Mage’s Kentucky Derby win: A salve for horse racing’s wounds
LOUISVILLE — At nineteen minutes past seven on Saturday evening, under pale clouds with a thick spring wind brushing past, two men in green golf shirts and khaki trucker hats tossed a blanket of roses across the withers of Mage, a three-year-old chestnut colt who had won the 149th Kentucky Derby at 15-1 odds in just the fourth start of his life. The garland weighs about 40 pounds, more than one might expect from a strip of ceremonial blossoms, but that’s just the flowers, and doesn’t include the weight of racing’s reputation, which comes tethered to this moment every year on the first Saturday in May. The Derby usually proves itself a sturdy foundation upon which a sport wobbles and remains (mostly) upright, regardless of the weight. This year it was an especially heavy lift.
