Justify is horse racing’s 13th Triple Crown winner after winning the Belmont Stakes. It is the second time in four years that a horse has won the Triple Crown. American Pharaoh accomplished the feat in 2015.

Gronkowski, the horse named after New England Patriots tight end Rob Gronkowski finished second behind Justify.

Here is the Twitter reaction following the Triple Crown victory: </s> Justify led all the way to win the Belmont Stakes by 1 3/4 lengths Saturday and become horse racing's 13th Triple Crown champion and second in four years.

The chestnut colt is the second undefeated colt to sweep the Kentucky Derby, Preakness and Belmont, improving to 6-0 in a racing career that began on Feb. 18. Seattle Slew was unbeaten when he won the Triple Crown in 1977.

Sent off as the 4-5 favorite, Justify went to the lead out of the starting gate and led nine rivals around the track's sweeping turns on Saturday. He's the first Triple Crown winner to face that many rivals in the 1f-mile Belmont.

Bob Baffert became the second trainer to win the Triple Crown twice. He did so with American Pharoah in 2015, ending a 37-year Triple Crown drought.

At 52, Mike Smith is the oldest jockey to win the Triple Crown. </s> UPDATE: Justify wins the Belmont Stakes to become 13th Triple Crown winner and second in four years.

Only 12 thoroughbreds have achieved the feat in the past century, but Justify’s rivals are already conceding it will take a minor miracle to stop him winning the most coveted prize in horse racing.

At this weekend’s Belmont Stakes on Long Island, the 150th anniversary of the New York race, Justify has the chance to join the exclusive stable of Triple Crown winners after triumphs at the Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes earlier this year.

The chestnut colt would become just the second horse to win the esteemed Triple Crown since 1978, with the great American Pharoah the most recent to complete the sweep in 2015.

Justify will run from the rail after drawing the unfancied No. 1 post — one trainer Bob Baffert always likes to avoid — but it will take more than that to stop him.

“I think, like all of us, we need Justify to wake up on the wrong side of the bed to have a chance,” said Todd Pletcher, trainer of fellow starters Vino Rosso and Noble Indy.

While American Pharoah charged to glory from post five, past Triple Crown winners from No. 1 include Citation (1948), Assault (1946), Gallant Fox (1930) and Sir Barton (1919).

For Baffert, victory for Justify would see him become the second trainer ever to have two Triple Crown horses to his name.

READ: Meet the tallest, and shortest, horses in the world

“This horse is starting to act like Pharoah,” said Baffert of Justify, which recently became the first Derby winner in 136 years that did not to race as a two-year-old.

“I think I see a lot of resemblance in these two, the way they move … When I worked him after the Preakness, American Pharoah, when he would breathe, he was like he was a machine. And this horse is getting there.”

The story so far

Justify, ridden by 52-year-old Mike Smith, won a rain-soaked Kentucky Derby ahead of Good Magic in May, before handing Baffert a record-equaling 14th race win in the second of the three Triple Crown events at the Preakness just two weeks later.

READ: What is the Triple Crown?

While each of the three races date back to the second half of the nineteenth century, the concept of the Triple Crown wasn’t conceived until several decades later.

Gallant Fox became the first horse to popularize the term with his success in 1930, although it was Sir Barton in 1919 that first won the three races in the same year.

American Pharoah’s 2015 victory put an end to a 37-year Triple Crown drought — a period that saw 13 horses fall short at the Belmont.

Visit cnn.com/winningpost for more news and videos

Smith and Justify, however, are hot favorites to win in New York on Saturday and write their names into racing’s history books. </s> (Reuters) - Justify won the Belmont Stakes in New York on Saturday to claim U.S. thoroughbred racing's Triple Crown, becoming just the second horse to achieve the feat since 1978 and the 13th overall.

The favored three-year-old chestnut colt was barely pushed as he completed the 1-1/2 mile (12-furlong) course in a wire-to-wire win in overcast but dry conditions at Belmont Park in Elmont, New York.

The victory marks the second Triple Crown win for Hall of Fame trainer Bob Baffert, who also won the Kentucky Derby, Preakness Stakes and Belmont Stakes with American Pharoah in 2015.

