Golden Tempo’s shocking Derby win

A 30-to-1 longshot, a trainer who publicly said this was her life’s goal, two brothers on competing horses, and a finish line nobody saw coming. Here’s everything you need to know.

The race nobody expected

When the gates opened at Churchill Downs on May 2, Golden Tempo was not in anyone’s conversation. An 18-horse field, six horses with single-digit odds, a favorite trained by eight-time Eclipse Award winner Todd Pletcher — and then there was Golden Tempo, sitting at 30-to-1 on the board with just four career starts and back-to-back third-place finishes on his prep résumé.

As the field rounded into the final stretch, Golden Tempo was in last place. Then 13th. Then, inexplicably, moving faster than anything else on the track. Jockey Jose Ortiz threaded through the field on the outside, caught the surging Renegade at the wire, and won by a nose.

History made: the first woman to train a Derby winner

Cherie DeVaux, a Saratoga Springs native who learned her craft under trainers Chuck Simon and Chad Brown before launching her own stable in 2018, had stated publicly that winning the Kentucky Derby as the first female trainer was the single goal of her career. On Saturday, she got exactly that.

Across the first 151 runnings of the race, only 17 women had ever trained a Derby starter. DeVaux became the first to win it. She is also just the second female trainer to win any Triple Crown race — Jena Antonucci was the first, with Arcangelo at the 2023 Belmont Stakes.

The Ortiz brothers, first and second

The subplot that will define how people remember this Derby: Jose Ortiz rode Golden Tempo; his brother Irad Ortiz Jr. was aboard Renegade, the favorite. They dueled down the stretch. Jose won. Irad finished second. Both brothers were in tears.

For Jose, the Derby win completes a personal Triple Crown — he won the Belmont Stakes in 2017 and the Preakness in 2022. He also became the ninth jockey ever to win both the Kentucky Oaks and Kentucky Derby in the same year, having won the Oaks aboard Always a Runner the day before.

Order of finish

The horse: a son of Curlin

Golden Tempo is sired by Curlin, himself a two-time Horse of the Year. The colt ran third in both the Risen Star Stakes and the Louisiana Derby in the lead-up to Saturday — results that, on the surface, looked modest. But pace analysts who dug into the trip notes found a horse that finished with energy at the wire in both races despite running into honest fractions. The Derby’s long 1¼-mile distance turned out to suit him perfectly.

What comes next: the Triple Crown

The Preakness is just two weeks away, and Golden Tempo’s connections must now decide whether to enter the second jewel of the Triple Crown. Last year, Derby winner Sovereignty controversially bypassed the Preakness before winning the Belmont. DeVaux and her team have not yet announced their plans, but if Golden Tempo runs at Laurel Park, expect Renegade — who enters as the clear favorite — to be waiting for a rematch.