 This is covering the spread part of the Fandall podcast network The second leg of the triple crown is set to take place take place this weekend at Pimlico It's the preak mistakes We're gonna break it down for today by talking to Christina Blacker of Fandall TV once again Getting her read on weather mage and go back to back and getting her read on this week's field at the preakness welcome On into covering the spread. That's right here on the Fandall podcast network and Numberfire.com my name is Jim sauna. So I am a senior writer and analyst for a number fire Joined here as mentioned by Christina Blacker. You can find her on Twitter at Christina FD TV She is a host analyst and reporter for FD TV. We're gonna break down the preak mistakes Christina Welcome back into the show. How you doing today? I'm doing really well Thanks for having me again, and it feels like we just blinked It was not that long ago that we were talking to you but this is part of the excitement of the triple crown Is packing these three races into the five-week span and we talked about like the strain of the horses You know how tough that is on their schedule, but like what about for you? I mean, you're going to Kentucky now you're going to Baltimore later on this week That's a lot of travel for you to jam into a couple days as well It is it's a lot of you know back and forth and for us that are based out on the west coast Which is a lot of the members of the Fandall TV team because our studio is here in Los Angeles When we're traveling for horse racing, we're pretty much going to the other side of the country almost all the time We're going to Florida. We're going to Kentucky. We're going to Maryland I mean, I think the closest place we go is Arkansas honestly Like we're always traveling all the way east and then back, but it's so exciting There's a big weekend every weekend pretty much in horse racing none as you know big as the triple crown itself But there's always something to look forward to and once you get there on the grounds that adrenaline just gets pumping You see the horses. You see the people It's like a little reunion everywhere you go to all the folks that work in racing getting to enjoy these cities together And of course the racing well, hopefully this week can be a fun one We're going to break down the preakness stakes and get Christina's read on mage and more in just one second But first a reminder to make sure you're subscribed to covering the spread wherever you get your podcasts both on your favorite podcast feed and Over on the faddle YouTube page if you like what you hear give us a thumbs up over on YouTube and leave us a five-star rating over on Apple podcast the second leg of horse racing's big three is here and faddle is a place to bet the preakness stakes because right now all Customers can get a no sweat preakness bet up to $20 That means you'll get up to $20 back if your win bet doesn't win bet the preakness with America's number one sports book Just visit racing dot faddle.com for your chance to get a no sweat preakness bet up to $20 this Saturday That's racing dot faddle.com age and residency Restrictions apply offer valid on first win wager refund issued in non withdrawal racing site credit that expires on June 12th 2023 Restrictions apply see terms at racing dot faddle.com gambling problem call 1 800 gambler now Christina We're gonna dive into the preakness here in a second at first Let's go back to church showdowns and talk about mage's win at the Kentucky Derby Looking back on it when you look at what allowed mage to win What are the strengths that mage has that allowed them to top the field on that Saturday? So there's a couple things to keep in mind here with mage first of all mage in his final prep for the Kentucky Derby Which was the Florida Derby? This is a race that happened back in April mage ran second to forte forte was our favorite for the Kentucky Derby Unfortunately, he had to be scratched the morning of the race due to a hoof injury Which was very minor but just horrible timing for forte But for mage there goes the favorite in the race and the horse that just beat you in Florida So I do feel a little bit for the forte connections because now mage goes on to win the race and of course They beat him pretty handily in Florida. So they're thinking gosh if we had been there if we had been able to compete Who knows if the outcome could have been different But look that's horse racing you have to be good and you have to be lucky and unfortunately for forte Really bad timing for a very minor issue So that was one of the things that obviously helped mage and really everybody else because the highest rated horse in the field Did not compete Secondly and this happened in both the Kentucky Derby and in the Florida Derby The horse is on the front end coming out of the starting gate in the early stages of the race went very fast And especially fast for the mile and a quarter distance of the Kentucky Derby And if you go back and watch that replay All of those horses that were in the top five going into the first turn The only one of them that hung around to get a piece of it was two fills the horse that ran second So many of those horses they basically just burned their energy early and then they faded late Mage was back at the back of the field. He was nearly last going a much slower tempo in the early stages So the pace of the race really flattered horses coming from so far back off the pace Mage was pretty far back angel of empire was pretty far back And mage was your winner two fills again who really dug deep and ran a huge race with second Angel of empire who also came from back third Ended up running