and 1:10.75 in the 2017 Florida Derby before finishing in :36.56 and :12.53 to win by five lengths. Always Dreaming, of course, went on to win the Kentucky Derby.

On the other end of the spectrum, a few notable Kentucky Derby contenders fall outside of our :38 cutoff. First and foremost is Sierra Leone, who is very likely to start as the second betting choice behind Fierceness after winning the Grade 1 Blue Grass Stakes and Grade 2 Risen Star Stakes. Sierra Leone unleashed an eye-catching homestretch rally to win the Blue Grass, but his closing fractions (:38.02 and :13.02) are ever-so-slightly slower than we prefer. It’s not a big knock – he missed both marks by only 0.02 – but it’s something to keep in mind. Blue Grass runner-up Just a Touch came home even slower, with finishing fractions of :39.31 and :13.71.

Stronghold also finished slower than ideal when battling to a tenacious victory in the Grade 1 Santa Anita Derby. The Santa Anita Derby has been one of the most productive Kentucky Derby qualifiers in recent years, but closing fractions of :38.69 and :13.10 suggest Stronghold needs improvement to challenge for victory on the first Saturday in May.

So where does this leave us? The finishing fractions suggest Catching Freedom, Forever Young, Fierceness, and Honor Marie are particularly formidable Kentucky Derby contenders, and if you’re willing to overlook a few caveats, Domestic Product and Endlessly rank as appealing longshots with a proven ability to finish fast. Don’t forget, in 2022 the Derby starter with the third-fastest final three-eighths time on our chart was Jeff Ruby Steaks third-place finisher Rich Strike, an 80.80-1 longshot who sprung a massive upset in the run for the roses.

Good luck with your Kentucky Derby handicapping!