Coming off an eight-week break, the Brad Cox-trained Tappan Street, with Luis Saez in the irons, took command of the Florida Derby in the last furlong and never let go. Breezing with dispatch around the speedy Neoequos and Madaket Road, who had been a pacesetters up the backstretch, Tappan Street took his almost electrically precise stride well outside the fading duelists to lay down his burst of power. He hit the wire going away by a length-and-a-quarter with a time of 1:49:27 over the mile-and-an-eighth. Coming off an eight-week break, he was fresh, to say the very least, and at 2-1, paid $6.80 on a $2 bet.

After he, too, rounded Neoequos and Madaket Road, the deep-closing top favorite Sovereignty, who went off at 8-5, made a game bid at Tappan Street but discovered that he’d left himself what the British trainers call “too much to do” to get by the victor. The line was upon him; he flashed through it in place.

Needless to say, trainer Cox was pleased with his newly-minted Derby prospect, but remained tightly focused on the mechanical realities of the run.

Noting the far-outside post position from the 9-hole, Cox told the press: “When you give ’em nearly, I guess, what, eight weeks between starts, there’s always a concern. ‘Does he know enough?’ But he’s a very smart horse, he’s intelligent. I felt he would break very, very well today, just the way he has been training. And he did. I think that put him in the race and really put him in a great position.”

As for Sovereignty’s deep closing style both in his prior win in the Fountain of Youth and in Saturday’s race, trainer Bill Mott, ever the open book, said this before the race: “I think we had a good draw the last time (in the Fountain of Youth) that helped him win. As narrow as the margin of victory was, the post helped him because he was able to save some ground around the first turn.”

With his outside post position, Sovereignty didn’t lose much ground in the longer Florida Derby, but neither did he do anything different than attempt his ordinary deep close. But his last week was four weeks back, as opposed to Tappan Street’s eight, and the trackside chatter was that he wasn’t as much on his game. When it came Sovereignty’s moment to pounce on the frontrunners, the pounce sufficed to put away Madaket Road and Neoequos, as his 8-5 odds would declare that he well should have. But the effort wasn’t nearly enough to get past Tappan Street’s vastly superior last-furlong kick.

The Florida Derby functioned entirely as it should have as a major Kentucky Derby prep, distilling and simultaneously refining the top talent. Noting the eight weeks of rest that Tappan Street had, Winstar Farm’s CEO Elliott Walden, who knows a thing or two about racehorses, said after the race: “I thought (Tappan Street was) traveling better. But Sovereignty’s a very good horse. He’s going to be a tough foe at a mile-and-a- quarter. (Tappan Street) had eight weeks, (Sovereignty) had four weeks. We’re on even ground now, (the Derby) will be a good race.”

Tappan Street’s jockey Luis Saez was more ebullient, having just finished riding his rocket minutes before. “I saw (Sovereignty) and I let my horse go a little bit more,” Saez said, “and he gave me a good turn of foot. When he came to the top of the stretch, I knew (we were) going to be tough to catch.”