Bob Baffert

A native of Nogales, Ariz., Bob Baffert grew up loving horses and graduated from the University of Arizona Race Track Industry Program. After climbing to the top of the Quarter Horse racing world, where he trained four champions, Baffert began the transition to Thoroughbred racing in the late 1980s.

Baffert completed the move in 1991 when he gave up his Quarter Horse division and within a few years was one of the most successful trainers in Thoroughbred racing.

In 2015 he became the first trainer in 37 years to condition a Triple Crown winner when his American Pharoah tallied victories in the Kentucky Derby, Preakness and Belmont Stakes. In all, Baffert has 16 victories in Triple Crown races: six Kentucky Derbys, seven Preaknesses and three Belmonts. American Pharoah was the fourth Baffert trainee to move on to the Belmont Stakes with a shot at the Triple Crown following Silver Charm (1997), Real Quiet (1998) and War Emblem (2002). Justify became his fifth when he swept the Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve and Preakness Stakes in 2018 and then completed the Triple Crown with a win in the Belmont Stakes.

Baffert finished second in all three Triple Crown races in 2012 with Bodemeister and Paynter. In 2014, Baffert trained classic hopeful Bayern, went on to win the Breeders' Cup Classic and was a Horse of the Year finalist. Baffert backed that up with a win by American Pharoah in the 2015 Classic.

He has won the Eclipse Award as outstanding trainer four times, most recently in 2015, has developed 11 horses that have won 15 Eclipse Awards as division champions, and was the national leader in purse earnings four consecutive years, 1998-2001. He was elected to the Hall of Fame in 2009, and three of his stars, Silver Charm, Silverbulletday and Point Given, have been inducted, too.

In 2016, Baffert picked up his 13th Breeders' Cup win with Drefong, who took the Sentient Jet Sprint for new owner Charles Chu, before winning the Breeders' Cup Classic for the third straight year when Arrogate outfinished champion California Chrome to win the $6 million. With 14 career Breeders' Cup wins, Baffert trails only D. Wayne Lukas (20).

Arrogate continued his brilliance in 2017, winning the $12 million Pegasus World Cup and then the $10 million Dubai World Cup for Baffert in impressive fashion to become highest-earning North American Thoroughbred of all time with more than $17 million in earnings. Baffert also won the Kentucky Oaks in 2017 with Abel Tasman.

Baffert's fifth Kentucky Derby win came in 2018 when undefeated Justify rolled in the slop to become the first 3-year-old since Apollo in 1882 to win the first jewel of the Triple Crown without racing as a 2-year-old. Two weeks later, again on a sloppy track, Justify faced pressure from champion Good Magic from start to finish and battled gamely in the stretch to win a thriller in the Preakness Stakes, setting up a bid for the Triple Crown in the Belmont Stakes. Amazingly, three weeks later, Justify added a Belmont win to become Baffert's second Triple Crown winner and the only Triple Crown champ who didn't race at age 2. Just one other trainer, James "Sunny Jim" Fitzsimmons, has trained two Triple Crown winners.

In November 2018 the Baffert-trained Game Winner rolled to his fourth straight win in capturing the Breeders' Cup Juvenile, becoming Baffert's 15th Breeders' Cup winner. Game Winner returned in good form for his 2019 campaign, posting two runner-up finishes that earned him enough points to secure a spot in the Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve. He joined Improbable and Roadster to give Baffert a typically strong hand in the 2019 renewal as he sought his sixth Kentucky Derby win.

Baffert’s 2019 Kentucky Derby hopes did not come to fruition, as Improbable finished fourth, Game Winner fifth, and Roadster well back in the pack. He entered 2020 with a very formidable hand as Authentic, Thousand Words, Nadal, and Charlatan all won key qualifying Kentucky Derby preps. The Derby was delayed four months due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and by Sept. 5 only Thousand Words and Authentic were entered. Thousand Words was scratched minutes before the 146^th Derby after a paddock accident, leaving Authentic as Baffert’s lone starter. Breaking from the outside post, the Into Mischief colt assumed the lead heading into the far turn and, under a masterful ride from John Velazquez, was all out to hold off Belmont Stakes Presented by NYRA Bets and Runhappy Travers Stakes winner Tiz the Law for a milestone victory, Baffert’s sixth in the Kentucky Derby. That tied him with Ben Jones for the most all-time wins in the Kentucky Derby.