The large and muscular Justify, owned by China Horse Club, Head of Plains Partners, Starlight Racing & WinStar Farm, was ridden to victory by veteran jockey Mike Smith.

At 52, Smith is the oldest jockey to ever win the Triple Crown.

Saturday's race, the 150th running of the Belmont Stakes, marked the fifth time Baffert came to Belmont with a shot at the Triple Crown. </s> ELMONT, N.Y. – It was Justify’s moment, after all.

In a withering display of power and durability, the late-blooming colt who didn’t race as a 2-year-old proved Saturday he couldn’t be worn out as a 3-year-old, thundering to victory in the Belmont Stakes to claim a place in history as the sport’s 13th Triple Crown champion.

After a 37-year drought in which the feat seemed impossible, Justify became the second horse in four years to achieve it, schooled, like his 2015 predecessor American Pharoah, by Hall of Fame trainer Bob Baffert.

Justify was bred in Kentucky by Langley, B.C.-based breeder John Gunther, who splits his time between B.C. and Kentucky.

Before Saturday’s Belmont Stakes, which Justify won by 1 3/4 lengths over surprise second-place finisher Gronkowski, the massive chestnut colt with the white blaze had won the Kentucky Derby by a 2 1/2-length margin, becoming the first since Apollo in 1882 to win the classic without running as a 2-year-old. Two weeks later, Justify weathered torrential rain and a blanket of fog to win the Preakness Stakes, setting himself up for the Triple Crown bid.

All that remained was to prove that he had the toughness and resolve to conquer the longest, most grueling leg of the Triple Crown – the Belmont Stakes. On Saturday, Justify did just that before a rapturous crowd of 90,327, leading wire-to-wire to cover the 1 1/2-mile distance in 2:28.18 with Hall of Fame jockey Mike Smith aboard. And he did it in the fading moments of a sun-splashed afternoon with a show of versatility, mastering a dry, fast track that represented a far different test than the slop he’d slogged through at Churchill Downs and Pimlico Race Course.

Justify’s dominance in a 10-horse field that included Preakness runner-up Bravazo and Derby horses Hofburg (who finished third), Vino Rosso and Free Drop Billy moved Baffert to tears afterward, as his thoughts turned to his late parents and friends he has lost, convinced they’ve somehow been helping him these last years.

With Saturday’s triumph, Baffert, 65, became only the second trainer to win two Triple Crowns (along with the late James “Sunny Jim” Fitzsimmons, whose triumphs came in 1930 and ’35, with Gallant Fox and Omaha, respectively). He also pulled ahead of longtime friend and rival trainer Wayne Lukas, 82, to claim a record 15 wins in Triple Crown races (five Kentucky Derbys, seven Preakness Stakes and three Belmont Stakes). But Baffert was far more interested afterward in speaking about how fitting and satisfying it felt to help Justify place his name alongside champions such as Secretariat, who’d claimed his Triple Crown 45 years to the day earlier, winning the Belmont by a record 31 lengths, in a record 2:24.

“The great ones, they just find another gear,” Baffert said of Justify, who improved to 6-0 and joined Seattle Slew as the only horse to claim the Triple Crown with an unbeaten record. “He is a magnificent animal.”

Smith, 52, the oldest jockey to win a Triple Crown, gave all credit to Justify, noting that all he had done was “let a good horse be a good horse.”

“This horse ran a tremendous race,” Smith said. “He is so gifted. He is sent from heaven, I tell you.”

Like “Big Red,” as Secretariat was lovingly called, Justify (an even bigger “Big Red,” at 16.3 hands and 1,380 pounds, compared to a typical 1,100-pound thoroughbred), drew the No. 1 post. While it served Secretariat well, it posed a concern for Baffert, who worried his muscular colt might get pinned against the rail if he didn’t break well.

The first horse to load in the gate, Justify stayed so still and steady as the other nine followed suit that Smith worried for a moment that he might not break at all. But he shot out with a fury, took a 1 1/2-length lead at the quarter pole and never let a challenger get closer than that.

