The U.S. Secret Service is preparing for a "probable" visit from Queen Elizabeth II to Kentucky around the first weekend in May, and there is a possibility she could attend the Kentucky Derby Presented by Yum! Brands (gr. I) on May 5.
   
"Our expectation is that the queen will be in the commonwealth," special agent Paul Johnson said. "A lot of her itinerary is very sketchy. We're in the preliminary stages."
 

Just when is Todd Pletcher going to finally end our long national nightmare and win the Kentucky Derby? He's been training on his own for, gosh, an entire decade. He's almost 40 years old. It is wearing on him so much, he's turning gray. Just what is taking him so darn long?

The South Florida-based trainer is flying high these days with a trio of 3-year-olds on the road to the Kentucky Derby. His latest prospect is Imawildandcrazyguy, who finished second to Notional in the Risen Star Stakes at the Fair Grounds in New Orleans this past Saturday.

Roy and Gretchen Jackson have yet to decide on a final resting place for the cremated remains of their homebred Kentucky Derby Presented by Yum! Brands (G1) winner Barbaro, and they do not expect to reach a decision in the immediate future.
“We haven’t decided anything,” Roy Jackson said. “It will probably be a little while; we’re still trying to weigh our options. We’re just going to take our time and try to do what is best.”

Tie Rod, one of two stakes winners in a nine-horse field, will stretch out to 1 1/16 miles and try for his third career stakes win in the $100,000 Turf Paradise Derby on Saturday at Turf Paradise. John Pendergast and Joe Johnson’s Tie Rod enters the Turf Paradise Derby off a win in the Rattlesnake Stakes on January 26 by an eye-catching 10 3/4 lengths.