Flashback: Mixed results for heavily favored stablemates in 1976 Kentucky Derby and Oaks

Mar 03, 2026 Vance Hanson/Brisnet.com

Bold Forbes, Angel Cordero Jr. up, winning the Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs. (Photo courtesy of Keeneland Library / Credited to Keeneland Library Featherston Collection)

There’s an adage that to succeed in racing, one must keep themselves in the best of company while keeping one’s horses in the worst. When it comes to winning the Kentucky Derby (G1) or Kentucky Oaks (G1), however, the latter is all but impossible today, as the purse money and prestige of both races ensure near maximum-capacity fields.

Such has not always been the case. Fifty seasons ago, in 1976, Bert and Diana Firestone were in the enviable position of owning the favorites for both the Derby and Oaks. And not just any favorites, but odds-on favorites.

Their filly Optimistic Gal had been a brilliant two-year-old, a winner of five stakes including three Grade 1s. Her only losses, in the Sorority (G1) and Spinaway (G1), had been to the one-turn specialist Dearly Precious, who was voted champion despite not having raced beyond six furlongs.

The Kentucky Oaks at the time was more of a regional target, rather than the most lucrative race in the division. No fillies that had raced over the winter in California, Florida, or New York were entered in the Oaks, and of the six that opposed Optimistic Gal, several had already taken a beating from her in two Keeneland preps.

Optimistic Gal, Braulio Baeza up, with LeRoy Jolley, Bertram and Mrs. Firestone, John Nazareth after the Ashland Stakes at Keeneland. (Photo Courtesy of the Keeneland Association)

Optimistic Gal started as the 1-5 favorite in the Oaks and finished up like one, winning by 4 1/4 lengths. So prohibitive a favorite was she that her success triggered a minus show pool of more than $16,000.

All eyes, though, were on her Derby-bound stablemate in the LeRoy Jolley barn. Honest Pleasure was voted champion juvenile colt after decisive wins in the Cowdin (G2), Champagne (G1), and Laurel Futurity (G1), and continued to look like a world beater through the winter and spring while taking the Flamingo (G1), Florida Derby (G1), and Blue Grass (G1).

The exploits of Secretariat three years prior were still fresh in the minds of many observers, and Honest Pleasure’s comparable dominance over his peers was beginning to draw loose comparisons. But not everyone was convinced of Honest Pleasure’s seeming invincibility in the Derby.

“Honest Pleasure has not demonstrated much versatility this season,” wrote Andrew Beyer, who covered racing at the time for the Washington Star. “In each of his starts he has met very weak opposition, has loped to a big early lead and has not been challenged.

“Honest Pleasure’s most recent performance was a slow, mediocre one in the Blue Grass Stakes. The colt’s apologists explain it by blaming jockey Braulio Baeza, who practically strangled his mount during the early furlongs. But there is no way to judge just how well Honest Pleasure would run if Baeza had urged him all the way. Conceivably, he might not have run much faster than he did.”

Jolley was not pleased with the ride in the Blue Grass either and did not immediately name Baeza as Honest Pleasure’s jockey when Derby entries were taken two days before the Run for the Roses. Whether it was a mere oversight or Jolley trying to make a point, all was apparently well soon after, especially after Optimistic Gal’s dominant performance in the Oaks.

Honest Pleasure lined up against only eight other horses in the Derby. At 2-5, he was the heaviest favorite in the Derby since the entry of Citation and Coaltown started at the same price in 1948. The only other horse at single-digit odds was Bold Forbes, the speedy Wood Memorial (G1) winner who started at 3-1.

“Can he go a mile and a quarter?” asked Beyer, who was suspicious of Bold Forbes’ stamina after he prevailed at Aqueduct over a speed-friendly track. “For almost his entire career Bold Forbes has looked like a sprinter, a miler at best.”

Baeza apparently had the same doubts about Bold Forbes’ ability to stay. After getting Honest Pleasure within a length of Bold Forbes after the opening quarter-mile, Baeza tapped on the breaks and allowed Bold Forbes to build up a lead as large as five lengths down the backside. The gap between the two narrowed to a half-length around the far turn and in upper stretch, but Bold Forbes had something left for the final furlong and won the Derby by a length over Honest Pleasure.

“I thought my horse was positioned right where he should have been all through the race, except at the finish,” Jolley said.

Although their top-level horses were seemingly in the right company on that Derby weekend long ago, the experience of the Firestones and Jolley proved that success in racing, regardless of what the odds board says, is no sure thing.