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86 LOUISVILLE MAGAZINE 4.17 that will qualify a field of 20 for the Derby. It's the run-up to the Run for the Roses, and it is something almost as special as the race itself. And before you ask, the answer is: Yes. Moss knows not to get his hopes up too high. He knows so much can go right one day, then so wrong the next. In fact, just a couple days later, one of his two Derby candidates, Gormley, will run a distant fourth in the San Felipe Stakes, an import- ant prep race. ings can unravel quickly. e winner of that race, Mastery, trained by four-time Kentucky Derby winner Bob Baffert, won striding away, looking every bit the horse to beat in the Kentucky Derby. But Mastery pulled up seconds later with a leg injury that knocked it out of the Derby picture. But Moss knows it can all come true, too. He's won the Kentucky Derby. He and his wife Ann got the blanket of roses in 2005 when Giacomo came home first at 50-1. at's the nature of springtime in the horse-racing game, when hope most cer- tainly springs eternal. When April showers bring May flowers, and horses just turning three years old suddenly may make great physical — and mental — advances. And should a precocious young oroughbred throw in a clunker, it also might bounce back to win its next race to keep the dream alive. Moss' horse Gormley, though starched in March, will run again in April in the Santa Anita Derby. And Moss' other horse, Royal Mo, is headed to Oaklawn Park, in Hot Springs, Arkansas, to try the Arkansas Derby path to Louisville — a route most recently perfected by American Pharoah, the 2015 Triple Crown winner. Meanwhile, all the way across the country in Miami, they're dream- ing Derby dreams at the barn of trainer Antonio Sano. ere's a handsome chestnut horse there named Gunnevera that's putting a spring in the trainer's step. Sano has 60-some horses under his care, but as he walks the shedrow of his barn at Gulfstream Park West (the former Calder Racecourse), he pauses for a second to pat Gunnevera on his forehead. "My Derby horse," Sano says. "He's been saying that since the day he picked the horse out for the owners," says the trainer's son, 19-year-old Alex Sano. "Even when he ran second in his first race, then fourth, he was calling Gunnevera his Derby horse. We said, 'Dad, couldn't you at least let him win a race first before you go calling him your Derby horse?' But that didn't stop him." en Gunnevera did win a race, and soon Sano was sending Gunnevera north in Au- gust to face the blue-blooded two-year-olds at Saratoga, where all the best horses, and their best people, go to summer. Gunnevera entered the Saratoga Special and came out of the gate fifth in a field of five — and last by a country mile. He was so far back that in the pan shot on the split-screen TV he wasn't even in the picture. Everyone in the Gunnevera camp was there — the three partners in Peacock Racing Stables and all of Antonio Sano's family. All were stunned. "We were wondering, what's happening? He's so far behind," Alex Sano says. A little concerned for the horse. And maybe a little concerned, as well, for Dad's reputation. Maybe the horse didn't belong at fabled Saratoga. But then jockey Javier Castellano let out a notch on the reins and Gunnevera took off like a rocket. e horse caught up with the field and rolled right on past, drawing away at the end. An easy winner. And, maybe, a horse with a chance to be a Derby horse. ere are really two parts to becoming a Derby horse. e first: simply qualifying to get into the race. e Kentucky Derby is so pop- ular with horse owners that, since 2013, Churchill Downs has used a points system, tied to the most prominent prep races, to determine the race's 20-horse field (and hopefully to draw more eyes to those prep races). e points increase as the prep race season climaxes coming into April, with the Florida Derby, Louisiana Derby, Wood Memorial, Santa Anita Derby, Arkansas Derby and the Blue Grass Stakes. ere is a big points race in Dubai for European and Middle Eastern horses. And for the first time this year, a starting spot is reserved for the leading three-year-old in Japan, a winner of the Hyacinth Stakes named Epicharis. (In the past, earnings determined the Derby field.) is year, 413 horses were early nom- inees for the Triple Crown races (Derby, Preakness and Belmont). Some of those are vanity entries, to be sure, but there are plenty of well-considered horses on the list. e points system is pretty straightforward, if not very romantic. It's meant to cap the Derby field at 20 in a fair way. e biggest stables with the most Derby contenders ship horses here and there in search of points. Most of the premiere preps are run about the same time, so a trainer may dispatch one to Kentucky, another to New York, etc., to try to grab several starting-gate spots for the Derby. e current leading proponent of that is trainer Todd Pletcher, who has started as many as five horses in the Kentucky Derby. But it is nothing novel. D. Wayne Lukas had five in 1996, the year he won with Grindstone. e Jones boys of Calumet Farm, Plain Ben and son Jimmy, kept Citation and Coaltown separated until Derby Day 1948, then finished first and second with them. Further back, horse owner Colonel E.R. Bradley ran one-two in the 1921 Derby, and Harry Payne Whitney ran three-four in a 12-horse field. Didn't leave much for the other fellas. But the second half of the equation — the hard part — is coming up with a horse good enough to run in the world's most famous race. And fine-tuning it to peak for the Kentucky Derby. at's the Race to the Greatest Race. People have spent lifetimes in the quest. Wealthy owners have blown millions devel- About 30,000 Thoroughbreds are foaled each year in North America, with many thousands more registered overseas. All of those are eligible to run in the Kentucky Derby at the age of three. But only one will win.