CRAWFORD | The morning after Derby stunner, Rich Strike and team still basking in the glow

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) – They can't tell you it was just a dream if you never fall asleep. The sun rose brightly on Barn No. 17 at Churchill Downs Sunday morning, but it never set on the stunning Kentucky Derby victory of the evening before for 80-1 long shot Rich Strike, his trainer Eric Reed, or the team behind him.

"I haven't slept yet," Reed said Sunday. "I thought I would, but I couldn’t. But it's sinking in now. I'm so proud of this horse and all my guys. My jockey (Sonny Leon). It was a team effort from a long time ago. We were just trying to get here. It just went a step further than we ever could've dreamed. I don't know what to say other than it's an absolute miracle."

Reed said that Rich Strike came away from his second career victory well, had eaten well and shown no ill effects from the longest race of his career. If all continues to go well, he said he plans to take the colt to Pimlico.

In the meantime, Rich Strike headed back to Reed's Mercury Farm in Lexington later Sunday morning and will stay there at least a week, where Reed has a private training track.

The colt, led by groom Jerry Dixon Jr., walked the shed row then emerged from the barn alert and calm. Dixon soothed him with his hands.

Reed said one of the best things about getting to run in the Derby was a chance to give his entire barn team the experience of taking a colt over. It turns out, he gave them a lot more than that.

"I'm happy for my crew," he said. "Those guys have gone to the smallest tracks. They've worked in conditions after our accident and storm years ago that most people would have never wanted to do again. They put in the hard time without ever getting a pat on the back from anybody but myself. You know, we don't have the big horses that this happens to. So I was so proud when they got to make the walk yesterday. To me that fulfilled the bucket list for my gang, and they were going to get to make the walk that they watch everybody else do every year. And matter of fact, I told one of them, 'Look at that crowd. Usually, we're up there watching them. And this year, they're watching you.' So a lot of this was for them."

Dixon is a fourth generation horseman, and has worked for Reed for several years.

"He's slept, he'll get two shavings bags and he'll just sleep there," Reed said. "He wouldn't leave the horse. He deserves this. He's worked hard his whole life."

When Dixon wasn't tending to the horse, Sid Scott, Reed's retired assistant trainer, was holding him, whispering to him. Both men clearly have a way of calming the colt.

"Sid's an excellent horseman," Reed said. "When I was 18, got my license and I was in my first string of horses, he was working on the back side. They didn't pay him one Friday, and we were starving to death, and I said, 'Don't worry, you come to work for me.' And we're like best friends ever since. We learned this business together and cut our teeth together.

"I told him last night, 'I remember when we were in the Wildwood Motor Inn efficiency, and him sleeping on the floor, and every other day I would take the floor.' It was a gravity house, so when you walked, the foundation sloped, and we were falling over. I mean, we had a little mouse to eat the m&m's off the countertop. You know, we had baloney and peanut butter. And now here we are."

The question now is, how far can Rich Strike take them?

"He ate all his dinner," Reed said. "And he was bright-eyed last night after the race when I got over here, finally. He was in there eating and everybody was still having a great time. And he seems really good this morning. So we'll see how he is the next day or two. But every time we've run him he's gained weight after a race. So I know we've never gotten to the bottom of him, and watching how he went after that pony after the race, I don't think we got to the bottom of him yesterday, either."

A good many people, particularly those who don't work much with horses or who don't watch a lot of horse racing, didn't understand a Churchill Downs outrider's rough actions with Rich Strike as he tried to bring him under control after the race, but may not have seen him biting at the neck of the outrider's pony (and he did, indeed, cut the horse.) Churchill's outriders have saved countless horses over the years, and in a case like one on Saturday, sometimes have to get physical to sort the animals out to keep them from hurting themselves or another horse.

Either way, Reed said Rich Strike isn't an aggressive animal by nature. But he has developed a competitiveness over his past couple of races.

"Yeah, he's a kind horse," Reed said. "And I just think, you know, he learned the killer instinct two races ago. Sonny got off him and told me, 'He's got the fire now. He wants to run them down or run over them.' And I think when that race (the Derby) was over, he saw the pony and thought he had another horse to beat and when that guy grabbed him, he was like, 'I'm supposed to run by you let me go.' Yeah, I don't think he meant it the way that some people thought, like being aggressive. I think he was just clicking and needed to outrun that one too."

Reed said he had watched the replay of Saturday's race only twice, and didn't hear a race call of it until midnight or so. Upon review, he gave credit to Leon, who rode him perfectly in a race that needed to go perfectly for him to win.

"He trained good enough to win that race all week long," Reed said. "We didn't think that was going to happen, but we knew if it did that we wouldn't be shocked – well, we would be shocked . . . Everything went right for him to win. It was a crazy pace. Then at the quarter pole the waters parted for him to get through, then he just had to get by that one horse in the middle of the stretch and Sonny rode him like he has ridden him every race, he was patient. He knew that to get any piece of it he had to save ground. I saw the move at the quarter pole and I told my father, actually, 'That might get us on the board.' And in deep stretch, I said, 'Oh my gosh.' And I fell down. I didn't see him hit the finish line. . . . It was a great ride by Sonny, and it had to go that way."

Reed, as you might expect, spent the night responding to congratulations from everywhere. Calumet Farm, which bred the colt and owned him until Dawson and Reed claimed him, reached out.

"All my friends drank a whole lot. I didn't. I don't drink," Reed said. "But I said a little prayer. Got a lot of nice texts from my children. You know, my wife (Kay), she's my secret weapon and back there at the barn. She doesn't like the press so she hid from you all yesterday after the race. And she's at the farm with the other hundred horses right now making sure they're getting fed and taken care of and working her tail off. I didn't give her enough credit yesterday, but I didn't have a chance to so i want to make sure she gets some credit today."

And now it's off to Pimlico and the Preakness. Reed said he likes to go slowly with his horses. He works them maybe every 12 days or so, instead of every week. He generally wouldn't run him back in two weeks, but that's the Triple Crown schedule, and he and owner Rick Dawson intend to stick to it. They have briefly talked strategy. They originally thought they'd look at the Belmont Stakes, thinking the mile and a half would suit their colt. Now they have an extra date, in Baltimore.

Reed said he has never raced at Pimlico, never even been there. He has about 100 horses at his Mercury Farm and Training Center in Lexington and more in Ohio. They primarily ship out and race in six states.

"I don't like running quick," Reed said. "This will be the first time we've had to do that if this is where it goes. But that's why he's been so fresh and getting better each race. We haven't we haven't pushed on him. I don't get these horses, 10 or 12 in your life, I get one in a lifetime so I've got to protect him. I'd like him to be here in a couple of years and not just have a few races and have something go wrong."

But Reed said the Preakness will be the plan.

"Absolutely. Should be that way," Reed said. ". . . So we'll make the call, but that's probably what we'll do."

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