Belmont Stakes primed for another Golden Tempo vs. Renegade duel

Horse racing’s Triple Crown season ends Saturday with the Belmont Stakes, and for the eighth straight year there will be no sweep.

In one sense that might not be the worst thing, since this Belmont will be the third straight contested over 1¼ miles at Saratoga instead of the traditional 1½ miles at Belmont Park. The latter track is being rebuilt and will reopen in September.

Interest in Saturday’s race (4:04 p.m. PDT, Fox) obviously would be much higher if Kentucky Derby champion Golden Tempo had won the Preakness, but at the very least, trainer Cherie DeVaux’s decision to skip the Maryland race eliminated the possibility of three weeks’ worth of arguments and hot takes.

“That would have probably been one that people would have commented on as possibly being an asterisk-type Triple Crown,” trainer Todd Pletcher said.

Pletcher, who has more Belmont wins than any living trainer, will seek his fifth Saturday with Derby runner-up Renegade, who was made the 2-1 morning-line favorite when post positions were drawn Monday afternoon. Renegade will start from Post No. 4 in the field of nine, just outside Bill Mott’s Chief Wallabee, the second choice at 3-1. Golden Tempo is third on the line at 9-2 after drawing the outside post.

All three horses, as well as the 6-1 co-fourth choices, Commandment (Post 7) and Emerging Market (Post 8), are attempting to follow the pattern of four of the last five Belmont winners — race in the Derby and skip the Preakness. Pletcher knows the route well: Three of his Belmont champions did it, and the fourth, the filly Rags to Riches, was idle from the Kentucky Oaks until the Belmont.

The four newcomers to the Triple Crown are all long shots: Pletcher’s Powershift (12-1, Post 2), Chad Brown’s Growth Equity (12-1, Post 6) and Ottinho (20-1, Post 5), and Doug O’Neill’s Vitruvian Man (30-1, Post 1).

Here are some of the questions ahead of Saturday: