5/4/2026
(Pictures from NBC replay on YouTube)
The Race
The roar of the crowd at Churchill Downs was deafening Saturday evening as the stunned crowd watched history unfold in front of their eyes. In a well matched field it was a 23-1 outsider, Golden Tempo that sling-shotted from last to first in the final strides to win the 152nd run for the roses.
The win also made history as trainer Cherie DeVaux became the first female trainer ever to win the Derby. It was also the first time a pair of brothers finished 1st and 2nd in the Derby. Neither Jose Ortiz or Irad Ortiz Jr had won the biggest race in horse racing and it was Jose getting by his brother Irad on 5-1 Renegade in the final strides to win it all.
There were also several scratches with a big one Saturday morning when The Puma was taken out of the race. Then at the gate White Shark reared up and was a late gate scratch that left 18 starters.
There was a lot of front speed and stalkers but by mid-stretch all the front speed collapsed with 70-1 Ocelli taking the lead to be passed by Renegade who was then passed by Golden Tempo. 7-1 Chief Wallabee closed along the rail from far back to get 4th.
The 23-1 1st place finisher and 70-1 3rd place runner threw the Prof DW Kentucky Derby…DERBY! contest into a massive tie for the top 10 placings.
Here are the top 4 finishers and their pay-outs in regards to the Prof DW contest rules. See rules on this link
1st 19 Golden Tempo win $48.24 place $19.14 show $11.90
2nd 1 Renegade place $7.14 show $5.46
3rd 22 Ocelli show $36.34
4th 12 Chief Wallabee
$1 exacta 19-1 $139.43
$1 trifecta 19-1-22 $11,250.78
*$1 superfecta 19-1-22-12 $94,489.95
*Tie-Breaker
The Contest
We had more than 100 entries for our 3rd annual Kentucky Derby…DERBY! contest and without a big favorite in this race the picks were spread out all over between the top favorites such as Renegade, So Happy, Commandment, Chief Wallabee and Further Ado.
In the end, there was only one person to successfully pick Golden Tempo and that was ESN’s own Tyler Hergert. The bad thing for Tyler is he is not eligible to win prizes. Tyler also selected Chief Wallabee to run 2nd, Litmus Test 3rd and Renegade 4th. But the $79.28 return on the $2 win-place-show bet would have been good enough to take 2nd place.
Matt King also from Eli Sports had picked #19 the last two years but got enamored with Chief Wallabee and picked him to win followed by Renegade to be 2nd, Golden Tempo 3rd and The Puma 4th which of course scratched. His $24.50 return off the place and show bets would have earned him 3rd place but again he’s not eligible to win prizes.
Professor DW had selected The Puma and like many re-entered prior to the deadline and took So Happy to win, Further Ado 2nd, Renegade 3rd and Chief Wallabee 4th. His $5.46 total did not get him in the top 30.
The Winner
There was no catching our winner Craig Fredrickson. Craig initially selected The Puma to win, Renegade to run 2nd, Golden Tempo 3rd and Further Ado 4th. So he slid all his picks up to take Renegade to win, Golden Tempo to be 2nd, Further Ado 3rd and added Commandment to run 4th. This move earned him the place and show pay for Renegade which was $12.60, the place and show money for Golden Tempo totaling $31.04 and he correctly got the exacta box of picking the top 2 in either order for $139.43 to push his final winnings to $183.07.
Mad Scramble for the rest of the winners!
After Craig and the ineligible pair to win prizes left a massive tie for second. It was anyone who selected Renegade to win or run 2nd each got back $12.60. A total of 21 tied for 2nd and came down to the tie-breaker.
Jared Kickner missed a great chance to grab 2nd place selecting Golden Tempo to place 3rd which got him $11.90 but could not get anymore. Had he picked Golden Tempo to be 1st or 2nd he would have been 2nd overall or had Renegade in any position. Instead he just missed the $12.60 that 21 others collected and finished 23rd.
The tie-breaker was guessing what the $1 superfecta pay-out would be with the “Price is Right” rule in effect meaning you can’t go over. The superfecta paid $94,489.95 thanks to the 23-1 winner and 70-1 3rd place horse this was a massive pay.
Out of 21 there were only 2 who guessed over and were out. They were super optimistic of a big pay with guesses of half a million and 2.3-million. The next and larger swath of those out were the ones who didn’t want to go over and guessed very low pays. 8 guessed less than a $1,000 and were all out. It came down to those guessing big pays. Here are the top 10 winners:
Champion 1st Place Craig Fredrickson $100 plus 8 Emerald Downs entries
2nd Place Ben Talbot (Tiebreaker 47,123) $60 plus 6 Emerald Downs entries
3rd Place Brady Haggerty (Tiebreaker 18,742) $40 plus 4 Emerald Downs entries
4th Place Ali Ahamed (Tiebreaker 14,700) $20 plus 4 Emerald Downs entries
5th Place Kim King (Tiebreaker 4,287) 2 Emerald Downs entries
6th Place Jeff Johnson (Tiebreaker 3,636) 2 Emerald Downs entries
7th Place Shawn O’Neill (Tiebreaker 3,580) 2 Emerald Downs entries
8th Place Sonya McCue (Tiebreaker 2,865) 2 Emerald Downs entries
9th Place Josh Kaiser (Tiebreaker 2,682) 2 Emerald Downs entries
10th Place Freddie Batcha (Tiebreaker 2,500) 2 Emerald Downs entries
The rest to 30th place (No this wasn’t just to get Professor DW a mention…or maybe it was.)
11th Lee Stockwell
12th Neil Podolnick
13th Bob Kickner
14th Wes Cameron
15th Carlo Marinuzzi
16th Raymond Frederick
17th Jim Spinelli
18th John Barnes
19th John Haggerty
20th Tyler Frost
21st Ralph Voltaire
22nd William Kaiser
23rd Jared Kickner
24th Roy Clark
25th Kevin Hamrick
26th Professor DW
27th Jeni Erickson
28th Trent Twamley
29th Garland Gibson
30th Christopher Barnes
Thank you all for playing! Congrats to our winners and up next look out for our World Cup Soccer tournament and MLB’s All-Star Baseball Bonanza!
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