Significant tests await Mendelssohn.

Obstacles are everywhere this week at Churchill Downs. A stroll through the barn area just after sun up Wednesday morning revealed plenty – cars, golf carts, occasional people on bicycles, plenty more folks on foot, cats and even chickens dot the expanse of asphalt, concrete, cinderblock, wood and dirt.

The Kentucky Derby is only three days away now and it already feels like the first Saturday in May in Louisville. Horses come and go before the allotted 15-minute training window for Kentucky Oaks and Kentucky Derby horses.

Perhaps the only quiet spot on the grounds is Barn 17, the specified quarantine facility and temporary home to the Ballydoyle contingent led by Mendelssohn.

Mendelssohn, who drew post 14 and is the 5-1 early second choice for the Derby, hasn’t come out of Barn 17 since he arrived late Monday night and wasn’t expected to until clearing quarantine Wednesday afternoon. A yellow sign hangs on the concrete outside wall of the barn that reads: “Warning: Export Animal Facility. No admittance of unauthorized persons” and around the clock security keeps watch of anyone who might think of going in, whether they want to or not.

A uniformed guard, from the front seat of his navy blue Ford sedan, asked “do you need to go in the barn?” as I approached a representative from International Racehorse Transport and a member of O’Brien’s team just after 6:45am.

“No, just want to chat with these guys.”

“That’s good, because you can’t go in.”

Again, obstacles.

Threeandfourpence, Seahenge, Mendelssohn and Deauville all arrived safe in Kentucky

At 6:57am the call goes out of the loudspeaker that the track is closed for a harrow break.

“It will reopen at 7:30 for Derby and Oaks horses only,” the woman’s voice squawks a few seconds later.

Mendelssohn, Deauville, Seahenge and Threeandfourpence will go to the track tomorrow morning with O’Brien and jockey Ryan Moore on hand, most likely during that time according to John Lyons, one of the two men standing at the chain-link gate outside the barn, decked out in a blue and red “A.P. O’Brien hat” and a USDA-mandated white jump suit that looks like he should be on the bag at the Masters.

“Everything is well with them, good,” Lyons said, adding that the last 36 hours have been very quiet for the quartet. “It will be good when they’re (cleared from quarantine). They need to go out and have a stretch then.”

Two missed days of training could be perceived as an obstacle, if one wasn’t familiar with O’Brien’s success shipping from Ballydoyle to the U.S., England, France, Australia, Dubai, Hong Kong and beyond. He’s won 12 Breeders’ Cup races in the U.S., almost always shipping in the week of the race, spending a few days in quarantine and training just a day or two before race-day.

Mendelssohn did it last year, flying from Ireland to San Diego to win the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf. He’ll attempt to do it again, but the task this time is a bit more demanding going 10 furlongs on dirt in a field of 20.

“The break will be so important, for Mendelssohn and for Justify,” said trainer Mark Casse, who sent Tepin from the U.S. to win at Royal Ascot and sends out Flameaway in the Derby.

“Somebody said ‘what’s a great post?’ There’s no post that’s secure, not with a big field. The problem with those middle posts, you break a little slow and you’re in trouble. Those guys on the outside, they have one thing in mind and that’s saving ground and they will come over harder on you than anybody’s ever seen. When they do, it gets pretty ugly inside.

“For Mendelssohn, he was so impressive in Dubai but this is a different cup of tea. The pace is going to be hot and furious, so I don’t know. He’s got a world of pedigree, he’s got a world class trainer, so if anybody can do it, he can do it.”

Kiaran McLaughlin, who trains Godolphin’s Enticed and won the 2007 Dubai World Cup with Invasor and many other races outside the U.S., said the 20-horse field might be Mendelssohn’s biggest obstacle.

“Great organisation, Aidan O’Brien is a great trainer with a great team of people,” McLaughlin said. “He’s very well bred and did it the right way in Dubai, but it’s tough, 20-horse field, everything has to go his way but there’s no question he has the ability to pull it off. The travels, too. I always felt like you could do it because we’ve come from the World Cup and run back within six weeks successfully. He’s five weeks in between, I think it can be done. Obviously he went back to Ireland then Ireland to (the U.S.).

“He’s very talented horse and if he happens to win he might become the most valuable horse ever. Or at least in the modern era.”