Super Derby is on Sat., September 25.

There is always intrigue surrounding a horse who is undefeated. Growing-up I was fascinated with them, especially as a fan who didn’t dig deep into performances with a handicappers eye. I remember when Lite The Fuse won his first two races at Saratoga. I was there for both, and was stoked about seeing the next potential star of the sport because without a blemish on paper, anything was possible.

Golden Moka is undefeated heading into the Super Derby, and the ceiling of potential is unknown. His first four races were somewhat unorthodox – Panamanian sprints to a Canadian Triple Crown race off the layoff – but he’s handled each start just fine. And when you combine the human interest element, he quickly becomes a horse to root for.

Golden Moka: From Panama to Canada To Bossier City. Can he do it?

From Remon to Canada to Bossier City

From what I can gather, Remon – where Golden Moka made his debut – is technically called Hipodromo Presidente Remon. The word hipodromo translates to racecourse. The track itself is located in the northeastearn portions of Panama City. According to one blogger, it’s where many well-known and famous riders broke their maidens. Braulio Baeza, Kentucky Derby winning jockey and ironically the Clerk of Scales at Louisiana Downs, joins Laffit Pincay, Jr. as jockeys who started their careers at there.

Golden Moka’s first three races in Panama were all sprints, which he handled with ease.

“He’s just a very good horse. I think they sprinted him early down there because that’s probably what they do. He has enough natural ability to get away with it. But ideally, I think he’s bred to go long.” -Brian Lynch

Lynch said the Prince of Wales became an option as he began to realize the raw talent of Golden Moka combined with how he was performing in the morning. He told me, “I’m usually not that ambitious, I don’t like to run a horse like that off a long layoff.”

He prefers instead to run a horse short first before stretching-out. Out of curiosity, I ran his name through Formulator and found that in the past five years he started just eight horses off layoffs of 180 days or longer going from sprint-to-route. Of those eight, three of them won (including Golden Moka) while two of them ran second. The ROI is a juicy $4.42.

Replay: Golden Moka winning the Prince of Wales

How good was the field Golden Moka beat in the Prince of Wales?

There were only seven horses in the Prince of Wales this year, but thus far, the form is holding-up fairly well. Second place finisher Mobil Unit subsequently ran second in a $125,000 Canadian-bred stake at Woodbine as the heavy-favorite while Mobthewarrior, who was fifth in the Prince of Wales, also ran second in a similar stake.  While neither would be serious contenders in a grade one, at least on their current form, they are fairly legitimate stakes horses.

Ultimately, the question becomes whether or not Golden Moka takes a step forward or not. On paper, he’s fairly level with both Apart and Hurricane Ike on raw figures. The Prince of Wales was also his first race in eight months and first as a 3-year-old. Any improvement in his second start of the year would make him tough to beat.

Meanwhile, Lynch remains cautiously optimistic.

“I think we’ve given him the right time between races so that he doesn’t bounce. He’s trained super up to this race. His work the other day was very nice. He’s sitting on a big race.” – Brian Lynch

We’ll soon find out if he’s right.