Is Barbaro's brother becoming Fredo Corleone?
To paraphrase The Godfather's Michael Corleone, "You're breaking my heart, Nicanor!"
I'm really beginning to worry that Nicanor is becoming the Fredo of the Dynaformer family.
In case you're unaware, Nicanor (below) is the full brother of the great Barbaro (they both have the same sire, Dynaformer, and dam, La Ville Rouge). Like the Corleone brothers -- Sonny, Fredo and Michael (remember, Tom Hagen was adopted) -- there are three Dynaformer full brothers, Barbaro, Nicanor and a two-year-old kid sibling Lentenor.
Well, as you may recall, Sonny was the rising star of the Corleone family until he was cut down in his prime --- sort of like, well, you know. Then there was Fredo, the middle brother, who was the doofus of the family, which brings us back to Nicanor.
On Saturday, while the real three-year-old contenders for the Triple Crown were racing in the Florida Derby at Gulfstream Park, Nicanor was trying for the third time just to win a race, this time a $42,000 maiden.
For the second straight race he finished second, even though he went off as the 3-to-5 chalk. In his first outing, Nicanor tripped over his own feet coming out of the gate and finished 10th. In his second race, he was leading in the backstretch when -- according to jockey Jose Lezcano -- "he was intimidated coming around the final turn." Then on Saturday, Nicanor was in position to take the lead coming into the stretch when, again according to jockey Lezcano, "he was just playing around looking at the other horses."
Now, as mentioned above, Saturday happened to be Florida Derby Day. Three years ago, the winner of that Kentucky Derby prep at Gulfstream was a colt named Barbaro and I guarantee you, he wasn't playing around and he was the one doing the intimidating.
