For Union Rags, It Was Over Before It Began They say a picture is worth a thousand words; these pictures tell a story of how Union Rags started poorly in this year's Kentucky Derby. Union Rags is the No. 4 horse, with the big white blaze on his forehead. You can see him coming out of the gate, with one eye on the horse to his inside, Take Charge Indy. Take Charge Indy broke from the gate to his right, despite the efforts of Calvin Borel to keep him straight. You can see Borel's efforts by looking at the angle of Take Charge Indy's head, relative to his body. Three things occurred that compromised Union Rags" next few steps from the gate. He veered away from the horse on his inside, rather than hold his ground, which may have resulted in a little bumping. He broke a step slower than the horse on his outside, Dullahan, who kept a very straight course. This resulted in Union Rags" knocking into Dullahan, and getting pinched back. All this occurred in less than a second. There is no time for a jockey to think, it's all instinct. Julien Leparoux's first indication that things were not going smoothly was likely when Union Rags drifted away from Take Charge Indy. By the time he could react to this move, Union Rags was already running into Dullahan. All this occurred during the fastest part of the race. While Union Rags was being shuffled back to third to last (he was in 18th place after the first quarter of a mile), the frontrunners had blazed the first quarter of a mile in 22.32 seconds. Union Rags was nearly 15 lengths off the pace at that point. Because Dullahan kept a nice straight line coming out of the gate, despite the action to his inside, Bodemeister, who broke out of Gate 6, had a very clean break. Bodemeister was able to easily get to the lead, a lead he held until inside the sixteenth pole of the race. Union Rags had gate schooled very well leading to the Kentucky Derby. There was no indication that he would break slowly. He had broken well in his previous starts, and when breaking out of the gate in the mornings during his early training, he had come out very well. In horse racing, you have to be prepared for the unexpected. Unfortunately for Michael Matz's team, they were compromised by two unexpected events, an uncharacteristically poor break, and the inability to hold a straight line that would have allowed him to recover more quickly. Unfortunately, that's horse racing.