Known Agenda wins Florida Derby, gives Panthers owner another Kentucky Derby shot

Vinnie Viola has fared better with his horses than he has with his hockey team.

The owner of the Florida Panthers has never sniffed a Stanley Cup title. But Viola won the Kentucky Derby with one of his horses — Always Dreaming in 2017 — and is now taking aim at another with Known Agenda.

The 3-year-old colt stated his case Saturday with a powerful 2 3/4-length win in the Florida Derby at Gulfstream Park.

“It’s unbelievable,” Viola said after Known Agenda and star jockey Irad Ortiz Jr. put away the field to win Florida’s top racing event, historically a major springboard to the Kentucky Derby. “How does it feel? You feel undeserving, quite frankly.”

The victory for trainer Todd Pletcher was a record sixth in the Florida Derby and his fifth in the past eight runnings.

The Kentucky Derby on May 1 is the likely next step for Known Agenda.

“That’s certainly the hope,” Pletcher said. “He certainly stamped his ticket today. The one exciting thing about him is that we felt distance is not an issue with him, and we feel that [the Kentucky Derby distance] mile and a quarter is right in his wheelhouse.”

Going into Saturday’s $750,000 race, Voila wasn’t convinced that Known Agenda belonged with the kind of horses he would end up facing in the Florida Derby. After all, Known Agenda had failed to distinguish himself in his two previous stakes races.

“I don’t know how many times I’ve asked [Pletcher] in the last week or two, ‘Do you think we really have a shot in the Florida Derby?’ ” Viola said.

Viola figured they would be better off sending the horse out to California in the Santa Anita Derby, another key Kentucky Derby prep.

But Pletcher convinced Viola the colt should remain in Florida, especially after watching him roll to a scintillating, throttled-down 11-length romp at Gulfstream in an allowance tuneup on Feb. 26. That race, while against weaker horses than the ones he faced Saturday, was at the 1 1/8-mile distance of the Florida Derby.

If not for Pletcher, Viola said, “this horse would be on a plane to California to run in the Santa Anita Derby. I didn’t think he was quite up to this level of performance.”

And then, as he watched Ortiz take the horse off the rail, wheel him outside, and surge past Soup and Sandwich, Viola knew they had made the right call. Known Agenda, the third wagering choice at 5-1 in the field of 11, was in command to the wire.

“I was like, I don’t believe this is happening,” Viola said, whose St. Elias Stable not only owns the colt, but bred him, as well.

The only question that remained when Known Agenda ranged up alongside lightly regarded Soup and Sandwich to put himself in contention was whether the 4-5 favorite, Greatest Honour, would mount his patented stretch run to overtake them all.

It didn’t happen.

Greatest Honour, who had won both the Holy Bull and Fountain of Youth Stakes earlier in the Gulfstream season, never seriously threatened and finished third.

“I thought he ran fine,” said Shug McGaughey, trainer of Greatest Honour, who finished nearly sixth lengths behind Known Agenda. “The winner ran a huge race.”

McGaughey said Greatest Honour was still a candidate for the Kentucky Derby.

“As of right now, yeah,” McGaughey said. “We’ll pack up and make sure he’s OK and move forward. He belongs.”

Mark Casse, trainer of Soup and Sandwich, said his colt is also likely headed to Kentucky.

Collaborate, who entered the Florida Derby with some fanfare and was sent off Saturday as the second choice at 9-2, finished fifth and will not be going.

He doesn’t have enough qualifying points to enter the Kentucky Derby and his trainer, Saffie Joseph Jr., said he did nothing Saturday to merit the trip even if he did.

“It’s disappointing,” Joseph said. “Basically, from the quarter pole, he looked like he was spent. But there are better days ahead.”

With the win, Ortiz broke the track record for most riding victories at a Gulfstream meet. The Florida Derby was his 138th win since the meet started. The meet ends Sunday.

“It means a lot,” Ortiz said. “The Derby is the biggest race we run here. It’s nice that I win the meet and I win that race, too.”