The 151st Kentucky Derby begins on Saturday, May 3. AccuWeather speaks with Kevin Kerstein of Churchill Downs Publicity on the upcoming race and how recent weather events have impacted preparations.
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00:00Tomorrow is the 151st running of the Kentucky Derby and as always it's the first step towards
00:06a possible Triple Crown. Kevin Kirstein with Churchill Downs joins us. Kevin, so good to see
00:11you. Good morning guys, thanks for having me. Well we've done a lot of severe weather stories
00:17in Kentucky this year so it's great to talk about something different, horse racing. Can you share
00:21some of the excitement statewide about this event? I'll tell you what, it is just a true
00:28celebration of everything Kentucky and just a worldwide event here at Churchill Downs
00:32and we're excited to be on the world stage both today and tomorrow. Today is Kentucky
00:36Oaks Day. We're expected to have more than 100,000 people here in the stands and tomorrow
00:40for Kentucky Derby Day. It's just been, you know, you mentioned the severe weather here
00:43in the Commonwealth and it's deterred a little bit of the statewide derby celebration plans
00:49early on but now it looks like it's going to be a great two days of racing and tomorrow
00:53for Kentucky Derby Day we're just really excited to be on the world stage here the next 48
00:57hours. And weather of course can impact any race. What are you expecting temperature wise
01:03and how are teams and trainers preparing? Well I like to say I'm an average handicapper.
01:10I'm an even worse meteorologist so I'm going to leave the weather forecast up to you guys
01:14so hopefully you can give us some good news for the next two days. Today it looks pretty nice
01:19outside. Hopefully the rain will hold off and you know it's always you know a very nerve-wracking
01:23thing for the trainers who are training their horses to compete in the top race of their lives
01:28and now to deal with the weather forecast. Some of these trainers are okay with their horses running
01:33on a fast track or if there's some moisture in it. Some have never experienced that before
01:37so it just gives a little bit of the extra nerves in their stomachs when their horses are maybe
01:42competing on an off-race track but right now everything looks dry for today's Kentucky
01:46Oaks Day and hopefully the same can be said for tomorrow's Derby Day. Yeah I'll dive more into the
01:49forecast coming up but the Kentucky Derby itself it's such a tradition. What is the same and then
01:54what will be new about this year's 151st race? There's so many rich traditions that are part of
02:01Kentucky Derby Day from the playing of my old Kentucky home to just the the celebration of just
02:06the iconic American sports event and the storylines coming into the Derby are just so unique every single
02:12year. There's two really special storylines this year that I'm really focused in on. One is a horse
02:18named Chunk of Gold who's trained by a 32 year old trainer Ethan West. He's never been on the
02:23limelight in the world stage. The horse was only purchased for $2,500 and then you have 72 year
02:30old Lonnie Briley who trains Coal Battle and Coal Battle just a rags to riches story for Lonnie Briley
02:36who's been in the horse racing industry his entire life and he's just finally getting into his top form
02:42of his career training for the first time on his own. So really looking forward to those two stories
02:47and the storylines that will develop here on Kentucky Derby Day but from the traditions to
02:51the individual storylines on these horses it's shaping up to be a great Kentucky Derby 151.
02:55I have a little interesting question for you. My brother is a huge horse racing fan and he tells
03:01me when you look at these horses they know they're athletes and they know what they're expected to do.
03:08Do you agree with that?
03:09I think so. I think when you watch these horses preparing so over the last probably six or seven
03:16days when they're preparing in the mornings training for this race they're sort of cool
03:19calm and collected and in the last couple of days these trainers have taken their horses over here
03:25during the races and schooled them in the paddock so they get used to the crowd and you can tell there's
03:30a little bit more amped up there you know they puff out their chest a little bit their ears are doing
03:35a little bit more attentiveness so you can tell I think from the the horse's body language that they
03:41they know that they're ready for the biggest race of their life.
03:44I know they're athletes but they're so cute. We're seeing all the video of them on your screen
03:47and they're just beautiful beautiful animals. I feel excited already such a fun event and just
03:53hearing from you amazing. So Kevin Christie with Churchill Downs thank you so much for joining us
03:57on AccuWeather Early and we hope it's a really successful weekend.
04:01Thank you guys for having me and hopefully you can give us some good news about this forecast.