Bob Baffert horse euthanized on track ahead of Preakness Stakes

Bob Baffert’s return to the Triple Crown stage after a two-year suspension was marred on Saturday when one of his horses was euthanized on the track after going down with an injury on the Preakness undercard.

Havnameltdown, a three-year-old black colt who went off as the favorite in the $200,000 Chick Lang Stakes, broke down on the second turn and threw jockey Luis Saez off his back before continuing to run down the stretch.

He was corralled by veterinary staff and put down shortly after, a grim scene that played out as Lil Jon’s Get Low played at ear-splitting volumes from a concert stage only a few hundred feet away in the infield.

“He sustained a really severe injury of his left front ankle,” track veterinarian Scott Hay said. “It was basically impossible to transport him and they had to euthanize him humanely on the grounds immediately.”

Saez, one of the leading jockeys in the US, was stretchered off the dirt course and taken to a nearby hospital for evaluation, where track officials said he was conscious with full movement of his extremities but complaining of leg pain.

The Chick Lang was the sixth race on a 14-race card headlined laster Saturday by the $1.65m Preakness Stakes, the middle jewel of thoroughbred racing’s Triple Crown and one of the few days when the sport attracts mainstream attention in the US.

The fatality comes only two weeks after the Kentucky Derby was overshadowed by the deaths of seven horses at Churchill Downs in a 10-day span, including two on the day of the race.

Baffert is back in the spotlight following a two-year ban from Churchill Downs stemming from the Medina Spirit’s stripped win at the 2021 Kentucky Derby after testing positive for betamethasone, a corticosteroid. Medina Spirit died