Monday Morning Message with Jason Beem May 4, 2026

Jason shares some thoughts about the historic Kentucky Derby (G1) win from Golden Tempo and Cherie DeVaux. 

A good Monday morning to you all. Finally coming down from the hysteria of Kentucky Derby Day, and it was a lot of fun to tape the Monday morning podcast and talk about it all. I feel like I did the whole show and maybe only got through like a third of the notes I had to talk about the race with. I really don’t think there’s such a thing as a boring Derby, but this year’s edition to me was especially exciting – just a ton of angles to discuss and things of interest to talk about. 

First of all, Cherie DeVaux becoming the first woman to win the race was just fantastic. I remember interviewing Cherie on the podcast when she first went out on her own as a trainer in 2018. If I remember correctly it took her quite a while to get her first win, and the build in her business was slow, but steady.

She’s become one of the top trainers in the country the last several years, and obviously this win in the Kentucky Derby cements her status among the top conditioners in our sport. Cherie has always been so good with the media and with sharing her story and her horses with fans; she’s such an outstanding representative for our game. It was truly so cool to see her win this race with Golden Tempo. 

Now let’s talk about Golden Tempo. I suppose I should have realized, but I guess it didn’t hit me until after the race, but prior to the Derby he’d only run at Fair Grounds down in New Orleans. So I imagine for the folks in the Big Easy, this is a very exciting development. Fair Grounds has been a very solid producer of Derby and Kentucky Oaks (G1) runners and winners over the years. 

I was profoundly confused by Golden Tempo’s big move down to the rail in his last start in the Louisiana Derby (G2). I think he had a chance to run better if they stayed outside, and it made me wonder if he really had the kind of kick late to win a 1 1/4-mile race like this. Well with a strong pace ahead of him, he certainly did as he rolled from last to get the roses. 

The betting in the Kentucky Derby is always interesting to follow because there can truly be some wild anomalies. Before his scratch, Great White was like 23-1, essentially the same price as eventual winner Golden Tempo. I didn’t think he would be less than 50-1. 

So Happy made sense being a shorter price because of the story involving the Glatts and his fun name, and the fact that he was a Santa Anita Derby (G1) winner. So I kind of understood why he was such a low price, even if I didn’t think he should have been quite that low. 

Renegade to me was always the most reliable-looking horse in the field. You can say the rail maybe cost him the race because of the trouble he had early on, but he also ran a very good race out of the one hole, so maybe it’s not that bad to draw down there? His effort was very solid, and I think you can make a case that when it’s all said and done, he might just end up being the best of this class. Obviously, there’s a long way to go in determining that. 

Overall, I walked away from this year’s Derby feeling very excited about the event, the race, and the weekend as a whole. I think the story of Cherie and Jose Ortiz both winning their first Derbies, how it all played out, Jose just beating his brother out in the final jumps, there was just a lot of emotion and feeling to the whole thing. 

The video of Cherie and her friends celebrating as they came down the lane was such a beautiful thing to watch – just the pure emotion of completing a goal and having a success that is backed by a lot of hard work and of course a little luck. It was just a really neat thing to watch, and something that you can usually count on the Kentucky Derby providing every year.  

Have a great week everyone!