Authentic and Thousand Words to face off in Saturday’s Preakness S. (G1)

Kentucky Derby (G1) winner Authentic and star-crossed Thousand Words give Spendthrift Farm a formidable duo in Saturday’s $1 million Preakness S. (G1) at Pimlico.

Authentic, a son of leading sire Into Mischief, drew post nine in the 11-horse field. Owned by Spendthrift along with MyRaceHorse Stable, Madaket Stables and Starlight Racing, Authentic has won five of six starts, including the Haskell Inv. (G1), and has earned $2,871,200. His 1 ¼-length Derby win over Tiz The Law gave trainer Bob Baffert his sixth Derby winner. Authentic will be ridden by John Velazquez, who was aboard in the Derby.

Co-owned with Albaugh Family Stables, Thousand Words had his Derby dreams dashed when he slipped and fell in the Churchill Downs paddock and had to be scratched from the Run for the Roses. He was unscathed by the incident though and has had a pair of solid works at Churchill in preparation for Saturday. A winner of both the Robert B. Lewis S. (G3) and Shared Belief S. this year, Thousand Words will be ridden by Florent Geroux and break from post five on Saturday.

The third Preakness horse with Spendthrift ties is Ny Traffic. The gray/roan son of Cross Traffic has competed against top company all year long and was beaten just a nose by Authentic in the Haskell. Ny Traffic drew post seven for Saturday. He is the leading earner this year for his top-10 Third-Crop sire.

The Preakness has a scheduled post time of 5:45 p.m. ET. As part of the Breeders’ Cup Challenge Series, the winner will receive a paid entry into the Nov. 7 Breeders’ Cup Classic (G1).