He has twice owned the runner-up and described this victory as "the best thing I ever saw".
The Champion Stakes win was a poignant one as it was the year after the trainer split with Sheikh Mohammed, who sponsored the race and owned the runner-up Halling.
"I love the fact he's calling his shots," said Terry Finley, who manages West Point Thoroughbred, the partnership that owns Macho Again, the runner-up in the Preakness who is back to challenge Big Brown.
Training was hardly a stretch -- her father, Fred, founded one of California's largest breeding operations, Cardiff Stud Farm, and owned the 1983 Kentucky Derby runner-up, Desert Wine.
Pipe's second favourite for the Champion Hurdle is last year's runner-up, Osana, owned by the Scottish businessman Thomas Barr, who replaced the stable jockey Tom Scudamore with Paddy Brennan for the horse's comeback run at Sandown.
Carlton House, also owned by the Queen, was runner-up to So You Think in the Prince of Wales's Stakes on Wednesday.
Nancy Alberts, who owns and trains the Preakness runner-up, Magic Weisner, initially said she would not start in the Belmont, but was hedging today.
The runner-up, Mark Croghan, who owns 13 of the top 20 American performances, did not run in this year's nationals and at 33 may be past his prime.
Two days later, Mrs. Clinton attended one of her campaign fund-raisers and basked in the praise of Senator Barbara A. Mikulski of Maryland, the first female Democrat to be elected to the Senate in her own right, and Katharine McPhee, the runner-up on "American Idol" in 2006.
In fact, Germany's own Blik became the 2017 runner-up of Startup Battlefield Berlin.
