Belmont Stakes (Grade 1)

TIZ The Law came into last week’s Belmont Stakes as the short-priced favourite on the back of impressive wins in the Holy Bull Stakes and Grade 1 Florida Derby.

And he justified the favourite tag in the same no-fuss fashion that he had won those two Gulfstream races.

The Belmont grandstand had twice in the last five years been packed with fans cheering home a Triple Crown winner and where a total of over 56,000 had seen Sir Winston win last year was eerily empty as Tiz The Law won the first leg of what was called a ‘back-to-front’ Triple Crown.

The Belmont, two weeks later than normal, was also reduced to nine furlongs and run in June, with the Kentucky Derby now moved to early September due to the Covid-19 pandemic which has hit New York severely.

New York governor Andrew Cuomo gave the ‘riders up’ call by video before the runners went on to the track to the playing on ‘New York, New York’

Racing in the colours of Sackatoga Stable, Tiz The Law, for whom manager Jack Knowlton had paid $110,000 in the Fasig-Tipton New York August Sale in 2018, is the first horse bred in New York state to win its signature race since Forester in 1882.

Sackatoga Stable, with different partners, also raced Funny Cide, who won the Kentucky Derby and Preakness 17 years ago for Tagg.

“It looked to me like everything went like clockwork,” Tagg said. Breaking well from stall eight of the 10 runners, the colt settled off the leaders and was always in the perfect position, just outside the leaders, to launch a challenge.

Moving to the front on the bend into the stretch, he was pushed out by jockey Manny Franco to pull away to a decisive three-and-three-quarter-length victory over Dr Post, in a time of 1m 46.53 secs.

Tiz The Law will have to overcome the longest time frame to compete in all legs of the Triple Crown, normally done in five weeks. It will be 105 days between last Saturday and October 3rd.

It was a huge triumph for Sackatoga Stable, who only campaign a few horses a year, and for veteran trainer Tagg, who went nine years without a Grade 1 win until Tiz The Law. With Belmont Park empty, Jack Knowlton watched the race with a group of partners from a restaurant in Saratoga Springs.

“It’s tremendous. We buy New York-breds – that’s our game – and we don’t spend a lot of money. We’ve been with Barclay Tagg for 25 years, and I keep telling everybody Barclay doesn’t get a lot of big horses, big opportunities, but when he does, he knows what to do.”

Tiz The Law’s earnings are now $1,133,300, second this year only behind the Pegasus World Cup winner Mucho Gusto. It was annoucned on Thursday that Coolmore had bought the breeding rights and he will stand at Ashford on retirement.

The colt came off a 12-week layoff from the Florida Derby and Knowlton believes Tagg can keep the son of Constitution and the Tiznow mare Tizfiz on the right track for the rest of the season.

“People were talking about the layoff, but he won eight weeks off and nine weeks off, and now he did it in 12. Barclay was brimming with confidence, which is unlike him, and ‘Tiz’ got the job done easily,” Knowlton said.

Tagg will now prepare the colt for the Travers in seven weeks at Saratoga after the horse came out of the Belmont in good shape. “He came out of the race great,” assistant trainer Robin Smullen said. “He ate up, and then he came out and grazed for an hour. His legs are good, his attitude and energy are good.”

“I’ve never won the Travers, and I want to win it,” Tagg said. “It’s very important to me.”

Todd Pletcher indicated the second, Dr Post, may next head to the Haskell Invitational Stakes on July 18th at Monmouth Park or the Travers. Linda Rice said of third-placed Max Player: “We’ll keep all the options open for now and sort it out when we get him back to the track in a week to 10 days.”