THE TWO MINUTE THRILL

If the Kentucky Derby had rules like those of the NCAA basketball tournament, most of the recent winners at Churchill Downs wouldn’t have made it to the starting gate.

In the NCAA, a team must keep winning to reach the title game. Today’s 124th running of the Derby at Churchill Downs will be shadowed by the fact that in this decade, only one winner came here off a victory in his final prep race.

The exception in the last eight years was Strike The Gold, who won the 1991 Derby three weeks after winning the Blue Grass Stakes at Keeneland. But the other rose-sniffers from the 1990s were losers turned winners: Silver Charm, Grindstone, Thunder Gulch, Go For Gin, Sea Hero, Lil E. Tee and Unbridled.

Based on this profile, trainer Bob Baffert, second in the 1996 Derby with Cavonnier and first last year with Silver Charm, can win with Real Quiet but is up against it with Indian Charlie.

Indian Charlie not only won his last race, the Santa Anita Derby, he has won all his races, and is trying to become the first undefeated horse to win the Kentucky Derby since Seattle Slew 21 years ago.

Real Quiet, because he couldn’t overhaul his stablemate at Santa Anita, is in sync with the eight-year pattern.

Baffert pooh-poohs the “decade of the losers” theory, and a lot of other things about the Derby.

“What do I think?” he said. “I think it’s a lot of bull . . . . As far as I’m concerned, you can throw Derby history out the window.”

More than any other trainer in the 15-horse race, Baffert needs to take this position. Horses with only four starts, like Indian Charlie, are not supposed to win the Derby, either. Neither are California-breds. Nor are horses that have won only one stake. This is the baggage that Indian Charlie must lug around the 1 1/4 miles at Churchill Downs today, along with jockey Gary Stevens and 126 pounds. And by post time, the bettors probably will add one more onus: A favorite hasn’t won the Derby in the last 19 runnings, since Spectacular Bid’s win at 3-5 in 1979.

Two of the winners this decade--Grindstone and Thunder Gulch--were from trainer Wayne Lukas’ barn. Grindstone came into the Derby off a second-place finish in the Arkansas Derby, and Thunder Gulch, after winning the Florida Derby, ran fourth in the Blue Grass, beaten by 4 1/2 lengths.

“Thunder Gulch just ran a sub-par race in the Blue Grass,” said Lukas, running Cape Town today off a third in the Blue Grass. “Thunder Gulch’s mind wasn’t on running at Keeneland. His problems were always mental things, but we got him thinking right for the Derby.”

Thunder Gulch also won the Belmont, part of Lukas’ record six-race streak in Triple Crown races.

After the Derby, Grindstone never got another chance. Within four days of his win here, he was retired because of a chipped knee.

“Grindstone might have been beaten in the Arkansas Derby, but he ran a hell of a race there,” Lukas said. “He was outside the whole time and had a horrible trip. Still, he only lost by a neck [to Zarb’s Magic, who ran 13th in the Kentucky Derby]. Just because he was second at Oaklawn Park wasn’t a reflection on what he could do.

“You want a good race, but you don’t want your horse to run so hard that he leaves his best race in the final prep. If Grindstone had blown them away in Arkansas, he might not have had anything left here. And as you know, he needed every inch in the Derby [Cavonnier lost by only a nose].

Trainer Carl Nafzger started the decade with a promising, well-bred colt named Unbridled. In Florida, however, the son of Fappiano couldn’t win either the Tropical Park Derby or the Fountain of Youth Stakes. But he turned heads with a four-length victory in the Florida Derby. A month later, he soured many of his supporters by finishing third, beaten by almost four lengths, as Summer Squall won the Blue Grass.

In the Derby, Unbridled turned the tables on Summer Squall, beating him by 3 1/2 lengths.

“You’ve got to get a good effort out of your Derby prep, but you don’t want your horse running 110% three weeks out,” said Nafzger, who hasn’t started a horse in the Derby since then. “You don’t want a horse running so well that he runs his best race three weeks before the Derby. After the Blue Grass, I said that he’d win the Derby, because he got so much out of the Keeneland race.”

Indian Charlie might have been the morning-line favorite, but Favorite Trick, a horse that lost his last race, emerged as the favorite after early betting of more than $400,000 Friday.

Favorite Trick, third in the Arkansas Derby, the only loss of his career, was 7-2 in the early betting, followed by Indian Charlie and Cape Town, both at 9-2. Then come Halory Hunter, 6-1; Real Quiet, 10-1; Artax, 11-1; Parade Ground, 15-1; Victory Gallop, 17-1; Hanuman Highway, 19-1; Chilito, 20-1; Old Trieste, Rock And Roll and field horses Basic Trainee and Robinwould, all at 30-1; and Nationalore at 60-1.

Because several inches of rain have fallen in the last few days, there has been speculation about how an off-track might affect this Derby, but the latest forecast would seem to make such conversations moot. Churchill Downs is probably the fastest-drying track in the U.S., and Friday, by the end of the card, the surface had gone from muddy to fast. There’s an outside chance of rain early today, but the afternoon is supposed to be dry with temperatures in the 70s. A fast track is probable.

While many of the Derby horses were finishing up their conditioning Friday with gallops around the track, Nationalore, the winless curiosity in this race, was unable to train. Because of an early post time for Friday’s races, the track closed for training at 8 a.m. Nationalore’s owner-trainer, Myung Kwon Cho, had hoped to train after 8 a.m. Consequently, the colt from California only walked the shedrow. With 15 races to his credit, more than any other horse in the field, he can probably afford a day off.