Maryland Jockey Club says a date change for Preakness is not set despite report

It’s been talked about for decades.

In an era when thoroughbred trainers are less inclined to have their runners make the two-week turnaround between the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness Stakes, should the second leg of the Triple Crown be moved back to draw a deeper field?

A Sports Business Journal article published Monday night said such a change is possible for the 2027 edition. Preakness would shift from its traditional spot on the third Saturday in May to the fourth Saturday of the month, giving Derby horses an additional week’s rest.

But Dan Illman, a spokesperson for the Maryland Jockey Club, said Wednesday that a date change for Preakness has not been set as the race enters the final year of its broadcast deal with NBC Sports.

“We are focused on securing the media rights deal before any discussions of a date change will be held,” he said.

The Sports Business Journal story indicated a new broadcast partner could determine what happens to the final race in the Triple Crown series, the Belmont Stakes.

Fox Sports, which holds the rights to the Belmont and some of the New York Racing Association’s premier races from the summer meet in Saratoga, is said to be interested in acquiring the rights to Preakness.

In that scenario, Fox “would endorse moving the Belmont Stakes back a week, thus giving three weeks between each race,” the report said.

A source close to the negotiations told The Banner that NBC Sports — which also holds the Kentucky Derby’s broadcast rights — is interested in retaining Preakness. Newcomers Amazon and Netflix are reportedly entering the fray.

It’s unclear where NYRA stands on a new schedule, but the organization has balked at the idea in the past. In 2023, the CEO of 1/ST Racing and Gaming, which owned Pimlico and Preakness at the time, said the company had talked about pushing the middle jewel back in the name of horse safety. But NYRA opposed moving the Belmont, and the calendar remained unchanged.

This year’s Belmont is set for June 6 at Saratoga, the last time it will be held at the historic upstate track before a remodeled Belmont Park opens in the fall.

In the years since the debate over the Triple Crown calendar perked up once again, much about Maryland racing has changed.

The state acquired Pimlico from 1/ST Racing and razed the old grandstand, with plans to erect a smaller, more modern facility in time to host the 2027 Preakness.

A nonprofit entity under the historic name of the Maryland Jockey Club is running day-to-day operations, which will eventually be consolidated at the rebuilt Pimlico.

While the redevelopment project is underway, this year’s Preakness will be held at Laurel Park with capacity capped at 4,800. Laurel Park, meanwhile, is being eyed for a center to train and stable horses that can’t fit at the revamped Pimlico site.

1/ST Racing retains the intellectual property rights to Preakness and the Black-Eyed Susan — held the Friday before with a card featuring stakes races for fillies and mares — and will license them back to the state for a fee and a percentage of the betting handle. But the Maryland Jockey Club will take over the races in 2027, and the organization is overseeing negotiations for the broadcast rights for both.

The conversation about the spacing of the Triple Crown races is unlikely to go away with fewer and fewer trainers opting to bring their Derby runners to Maryland.

Last year’s Derby winner, Sovereignty, skipped a shot at the Triple Crown and pointed to the Belmont, which the colt won on the way to claiming Horse of the Year.

A reimagining of the series goes as far back as the 1990s, when the sport of kings was in the midst of a drought of Triple Crown winners.

Even though American Pharoah broke through in 2015 and was followed three years later by Justify, proponents for a new schedule argue the races would benefit from having more horses run in all three legs.

To get buy-in from more trainers, the thinking goes, there would need to be longer rest periods between them.