third from the back of the pack So the pace was a huge part of it The fact that forte was not in the race was a huge part of it And I think if you're just looking at mage himself and trying to isolate what makes him good He's a really gritty competitor. He's just tough. He's not as physically big in stature as a lot of these other horses He's not going to overwhelm you when you see him up close But he's kind of that scrappy little competitor that just finds a way to win and has a lot of heart If you look at some of the replays and just the pictures after the race He is covered in mud and dirt his whole face And you can imagine if you're a horse and you're a jockey at the back of the pack All of that dirt all that mud is coming right back at you and flying at you It's like somebody throwing, you know snowballs at you as you're trying to run forward That's kind of what happened to mage and to his rider So I give him a lot of credit because he's just got a lot of heart And that's something that you cannot teach a horse. You can't teach a competitor that you can get them physically to their best But if they don't have that kind of x factor in that determination A horse is not going to win a race from his position without that fighting instinct So the grittiness and the pace and the patience pay off there But this is obviously a different track at pimlico than what we saw at church held down So how much of that can translate? What are the key differences between what we saw at church held downs? And what we'll see this saturday at pimlico So at pimlico the first thing that's going to be different versus the kentucky derby is we're going just slightly shorter in distance We went a mile and a quarter in the derby We went a mile and three or we will go a mile and three sixteenths in the preakness Now mage is a horse that I think actually gets better with distance But this is a pretty minor fluctuation in the distance. So I don't think that For example, if you lose is I don't think we can make the distance his excuse per se The track at pimlico is a little bit smaller in that the stretch is shorter Then the stretch at church held down the stretch run at church held downs is one of the longest in north america The only longer stretch in north america is at los alamitos in orange county california So for a horse coming from off the pace you have all that time to catch the front runners Mage is going to be coming from off the pace. So if you look back kind of at the history of the preakness There's a lot of horses that do well Being up on the front end being in that first flight of horses And especially if they can kind of rate themselves and just not go too fast and not burn all that energy early Like the horses did in the kentucky derby The one thing I will say about the pace this weekend though for mage Is I don't know that he's going to get that hot pace to run at again. So that to me Is the biggest concern for mage. He's going to have to overcome A race shape. That's what we call it when you're talking about the pace to talk about the race shape He's going to have to overcome a race shape that isn't necessarily Flattering his running style whereas in the kentucky derby and the florida derby the race shape really helped him Now is that due to the size of the field the length of the course? What causes that race shape to be so different in this situation? It's a few different factors Yes, the size of the field for sure because you think about the kentucky derby and you know 20 horse field in this case because we had so many scratches that were fewer But everybody's kind of jockeying for the position is the the phrase and it's very little The jockeys are kind of going to get that first kind of point of call if they can But in a race like this we have far fewer horses. So in this year's preakness We have just eight runners But also it depends on the individual horses that have entered the race Every horse has a preferred running style So do we have a handful of horses that have that running style where they want to all be up on the front end? And they might duel each other into submission and set it up for a horse like mage We don't really have that we do have some horses that like to be close to the pace But I don't think we have enough to create that race shape that mage wants Now that could be an implication for mage which we'll talk about here in a second But let's talk about the post draw first which occurred earlier on this week and with eight horses It's not as big of an impact here as it might be for the derby. I would assume mage drew the third post here any big takeaways for you from that post draw that we saw earlier on Yeah, there's a couple so Prior to the to the post draw for the preakness They interviewed mage's trainer his assistant trainer gustavo del dato junior and they asked him Where would you like to be drawn and he said oh, I'd prefer to be somewhere towards the outside if I could So there's the first knock. He didn't get any post position towards the outside He is post position number three But again as you said and spot on the post doesn't make as much of an impact in the preakness Especially with an eight horse field as it does in the kentucky derby The other takeaway from the post draw for me It was the fact that the number one horse that national treasure drew the rail National treasure to me is the fastest horse in this field as far as that early pace And he's putting the blinkers on So blinkers are a piece of equipment that horses will wear That kind of shields their eyes a little bit and what it does is it restricts their peripheral vision If you think about the anatomy of a horse, their