Angel of Empire Cements Himself as Front-Runner for Brad Cox Barn

After his performance in the Risen Star, Angel of Empire left no reason to believe that he would do anything other than improve heading into the Arkansas Derby and boy did he ever. Despite that impressive Risen Star, Angel of Empire ended up being the 4th betting choice on the board at 9/2 come post time. Jockey Flavien Prat sat middle of the pack with a stalking trip on this colt and pounced at the opportunity to run into a relatively timid pace coming around the final turn. In the end, the Brad Cox trainee won going away by at least 3 lengths over a closing #9 King Russel at a massive 58/1!!!! (Talk about screwing up my $10 exacta with AoE on top)

The other favorites in this race didn’t show anything overly impressive. Reincarnate (3/1) and Rocket Can (5/2) finished 3rd and 4th respectively. As it currently stands, both of those horses are in the field for the Derby but they would both have to take a massive step forward to compete in the 20-horse field. The same can be said for Jace’s Road who was somewhat of a no-show in this spot at 3/1 and got caught in a lot of traffic. Most experts don’t believe that Angel of Empire has what it takes to win the KY Derby, but I’m not ready to completely throw him out just yet.

Check out the Decadent & Depraved Podcast to hear all of our picks, insight and analysis of the races ahead this weekend. Check back to KyDerbyTrail.com for our picks before race time Saturday. Best of luck to everyone betting this weekend. Lets cash some tickets!!!!