Why contested 2019 Kentucky Derby win has trainer Bill Mott wanting more with Rocket Can

A plaque commemorating Country House's victory in the 2019 Kentucky Derby is fixed to Bill Mott's barn on the backside of Churchill Downs; but the 69-year-old Hall of Fame trainer is still chasing the feeling of having a horse cross the finish line first in the Run for the Roses.

"We'll keep trying until we do it," he said.

Four years ago, Mott stood surrounded by reporters outside his barn the morning after Country House was declared the winner of Derby 145. First-place finisher Maximum Security was disqualified to 17th for interfering with other horses on the final turn, marking the first time in race history an on-track infraction has determined who gets to wear the Garland of Roses.

"We're the only one so far," Mott said, "so, if there was anything great about it, that was it."

In the immediate aftermath of the 21-minute review that led to his first Derby victory, Mott called the moment "bittersweet." The next morning, the South Dakota native was still processing his emotions while speaking to the media after an evening of celebrating with hamburgers and beer.

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"I feel terrible that I have to apologize for winning, and I really feel terrible for the owners," he said then. "I hate to sit there and apologize and saying something as foolish as, 'I'm sorry I won.' I don’t want to give (the owners) the wrong impression, that I'm unhappy about winning, because I'm not. I'm thrilled.

"It's just such an unusual way to have to go to the winner's circle and win a Kentucky Derby."

Mott is in line to take sole possession of ninth place with his 12th career Derby start this year in Rocket Can, a gray/roan colt who ranks 10th on the points leaderboard with 60. Mott's only finishes on the board, however, came from the contested 2019 race — Maximum Security's disqualification also bumped another one of his horses, Tacitus, up to third.

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There are connections to that infamous Run for the Roses in the 2023 field. Country House's jockey, Flavien Prat, is riding Angel of Empire; and the jockey who crossed the finish line first with Maximum Security, Luis Saez, will be aboard Tapit Trice. Mott has been in the game long enough to know that anything can happen, and the Derbys that have followed Country House's victory serve as a reminder of just that.

"We’re all guessing," he told The Courier Journal during the buildup to Hofburg's seventh-place finish in 2018. "We’re guessing about the distance, the 10 furlongs. That’s something that none of the horses have ever been exposed to and we’re guessing that they will handle a 20-horse field and the crowds and everything that goes along with it. There’s no really good way of knowing until you try it."

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'A way of life'

Mott didn't do much guessing when it came to dedicating his life to thoroughbreds. Having grown up watching his father, a veterinarian, tend to horses, he began working his way up the ranks as a teenager.

"I was 14 years old and needed a job, so I got a job on the racetrack," he said. "Don't most people go to work when they're 14?"

Most teens don't buy racehorses, but the enterprising Mott did just that with My Assets, a $320 mare he ran at unrecognized meets in South Dakota. Using purse earnings and money he made selling cattle and pigs, Mott paid $2,000 for a horse called Kosmic Tour and notched a win in the South Dakota Futurity before graduating high school. He set out on his own in 1978 after working under Jack Van Berg and 20 years later joined him in racing's Hall of Fame as the youngest trainer ever to be inducted.

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"I've always been fascinated with the business," Mott said. "I always wake up every morning excited. ... It's a way of life."

Mott received back-to-back Eclipse Awards for most outstanding trainer in 1995 and 1996 thanks to his work with Cigar, a Maryland-bred descendant of Triple Crown winner Seattle Slew who won 16 consecutive races between October 1994 and July 1996. On June 8, 1986, he passed Henry Forrest as the winningest trainer at Churchill Downs with 272 and held the record for more than 31 years before being dethroned by Dale Romans' 703rd trip to the winner's circle in 2017. He won the Belmont Stakes in 2010 with Drosselmeyer and on June 20, 2020, tallied his 5,000th career victory in Louisville.

"Billy's just rock solid," said Kenny McPeek, who's training 2023 Derby hopeful Sun Thunder. "If anybody deserved to win a Derby, it was him."

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'Take a chance'

There's been plenty to talk about since Country House's win in 2019 gave way to a stretch of unforgettable Derbys.

In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic postponed the race to the first Saturday in September and limited the number of spectators in attendance. The first-place finisher in 2021, Medina Spirit, was disqualified after testing positive for the anti-inflammatory drug betamethasone and more than nine months of legal jockeying and laboratory tests. Last year, an 80-1 longshot who was on the also-eligible list until the morning before the race scored the second-biggest upset victory in Derby history.

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Mott said there's a lesson among the madness: "If your horse is doing well, and you have some sort of confidence in him, then I think you need to take a chance.

"There's only one Derby," he added. "You don't get that chance very often."

This year, Mott's chance lies in Rocket Can, who has a 2-2-0 record across seven starts. The Kentucky-bred horse and jockey Junior Alvarado have "a lot to prove," Mott said, heading into owner Frank Fletcher Racing Operations' first Run for the Roses off a fourth-place finish in the Grade 1 Arkansas Derby; but Rocket Can looked up for the challenge while completing five furlongs in 1:01 on April 23 at Churchill Downs.

There's still more work to be done, but Mott said he'll take some time on race day to reflect on his decadeslong career, including the moment he hoisted the Kentucky Derby trophy into the air on May 4, 2019 — no matter how the hardware ended up in his hands.

"We gotta be grateful for it, absolutely," he said. "We're lucky enough to be here and participate at the top end of the game — the best jockeys, the best trainers, the best horses. Knowing that you've made it here is worth something."

Reach Louisville men's basketball reporter Brooks Holton at bholton@gannett.com and follow him on Twitter at @brooksHolton.

This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Kentucky Derby: Bill Mott on Rocket Can in Run for the Roses and 2019