Eight horses are entered in Saturday’s $150,000 Jerome Stakes at Aqueduct, which kicks off the Road to the 2022 Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve prep series of races in New York.
A trio of Road to the Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve prep races will take place Saturday, Jan. 1, across the country to kick off 2022. By far the most competitive on paper is the $250,000 Smarty Jones Stakes at Oaklawn Park, which drew a full field of 14 newly turned 3-year-olds.
The past two years, the Sham Stakes at Santa Anita Park has been a key prep on the Road to the Kentucky Derby, producing the last two winners of the first leg of the Triple Crown.
The New York stretch of the Road to the Kentucky Derby kicks off on New Year’s Day at Aqueduct with the Jerome Stakes offering eight newly turned 3-year-olds the opportunity to pick up a few qualifying points, which could come in handy should those runners still have Triple Crown aspirations in the spring.
The North American horse racing calendar turns over this Saturday, and horsemen, fans, and gamblers alike are all anticipating a 2022 that’s full of great racing, big scores, and more than anything else, a sense of normalcy resembling this time a couple of years ago… which will mean we’ve left the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic behind.
