Rich Strike might have been the first horse to win the Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve (G1) after having been claimed, but he was not the first to run for a tag prior to winning the Derby. In the modern era, three other future Derby winners ran in claiming races without changing hands: Mine That Bird (2009), who won a $62,500 maiden claimer; Charismatic (1999), who started twice with a $62,500 tag; and Dust Commander (1970), who ran for a $7,500 tag in his second start.
All four were pricy compared to Apollo (1882) and Elwood (1904). Both ran in selling races (the precursors to modern claiming races) prior to their big days at Churchill Downs, and both were offered at less than $1,000.
Unlike a claiming race, horses ran in selling races for price tags which were the minimum bids for a post-race auction. If no one put in a claim for a horse, the horse stayed with its owner, just as in the modern claiming system. If one or more people did submit a claim, the auction was on, with the horse going to the highest bidder—who could be the original owner if he or she was willing to outbid any claimants.
In 1882, Apollo entered a New Orleans selling race on April 18 with a starting price tag of just $900. Unplaced in two tries at 2, Apollo had run second in the April 11 Pickwick Stakes, and that was where he finished again as a lowly selling plater. After the race, there were no takers, but the gelding's form began improving. Four weeks later, Apollo ran heavily favored Runnymede down in the shadow of the wire to win the Kentucky Derby by a half-length at 10-1 odds. As later events proved, he was no champion, but by the end of the season, he had won six stakes races and earned $14,030.
Elwood was offered even more cheaply than Apollo. Purchased from Missouri breeder Emma Prather for $700 as a yearling, the colt started in a selling race on March 31, 1903, at Memphis with a price tag of $500. He won an expensive victory for owner-trainer "Boots" Durnell and his partner Emile Herz, who paid $1,605 to buy the colt back out of the post-race auction, only to have him fail to win another race from a 17-start juvenile campaign.
Given to Durnell's wife, Lasca Durnell, as a wedding gift sometime after August 1903, the "Missouri Mule" ran in at least two more selling races among 17 starts in California in 1904 before coming to Louisville and putting Mrs. Durnell's name in the record books as the first woman to own a Kentucky Derby winner. He also made Mrs. Prather the first woman credited with breeding a Derby winner and so is better remembered for his part in the history of women in racing than for his dubious distinction as the cheapest-priced claimer or selling plater ever to win the Kentucky Derby.