eyes are really on the side of their head and they have near 360 degree vision They only have two blind spots directly below their nose and directly behind their tail So they can see all the way around them when you put blinkers on and you kind of cover the Outside corners of their eyes. They have to focus forward and that will cause a horse to run faster early They really only have one direction to look and so it just makes them more focused on running forward versus looking around Who's coming to my left who's coming to my right when you put blinkers on a horse you get more speed So now you have a speed horse on the rail with blinkers National treasure. I would be shocked if he's not on the lead in this race Do you think that would be a disadvantage for them in terms of they may tire themselves out early on? Like we saw at the kentucky derby or are they fast enough where They could just build a nice lead here Yeah, so it's It's tricky when you put blinkers on a horse and this is the job of the horse trainer You want that focus, but you don't want them running off you have to Teach them to race forwardly and kindly and not really on the bridle and dragging their rider to the front Bob bafford is the trainer of national treasure. He trains for speed a lot of his horses This is how they win races in gait to wire fashion So one thing that I always say about his horses is as fast as they are They're not runoffs and they're not headstrong and he Instills that in them from day one of their training regime. So this horse is three years old He's been in the barn since he was two He's gone through a year and a half of this and I I would not be worried at all about national treasure doing So but it does happen and you're exactly right There are some horses that you put blinkers on and you go. Whoa. Okay. That was a mistake This horse can't handle this piece of equipment. We have to take them off Go back to the drawing board So it sounds like the post draw a good thing for national treasure four to one right now to win Mage eight to five to win after the post draw. Let's talk about mage specifically here It sounds like maybe not the best post draw But as you said not the biggest issue and maybe not the best race shape for mage So when you look at that number at eight to five christina Do you see any value in betting mage at that number or does the value lie elsewhere in this field? Well, I think if you're betting sports and you're talking about You know odds like that and eight to five that that's not really a bad price Right if you're thinking about making a bet on your favorite football game or favorite basketball game You're kind of okay with what you're looking at on mage I will say he is in my eyes and I think a lot of people would agree with this The classiest horse in the race and by that I mean he is the most talented of this field as far as raw ability goes A lot of these horses all of them actually did not run in the kentucky derby And remember how we talked about qualifying them for the kentucky derby You have to earn points to run in the derby So the derby was hands down the best three-year-olds of this generation These horses taking on mage Are a slight step below not to knock them at all, but they didn't qualify for the derby So, you know, we can't really put them in that same category as far as class goes So mage even though he might not have the race shape he wants Because he's the classiest horse in here He very much has the ability to overcome that and maybe even to run a little differently to run a little closer to the pace Because his jockey Javier Castellano he can look at this race on paper and tell you exactly what i'm telling you So he knows that he knows I can't afford to be too far back today Because these horses on the front end are not coming back to me in the end He can ride mage a little differently and because mage is a classy horse He can probably handle that to overcome the race shape I personally as far as value goes i'm picking national treasure and I feel kind of bad saying that Because I want to root for mage. I want to root for a triple crown Our entire team is there at pimlico this week and if we you know move ahead It's going to be all hands on deck for the belmont in three more weeks time and Fandal tv will be all over it and it's definitely more exciting when you get to the belmont with the triple crown on the line But I think national treasure is pretty good And I know he's very fast and I know he's not going to come back to mage So to me the value in the race is betting national treasure So national treasure is four to one right now uh to win this event Would you have had that thought before the post draw? Like did you think that national treasure based on the speed? Based on the background of the trainer about baffer Did would you have thought that before the post draw or was that advantageous enough to Kind of break the tie for you in going with national treasure It was definitely in my mind and had there been another horse in this race that I thought was Equally as fast as national treasure in the early stages Then I would probably end up going with mage But because I don't see anybody else. It's as fast as national treasure and You compound that with the fact that he has the rail if if national treasure had been drawn all the way to the outside to post position Number eight I probably wouldn't pick him because then he has to use all of that early speed To clear the entire field before he gets to the first turn and horses for the most part They kind of have one big move and if you use that at the very beginning of the race What are you left with at the end? You know