Justify wore different silks than he sported in the Derby under a previous agreement among his four-way ownership group, swapping Winstar Farm’s white and green for China Horse Club International’s red with yellow stars. Baffert had joked earlier in the week that, with luck, the jockeys who had their sights set on beating Justify might get confused by the change.

No chance. Between his imposing size and glistening chestnut coat, Justify is difficult to overlook, particularly with his muscular hind legs propelling him forward.

Behind him horses diced for position. The lightly regarded Gronkowski, dead last through the first half-mile, fittingly played the role of lead disrupter. With real-life New England Patriot tight end Rob Gronkowski screaming in the stands, his namesake colt surged to third at the 1 ¼-mile mark then unseated Vino Rosso for second as the field turned for home.

Smith, with two previous Belmont Stakes victories to his credit, kept it simple, sensing the power in the competitor beneath him. He took his hand away to give Justify a periodic breath, then gave him a squeeze when he wanted more.

“He listens to you–to everything I do,” Smith said afterward.

And on they thundered, with the front-running jockey keeping the red-and-yellow silks clean as the other horses got caked in dirt.

“Once they turned toward home, I felt at that point he’d hold anybody off who was coming,” Smith said.

In the winner’s circle afterward, the deafening cheers and applause weren’t simply a reward; they were vindication.

When skeptics questioned his audacious ambitions for the late-developing colt, Baffert said Justify was talented enough to win the Kentucky Derby with minimal experience. And when they questioned Justify’s grueling workload – five races in a three-month span, with the Belmont his sixth in less than four months – Baffert said his horse was tough enough to handle it.

On this afternoon, they had each other’s backs. Horse racing’s defiant ones proved they were hostage to no timetable but their own. </s> Bob Baffert is the only trainer to have two Triple Crown winners in his stable.

 Saturday, undefeated Justify went wire to wire to win the 150th Belmont Stakes in New York and even bigger, he

 is the 13th horse to win the Triple Crown…horse racing’s highest honor.

 51 year old jockey hall-of-famer Mike Smith rode the talented horse to victory.

The post Justify Wins 150th Belmont, Triple Crown appeared first on 850 WFTL. </s> First the rain, then the fog and finally the greatness.

Hooked in a nose-to-nose duel all the way around the track with his primary rival Good Magic, Kentucky Derby winner Justify held on to win the 143rd Preakness on Saturday and will head to the Belmont Stakes on June 9 with a chance to become horse racing’s 13th Triple Crown winner.

Unlike his romp through the Derby, Justify had to gut this one out in the slop, finally putting away from Good Magic in deep stretch but also having to hold off Bravazo, who charged late but came up a neck short. Tenfold was a fast-closing third.

Trainer Bob Baffert, who also trained 2015 Triple Crown winner American Pharoah, won his 14th classic race, tying D. Wayne Lukas for most all-time.

Justify #7 ridden by jockey Mike Smith wins the 143rd running of the Preakness Stakes at Pimlico Race Course on May 19, 2018 in Baltimore, Maryland.

All week, the race shaped up as a coronation for Justify, who won the Kentucky Derby by a convincing 2 1/2 lengths and drew immediate comparisons to the likes of American Pharoah and Seattle Slew, the only horse to win the Triple Crown with an undefeated record.

That Justify, a unique physical specimen with blazing early speed, was able to win the Derby at all off just three career races in 77 days, was not only an impressive training feat by Baffert but a testament to the horse’s immense talent.

And for many bettors, who made Justify a massive 2-to-5 favorite at post time, there was an air of expectation that Justify would likely duplicate that effort in the Preakness against a smaller field and head to Belmont with a chance to win the Triple Crown, just as Baffert’s four previous Kentucky Derby winners had done.

But there were two big questions Justify had to answer at Pimlico. The first was whether a heel bruise that surfaced after the Derby was indeed a non-issue, as Baffert consistently maintained, or perhaps that kind of small physical problem that gets magnified under the grueling Triple Crown schedule. The second issue was whether Justify’s form might simply regress running for the fifth time in a 91-day span, a fairly heavy workload for horses in the modern era.

