Wet Forecast Doesn’t Worry Holy Bull Fans : Kentucky Derby: Early favorite defeated Dehere on a sloppy track last year.

No one has ridden more wire-to-wire Kentucky Derby winners in the last 18 years than Angel Cordero.

There have been only three--Bold Forbes in 1976, Spend A Buck in 1985 and Winning Colors in 1988--and Cordero was aboard the first two.

Holy Bull, the favorite in today’s 120th Derby, will try to copy those three winners at Churchill Downs. Fourteen rivals are out to thwart him, and about 130,000 fans are expected to be here, on a day that might be even soggier than Friday. The forecast is a 90% chance of rain and temperatures in the 60s.

It would be only the third off Derby track in the last 24 years. Sloppy going generally helps front-runners such as Holy Bull, who was listed at 8-5 in the morning line Thursday based on his seven victories in eight starts, including the Florida Derby and the Blue Grass Stakes in his last two tries. He was 5-2 on Friday.

In the seven-furlong Futurity at Belmont Park in September, Holy Bull led all the way on a sloppy track and beat Dehere, last year’s juvenile champion who was eliminated from the Triple Crown races because of injury early this year.

On a track labeled good for the 1 1/16-mile Fountain of Youth Stakes at Gulfstream Park in February, Holy Bull was sixth and last, but a temporary breathing disorder, not the running surface, was given as the reason he ran so poorly. Dehere won the race, beating Holy Bull by 24 1/4 lengths.

“I hope it’s not muddy,” Holy Bull trainer Jimmy Croll said of the Derby. “I want everybody to have a fair track. But if it is off, I’ll change his shoes and put on stickers.”

Stickers are attachments that give horses better traction in mud, much as cleats help football players on wet fields.

Cordero, who roomed with Wayne Lukas in Arcadia for about six months more than a decade ago, when the trainer was between wives and the jockey was trying to crack the West Coast circuit, is rooting for Lukas’ Tabasco Cat today.

But in looking at the Derby with his head instead of his heart, Cordero gives Holy Bull a big chance.

“The only way he can lose is if somebody goes with him (early),” he said. “He’s the big guy in the race, and somebody’s got to hit him first. It’s like in boxing, the only chance you’d have against Mike Tyson is to try to hit him first.”

In 1976, when only nine horses ran in the Derby, no one in the field could deliver an early knockout against Bold Forbes, who had won the Wood Memorial by 4 3/4 lengths with his front-running style two weeks before. The presumed hole in Bold Forbes’ resume was the same as the flaw in Holy Bull’s, that he would be unable to last 1 1/4 miles.

Honest Pleasure was also a front-runner. He came to Churchill Downs on a nine-race winning streak and was sent off as the 2-5 favorite, the lowest odds on a horse in the race since the Citation-Coaltown entry in 1948. Bold Forbes, trained by the late Laz Barrera, was the 3-1 second choice.

“I was going to go to the lead unless my horse broke bad,” Cordero said. “There was another horse in there, Cojak, who had good speed, but it turned into a two-horse race. I was going out there with my horse, and if I got beat, I got beat. There was no way I was going to try to set off those other horses.

“Honest Pleasure (and jockey Braulio Baeza) came at us four times, but by beating him to the lead, we took his weapon away. At the eighth pole, I thought he had me, but my horse didn’t give up. He was so tired as I pulled him up (past the wire). He went down to one knee he was so tired.”

Bold Forbes ran third in the Preakness, but came back to win at 1 1/2 miles in the Belmont Stakes.

“He shocked me in the Belmont,” Cordero said. “That was a miracle.”

Although Spend A Buck had won twice in April by 20 lengths at Garden State Park, Cordero was going to stalk the only other front-runner, Eternal Prince, in the 1985 Derby.

“We even thought a couple of other horses might go (to the lead),” Cordero said. “Sometimes there are jocks who like to steal to the front, just so everybody can see them on TV. But Eternal Prince didn’t break good, and when we got off to 23 (seconds for the first quarter mile), my horse was gone.

“I didn’t even ask my horse to break that fast, but when he did, I just let him go. On the first turn, we were so far ahead, I looked back and couldn’t see any horses behind me.”

Spend A Buck was ahead by six lengths after half a mile and won by 5 3/4. That was the largest winning margin since Assault’s eighth-length victory in 1946, and none of the winners in the eight years since Spend A Buck have won by more than 3 1/2 lengths.

The consensus seems to be that Holy Bull will either win this Derby by a Spend A Buck-like margin, or finish far back.

“If he gets away like Spend A Buck did, he’ll be hard to catch,” Cordero said. “He’s got the speed and the power and the class.”

Today’s Kentucky Derby

The Run for the Roses. The best two minutes in sports. It takes place today at Churchill Downs in Louisville, Ky., where 15 3-year-olds will vie for the first jewel of the Triple Crown. It has been 16 years since Affirmed won the Kentucky Derby, Preakness Stakes and Belmont Stakes, but until today’s race is final, all are contenders to accomplish the rare feat.

RACE FACTS

* Post time: 2:30 PDT

* TV: Channel 7, 1:30 p.m. (Preview: ESPN, 11:30 a.m.)

* Weights: 126 pounds.

* Distance: 1 1/4 miles.

* Purse: $888,800 if 15 start.

* First place: $638,800

* Second place: $145,000

* Third place: $70,000

TRACK CONDITION

Rain seems a sure bet today in Louisville.

The forecast is a 90% chance of rain. But the National Weather Service held out at least some hope that the Kentucky Derby won’t be run in a downpour, calling for “a few periods of showers and thunderstorms.”

The high should be in the upper 60s, with southwest winds at about 15 m.p.h.

The last Derby to be run on a track labeled anything other than fast or good was in 1989, when Sunday Silence ran the 1 1/4 miles in 2:05 on a muddy track. That was the same time Tim Tam ran in 1958, which had been the last time the track had been labeled muddy. There have been 24 Derbies run on off-tracks in the previous 119 runnings of the race.

THE FIELD

No. Horse Jockey Trainer Odds 1. Soul Of The Matter Kent Desormeaux Dick Mandella 25-1 2. Valiant Nature Laffit Pincay Ron McAnally 17-1 3. Powis Castle Chris Antley Rodney Rash 20-1 4. Holy Bull Mike Smith Jimmy Croll 5-2 5. f-Ulises Jorge Chavez Alfredo Callejas 11-1 6. f-Mahogany Hall Willie Martinez James Baker 11-1 7. Strodes Creek Eddie Delahoussaye Charlie Whittingham 5-1 8. Go For Gin Chris McCarron Nick Zito 10-1 9. Tabasco Cat Pat Day Wayne Lukas 9-2 10. Brocco Gary Stevens Randy Winick 5-1 11. f-Smilin Singin Sam Larry Melancon Niall O’Callaghan 11-1 12. Southern Rhythm Garret Gomez Jim Keefer 17-1 13. Blumin Affair Jerry Bailey Jack Van Berg 13-1 14. f-Meadow Flight Shane Sellers Jim Ryerson 11-1 15. Kandaly Craig Perret Lou Roussel 45-1

f-mutuel field.