Golden Tempo is officially the story of the 2026 Triple Crown season. After taking the roses at Churchill Downs back in May, the colt skipped the Preakness — and then came back to bury the field at Belmont Park. Two-thirds of the Triple Crown, with a Pimlico-shaped hole in the middle that's going to haunt racing fans for a while.
The stretch run at Belmont, with the Derby winner pulling clear of the pack.
The skipped Preakness is the whole conversation now. Triple Crown winners are rare enough — only a handful in the entire history of the sport — and the only thing standing between Golden Tempo and immortality was a race his connections opted out of. You can argue the spacing, you can argue the freshness, you can argue whatever you want, but the horse just proved on the biggest stage in racing that he probably would've handled Pimlico too.
Race footage of the Belmont finish that doubled the Derby winner's classics haul.
Dave Portnoy, who has never been shy about announcing his horse plays, got cooked on this one and ate it on the timeline. Hand up, throw it out, watch it run you over — the cycle of life for anyone who tries to handicap a 1.5-mile dirt race the first Saturday in June.
Portnoy throws the hand up after fading the eventual Belmont winner.
Hand up. I threw out Golden Tempo. He jammed it down my throat. It sucks he didn’t have a chance to win the Triple Crown but what a monster. #BelmontStakes2026
Big Cat summed up the collective mood in one sentence. Great horse. Real shame we didn't get to see the whole thing play out.
Big Cat with the universal racing-fan lament about the missing middle leg.
Wish Golden Tempo raced in the Preakness. Great horse
So that's the bow on the 2026 classics. Golden Tempo goes 2-for-2 in the races he entered, the Preakness winner gets to keep his asterisk-free trophy, and the Triple Crown remains the hardest thing to win in American sports — partly because the horses good enough to win it don't always bother trying.