Those possibilities inspired trainer Chad Brown to give Good Magic another chance after he ran a solid second in the Derby and for D. Wayne Lukas to believe Bravazo, after a troubled sixth in Louisville, could possibly serve as a spoiler in a smaller field. And, as always, the Preakness attracted some Triple Crown newcomers like Quip and Tenfold to see how they stacked up against a Derby winner.

Justify #7 ridden by jockey Mike Smith wins the 143rd running of the Preakness Stakes at Pimlico Race Course on May 19, 2018 in Baltimore, Maryland.

Much like the Kentucky Derby two weeks ago, the Preakness was a dripping wet mess. A seemingly never-ending storm front dumped rain over the area for five straight days, which are particularly challenging conditions at a place like Pimlico, which is 143 years old and now the focus of a fight between its owners and the state of Maryland about whether the race will be moved to a more modern track just south of Baltimore or whether the local government will step up and spend hundreds of millions to rebuild Pimlico.

“We’ve got leaks everywhere, people sitting at tables and tiles falling out,” said Tim Ritvo, chief operating officer for the Stronach Group, which owns the track. “It’s a struggle like that because it’s important to us that the customer has a great experience, and it’s hard to do that in this facility.”

Still, the track said 134,487 people showed up Saturday, many of whom seemed to be enjoying the mosh pit of mud and modern music emanating from the infield without any regard for the racing conditions, which were awful.

The track was so wet, Pimlico was forced to move five of the six scheduled grass races Saturday to dirt and worked around-the-clock in the days leading up to the Preakness to drain water off the course so that it wouldn’t pool along the rail. Then, when the rain finally lifted on Saturday afternoon, it left a heavy fog in its place that made it practically impossible for fans to see the backstretch.

When the horses finally emerged into view, Justify had been through a full mile of a head-to-head duel with Good Magic, a battle that clearly tired both horses. Still, Justify had enough to win -- and now stands just 1 1/2 miles away from history. </s> (CNN) — Race favorite Justify, ridden by Mike Smith, won the 144th Kentucky Derby on a sloppy track at Louisville’s Churchill Downs on Saturday.

Justify is trained by Bob Baffert, who now has five Derby wins.

Good Magic finished second, just ahead of Audible.

The race was the wettest in the event’s history as more than 2.8 inches of rain fell Saturday.

Justify broke from the No. 7 post well, ran to the front with Promises Fulfilled and pulled away just as the horses passed the 3/4 mile marker in the 1-1/4 mile race.

The next race in the Triple Crown series is May 19 — the Preakness Stakes at Pimlico Race Course in Baltimore. The Belmont Stakes in Elmont, New York, is June 9 at Belmont Park. </s> BALTIMORE, Md. (CNN) — Justify, trained by Bob Baffert, won the Preakness Stakes on Saturday (May 19), capturing the second event in horse racing’s Triple Crown.

Baffert has won 14 Triple Crown races, tied for most with D. Wayne Lukas. Seven of those wins are at the Preakness.

Justify was tested by Kentucky Derby runner-up Good Magic for most of the race. But Justify took a short lead coming down the home stretch and held off hard-charging Bravazo, who finished second, and Tenfold, who was third.

“That was a nail-biter. … I’m so happy that we got it done,” Baffert told broadcaster NBC. “He’s just a great horse, to handle all that pressure and keep on running.”

Jockey Mike Smith, 52, became the oldest jockey to win the Preakness. He admitted his horse grew fatigued by the battle with Good Magic.

“He got a little tired. This was his hardest race that he’s had,” Smith said.

At 1 3/16 miles, the Preakness is slightly shorter than the Kentucky Derby, and Bravazo and Tenfold, both of which skipped the race two weeks ago, almost caught Justify at the end.

Heavy fog made it difficult for the TV audience and the 134,487 spectators at Pimlico Race Course in Baltimore to see parts of the race.

The final leg of the Triple Crown is the Belmont Stakes on June 9 in Elmont, New York. With a win at the Belmont, Justify would become the 13th horse to capture the Triple Crown. American Pharoah, also trained by Baffert, is the last horse to accomplish the feat, in 2015.

Justify has won all five stakes races he has run.
Justify wins the Belmont Stakes and becomes the second horse in four years to win the U.S. Triple Crown of Thoroughbred Racing.