Which Horses Head into the 2026 American Triple Crown Season with the Most Hype?

Picture Chad Brown watching a replay. February 14, Fair Grounds, the Risen Star at the sixteenth pole—Chip Honcho refusing to crack, Paladin grinding into him stride for stride, Tyler Gaffalione not asking, not panicking, just waiting. 

Brown has trained enough champions to know what it looks like when a horse doesn’t quit. Paladin didn’t. He reeled in the leader and prevailed by a half-length in 1:49.14, banking 50 Triple Crown qualifying points, and turned a graded stakes grind into the single most meaningful prep result of the early trail. 

That’s the texture of this Derby trail two months before the gate opens at Churchill Downs on May 2. Not easy. Not surgical. Gut-check performances, Beyer jumps that rewrite narratives overnight. Sovereignty taught us last year that hype hierarchies don’t survive first contact with Churchill’s stretch—he beat Journalism not once but twice, making the 2025 Triple Crown trail feel like a two-act play. The 2026 trail has its own cast. Let’s meet them.

Paladin

There’s a peculiar burden in arriving in Kentucky undefeated. Paladin carries it with an uncanny grace. Three starts, three wins: a juvenile maiden, the Grade 2 Remsen in the fall, and now the Risen Star under genuine duress. That last one matters most, because Chip Honcho—Steve Asmussen’s 1 1/8-mile specialist—was no pushover. Asmussen’s horses don’t surrender stakes races politely. Paladin took it anyway, grinding late under Gaffalione without flash, without margin to spare, without flinching.

Here’s what separates him from typical Remsen-to-Risen Star travelers: Gun Runner stamina. The sire threw Knicks Go, threw Olympiad—horses who turned the classic distances into weapons, not tests. Brown knows this pedigree. He spaces his horses, keeps them fresh between starts, and has an almost telepathic read on when a horse has another gear available. 

The Blue Grass at Keeneland on April 4 is next, a Grade 1 big purse extravaganza that distributes points on a 100-25-15 scale. Win that, and online betting sites will slash odds on his inevitable coronation even further. The latest horse racing at Bovada odds already have Paladin listed as the +650 frontrunner in the Triple Crown opening Kentucky Derby, and he may not be that lengthy for much longer if he does reign supreme in Lexington. 

He has the record. He has the trainer. He has the bloodlines that suit Belmont’s marathon. Now, he must live up to the billing. As Journalism proved last year, that’s easier said than done.

Nearly

Todd Pletcher stood in the Gulfstream winner’s circle on January 31 with the expression of a man who’d been holding a royal flush for weeks.  Nearly—a Florida-bred Not This Time colt owned by Centennial Farms, ridden masterfully by John Velazquez—had just dismantled the Holy Bull field in 1:44.52, winning by 5¾ lengths off fractions of 22.82 and 45.96. Those are torrid numbers for a 1 1/16-mile prep. And yet, Nearly sat outside Cannoneer looking, as US Racing put it, like he was out for a morning jog. When Velazquez shifted his weight at the quarter pole, the race was over. Almost instantly. 

Don’t sleep on the arc. Unplaced, unplaced, allowance winner, Holy Bull annihilator. Pletcher pupils have done this before; he’s sent Always Dreaming, Super Saver, and Nyquist down this trail and understood the calendar better than any trainer alive. Plus, the partnership with Velazquez carries institutional memory worth millions. 

But the 98 Beyer invites skepticism, too. That 27.54 final quarter—did he earn it, or did Cannoneer’s pace implosion gift it? The Florida Derby at Gulfstream on March 28 will answer that. A genuine pace test at 1 1/8 miles against fresh competition will tell us whether Nearly’s figure reflects class or context. 

Can he reach 1¼ miles in May? Velazquez has ridden enough classic winners to know the answer already. We’ll find out together.

Renegade

Eight of nine. That’s where Irad Ortiz Jr. found himself with half a mile to run in the Sam F. Davis at Tampa Bay on February 7. Then Renegade made his move. Into Mischief colt, three-start maiden—and Ortiz pointed him five-wide around the far turn like he was steering a freight train through a roundabout. What followed was closer to violation than horse race. 

He vaporized Wayne’s Law approaching the final furlong, won by 3¾ lengths, and earned a Beyer jump to 92 alongside a 100 Equibase figure that made figures analysts double-check their software. Rival jockeys were using the word monster. Mike Repole, co-owner alongside Robert and Lawana Low, was fist-pumping like he’d just hit a walk-off home run. He’s been here before—Always Dreaming, Vino Rosso—and he knows what a Pletcher closer loaded with quality looks like at this stage. 

Here’s the rub. Churchill Downs is a closer’s gauntlet at the best of times. Twenty horses, two turns, the quarter pole crammed with traffic. The Davis’s wide-open Tampa Bay oval handed Renegade exactly the clear path a five-wide rally requires. Churchill won’t. 

The Arkansas Derby at Oaklawn on March 28 is his litmus test—not for speed, but for tactical intelligence. Does he show enough stalker ability to win without circumnavigating the field? If Pletcher can dial in a forward position, Renegade becomes terrifying. If not, he’s the most dramatic horse in the field who ultimately falters before finishing fifth.