Japanese Runners 'Take Up the Challenge' on Derby Day

Among successful prep races for the Kentucky Derby (G1), the Florida Derby (G1) is tops, having produced 24 winners of North America's most prestigious horse race. Other major preps for 3-year-olds are not far behind with the Blue Grass Stakes (G1), Wood Memorial Stakes (G2), and Santa Anita Derby (G1) having generated 23, 20, and 19 winners, respectively.

But horses exiting other graded races, for a variety of reasons, have been relatively cold in the Run for the Roses. The Lecomte Stakes (G3), Lexington Stakes (G3), Sham Stakes (G3), Southwest Stakes (G3), and Tampa Bay Derby (G3) are among the races that have each produced just two winners, and only a single Derby winner apiece has exited the Gotham Stakes (G3) and Sunland Park Derby (G3).

Horses from still other prep races have never won the Derby, and in the case of the UAE Derby (G2) in Dubai, none of its competitors have ever recorded better than a fifth-place Derby finish.

Since 2000, 18 times horses from the UAE Derby raced in the Derby, each time coming away without playing a significant role in the outcome.

This year, Derma Sotogake  and Continuar , two Japanese horses that traveled to Dubai and finished 1-3 in the UAE Derby, will look to end that slump when they race in the May 6 Run for the Roses at Churchill Downs.

They may have a better chance of success than prior UAE competitors. Japanese horses have excelled on the international racing stage in recent years, winning two Breeders' Cup races at Del Mar in 2021 and dominating on major racing days in Dubai and around the globe.

Plus, both Derma Sotogake and Continuar are seasoned travelers for 3-year-old racehorses, having already been, over the winter and spring, to Saudi Arabia and later Dubai.

Conditions have become a bit easier for equines traveling to Churchill Downs in recent years after the track added quarantine barns for foreign shippers to its backstretch. They have been stabled longer at Churchill Downs than many of their Kentucky Derby counterparts.

Derma Sotogake would appear to have the far better chance of the two Japanese runners coming to Churchill via the UAE Derby, having won four of eight races, topped by the $1 million UAE Derby by a frontrunning 5 1/2-length margin over Dura Erede , who is not pursuing the Kentucky Derby. Ten lengths behind the winner in third was Continuar.

Derma Sotogake was also in front of Continuar when they were 3-5 in the Saudi Derby (G3) at King Abdulaziz Racecourse, and 1-2 in the Mochinoki Sho last fall at Hanshin in Japan. Three-quarters of a length separated them in the Saudi Derby, a nose in the Mochinoki Sho.

Derma Sotogake was also superior in a joint breeze over the Churchill Downs surface April 26, and possesses speed, an enviable attribute in a large Kentucky Derby field in which closers are often compromised by traffic. Derma Sotogake was hustled to the lead from his inside post in the UAE Derby and pulled away when asked in the stretch by jockey Christophe Lemaire.

A start earlier, he was slowly away in the Saudi Derby and made progress to finish third.

"It's absolutely amazing to see the Japanese willingness to take on dirt racing since the dirt surface in Japan is so different—from Dubai, from Saudi, from America," Kate Hunter, the Japan Racing Association representative for the Kentucky Derby, said on a National Thoroughbred Racing Association media conference call. "So it's been really heartening to see them take up that challenge because it is a true challenge."

Japanese dirt tracks are deeper and sandier, she explained.

Derma Sotogake became the third Japanese-trained horse, and the second Japanese-bred, to win the 1,900 meter (about 1 3/16 miles) UAE Derby. The earlier two also pursued the Kentucky Derby, with 2016 UAE Derby winner Lani  running ninth in the first leg of the Triple Crown that spring and 2022 UAE Derby winner Crown Pride  fading to 13th last year after pushing the fastest opening quarter-mile in Kentucky Derby history.

Lani would go on in 2016 to finish fifth in the Preakness Stakes (G1) and third in the Belmont Stakes (G1).

Other Japanese-based horses to run in the Derby include Ski Captain, 14th in 1995, and Master Fencer , sixth in 2019.  They made their final pre-Derby starts in Japan.

Having won the UAE Derby in 1:55.81, the fastest time in the race since Mendelssohn   won it in 2018 in 1:55.18, Derma Sotogake has drawn the interest of some horseplayers typically skeptical of the chances of foreign invaders.

The Japanese horses, just like the UAE Derby participants before them, have much to gain if successful in the Kentucky Derby, making it a gamble worth attempting despite the race's difficulty, particularly for foreign shippers.

Speaking of the importance of international participation, Hunter said, "I firmly believe the Kentucky Derby isn't just America's greatest race. It could very easily be the world's greatest dirt race, in the sense when you see the success of horses that have been through the Kentucky Derby, that have won the Kentucky Derby."