Mo Donegal Wins the Belmont, Ending Rich Strike’s Magical Story

So, fairy tales do not have legs in horse racing.

If they did, Sonny Leon aboard Rich Strike would have been ding-donging down the stretch of the 154th running of the Belmont Stakes on Saturday.

Instead, a colt named Mo Donegal, trained by Todd Pletcher, who is based in New York, and ridden by the nation’s top rider — another New Yorker, Irad Ortiz Jr. — made sure the trophy for what is known as the Test of the Champion stayed home.

The results attest to the mundane nature of the final leg of the Triple Crown: Mo Donegal lived up to his status as a nearly 3-to-1 favorite, finishing the mile-and-a-half marathon in a final time of 2:28.29. The colt paid its backers $7.20 for a $2 bet and rewarded its owners, Donegal Racing and Repole Stable, with an $800,000 first-place check.

Mo Donegal left little doubt that he was the best horse on Saturday. He blew past the early pacesetter We the People in the stretch and held off his stablemate Nest, a filly, for an easy three-length victory. Skippylongstocking was a distant third.

“I thought both horses were traveling really great the whole way,” Pletcher said. “The one thing I told Irad was to be patient, and I think he got the best trip in the race.”