The Florida Derby win by Quality Road was something of a total letdown perfomance to me. He should have killed that field. While still a very good performance - I think issues with his feet might have had a bit of a negative impact on him that day. Or maybe he just wasn't as sharp in his first try around two turns.
By far and away the most underappreciated performance by any male horse last year (and almost certainly the best by any male) was Quality Road's Fountain Of Youth win where he pressed This One's For Phil through punishing fractions .. and still drew away from a very good field in the stretch run to win with an absolutely giant pace and final figure.
People just don't appreciate how wicked the fractions were in that race because of the run-up issues at GP going 1 mile. I realize it was This One's For Phil who set them and Quality Road who stalked them .. but still.
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