On This Day...

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Photo: The Blood-Horse Library

Old Rosebud

Old Rosebud, who won 12 of 14 races as a 2-year-old, had been away from the races for eight months before making his 3-year-old debut.

The long awaited start came in Lexington at a mile April 25. Racing over a slow track under Johnny McCabe, Old Rosebud won by six lengths "under restraint all the way to win as his rider pleased."

That year's Kentucky Derby purse was doubled to $10,000-added and drew a field of seven. Old Rosebud, the odds-on favorite, got out to the front and won by a record eight lengths in track-record time of 2:03 2/5. The time stood as a record until Twenty Grand bettered it in 1931 in his Derby win, but the eight-length margin has never been bettered, only equaled.

Old Rosebud did not contest the Preakness, won by Holiday, nor the Belmont Stakes, won by Luke McLuke.

Old Rosebud later would be the pen name for Turf writer Charles Hatton.

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