the thing that separates really good horses from Those that might be a cut below is the fact that they can sometimes stop and start and have more Acceleration other times than others and these horses at this level generally do But when you're stacking them all up against each other, you want your best trip, right? National treasure is going to get his best trip come saturday because of the rail because of the speed because of the blinkers And so that really the post kind of put me over the edge in terms of my own selection was knowing Okay, this is like we're serving it up to him on a silver platter. Here's the preakness Go to the lead just hold everybody off Okay, so national treasure four to one is christina's pick to win the preakness But obviously it's not just win bets christina there are other slots We can fill in here too Any other horses you think might be good values a bit undervalued by the betting markets right now That you are checking out when it comes to the non win bets this weekend So there are a lot of new sequences this weekend being offered at pimlico and A few of them are these pick fours and pick fives so for sports but this is kind of like a parlay But you're basically for the most part usually betting Races that are in succession like races seven eight nine and ten or races one two three and four In this case, pimlico has put together some races over the friday and saturday program So you're betting pick fours and pick fives that are transferring from the friday card Which is called black eyed susan So it's kind of the fillies get their chance to run for a similar type of prestige and money And then into the preakness card on saturday. I love a horse in race 13 on friday So i'm backing you up to friday here race over 13. This is the black eyed susan Which is the filly equivalent of the preakness. I like the four horse merlaza in that race So race 13 on friday the four horse her name is merlaza. She's three for four lifetime Brad cox trains her and I was watching all the replays from the fillies that are in the black eyed susan And as I kind of described mage is kind of gutty and gritty and a great competitor Merlaza has this insane kick on a dirt track, which you usually get that kind of acceleration from a turf horse She has the heart. She obviously has the record in the class But watching her last race man, she can pick it up in a minute And she's taking on tougher horses this weekend than she ever has But I think she has the ability so i'm going to start playing some of those crossover Sequences from friday to saturday and then anything that I can play on friday involving merlaza So that could be a double. I could play the double from race 13 to 14. I could play something into her I could use her in exact as she's for me. She's six to one on the morning line She's kind of the horse that I really am going to Center around to find some bets with some value getting back to national treasure I know he's four to one on the morning line, but I don't think he's going to be four to one plus 400 come post time in the Preakness, I think everybody's going to see the pace and I think the price on national treasure comes down I still think mage will be the favorite But I don't think national treasure will be quite as good of value as four to one Okay, so we're checking out merlaza the number four horse in race 13 on friday at pimlico That's the black eyed susan six to one on merlaza and then looking at national treasure four to one for the morning line There and likely going down on saturday That is christina blacker make sure you check her out and check out everybody over at fandall tv across this week and every week You can find christina on twitter as well at christina fd tv christina save travels have fun in baltimore this weekend Good luck to you and looking forward to talking to you once again about some more horse racing in the very near future Anytime i'm really excited to get there i'm working on some content today for fandall tv plus which is our app We have a lot of great selections on there. So myself the entire team that will be on site We have some kind of behind the veil content If you want to take a look at some other selections and picks on fandall tv plus Well the social content and the fandall tv plus content for the derby was great So looking forward to watching that this week as well christina. Thank you Have fun and looking forward to talking to you soon. Thanks. I appreciate it Alrighty check out again christina on twitter at christina fd tv And you can find a lot of her work over on the fandall socials as well at fandall Fandall racing as well to check out all the stuff christina has going for her this weekend That's correct things up here for today on covering the spread talking about the pregnant stakes We'll be back with you once again tomorrow. We're gonna talk about some mlb We'll talk about some nascar at north wilksboro as well nor from no formula one this week Because that race has been rained out in imola, but we'll talk more about some other kinds of racing Later on this week to get that as it is posted make sure you're subscribed to covering the spread wherever You get your podcast and check us out over on the fandall youtube page as well If you've got any questions for me. I am on twitter at uh jim sonnis j i m s a n n e s You can also follow the fandall podcast network at fandall podcast I want to thank you all for tuning in for today. Good luck to you with your bets of the pregnant stakes And uh for the friday races of pymlico as well. We'll talk to you once again later on this week This has been covering the spread right here on the fandall podcast network