BALTIMORE — Chip Woolley Jr., the cowboy with the big black hat, will be glad to get home when the Triple Crown is over.

Not that Woolley hasn’t enjoyed the trip so far. The trainer will try to validate Mine That Bird’s reputation on Saturday in the Preakness Stakes at Pimlico.
Having pulled off a stunning 50-1 upset in the Kentucky Derby, Mine That Bird faces 12 rivals in the middle jewel of the series, including the sensational filly Rachel Alexandra.
“It’s been pretty fulfilling,” Woolley said Friday. “It’s been exciting. You couldn’t ask for anything better than what’s happened to me so far. We never came here thinking we could win the Derby. We just wanted to get as much as we could. Little did we know, we’d knock a home run.”
Still, this is all a long way from home in Bloomfield, N.M.
“I’ll be glad to go back home,” he said. “It’s more laid-back and comfortable there. I don’t know if all this will change anything. We’re all pretty tight back there.”
Woolley drove from New Mexico to Churchill Downs for the Derby, transporting his horse in a van hitched to his pickup. He plans remain with the gelding through the three-week gap between the Preakness and Belmont Stakes.
“I won’t go back home until the horse is done with this campaign,” he said.
If all goes well in the Preakness, Woolley will take Mine That Bird back to Churchill Downs and train him there for the Belmont on June 6.
“The horse will help decide everything,” Woolley said. “Everything we do will be in the best interests of this horse. As long as he’s healthy and doing good, we’ll keep spotting him.”

LAST HURRAH: Every moment is tinged with nostalgia for trainer Larry Jones as he sends out Friesan Fire in the Preakness.
Jones will drastically scale back his stable at the end of the year. He and wife Cindy will still train a few horses, but the scope will be greatly reduced.
Jones felt he needed a break following the emotional ordeal after the fatal breakdown of his filly Eight Belles moments after finishing second in last year’s Kentucky Derby.
From inside the Pimlico stakes barn, Jones reflected on what could be the final time he stood in that spot.
“Every time we do something, we realize it could be the last time,” he said. “We’re trying to enjoy it as we go. Some of it we’re going through thinking, ’Thank God I don’t have to do this again.’ It’s good and it has been good.”
With a reduced workload, the 52-year-old trainer will be able to do things most folks his age take for granted: sleeping late, taking vacation and enjoying time with his grandchildren.
“I want to be there to see them open birthday presents,” Jones said. “On Christmas, we hope to have them all in one spot. That’s something we haven’t got to do that everybody takes for granted.”
Jones recalled having to run a horse on Christmas Eve in Louisiana. It entailed a six-hour roundtrip drive from his winter base at Oaklawn Park in Hot Springs, Ark.
“Thank goodness I fueled up with gas when I got there,” he said. “Restaurants and gas stations along the way back were closed. Even though we won, I was driving back feeling sorry for myself because everyone else is having Christmas. If I ran off the road or something happened, I’m hung there until the 26th.”
Next year, that won’t be a problem. Jones will be home for the holidays.

OUT MOWING: How did Calvin Borel, the jockey on the hottest horse in the Preakness, spend the day before the big race?
Mowing the lawn.
“The yard is good,” Borel said Friday. “It couldn’t be better.”
Borel opted to ride the filly Rachel Alexandra, even though that meant giving up the mount on Derby winner Mine That Bird.
Racing historians have not found another instance of a Derby-winning jockey switching horses for the Preakness.
Borel decided not to ride Friday at Churchill Downs. Following the yard work, he planned to hop a flight from Louisville, Ky., to Baltimore.
“We’ll just get there and relax a little bit,” he said. “We’ll check out the filly in the morning and we’ll go from there.”

FINISH LINES: Big Drama will try to break the Preakness rail jinx. Tabasco Cat in 1994 is the only horse in the last 48 years to win from the No. 1 post. Since 1909, post No. 6 has produced the most winners with 15. Terrain has that slot on Saturday. ... D. Wayne Lukas sends out Luv Gov and Flying Private, extending his Preakness record to 34 starters. The Hall of Fame trainer has won the race five times. ... Robert Wyndham Walden owns the record for most wins by a trainer with seven, including five straight from 1878-82. Tobacco manufacturer George Lorillard owned all five. ... The record Preakness crowd was 121,263 in 2007. ... Rachel Alexandra could become the first filly to go off the betting favorite since Whimsical scored her Preakness victory at 8-5 odds in 1906. ... Rachel Alexandra will try to become the fifth filly to win the Preakness, and first since Nellie Morse in 1924. No woman has ever ridden or trained a Preakness winner. Trainer Nancy Alberts came closest in 2002 when Magic Weisner was second to War Emblem.