Triple Crown denied: Rombauer wins Preakness

Concert Tour was a disappointing ninth in a 10-horse field.

Maryland racing officials required Concert Tour and Medina Spirit to undergo additional testing and monitoring as conditions to run in the Preakness. Those three rounds of tests came back Friday, clearing them to race. None of the other horses were subject to that level of scrutiny, which came out of the situation at Churchill Downs and Baffert’s four other medication violations over the past 13 months with other horses.

That was set aside for at least the 1:34.78 it took for Rombauer to completed the 1 3/16-mile race, paying $26.50 to win, $10 to place and $5.20 to show.

“He broke as expected and I thought he put enough pressure on Medina Spirit to make it a horse race and then he ended up second,” Midnight Bourbon trainer Steve Asmussen said. “He showed up. He’s improving. And he’s not there yet, all at the same time.”

Midnight Bourbon was sixth in the Kentucky Derby behind Medina Spirit, whose victory still hangs in the balance with a second test yet to be analyzed. It’s unclear how long that will take.

Trainer Michael McCarthy won a Triple Crown race for the first time and captured the Preakness before Hall of Famer Todd Pletcher, for whom he worked as an assistant before opening his own barn. Pletcher gave McCarthy a bear hug after the race.