“My owner has a one-horse stable. He’s a blue-collar guy,” Ness said. “It’s a big race, more than anything. The money is no joke.”

“I’m not surprised [that they appealed],” said Ain’t Da Beer Cold’s trainer, Kenny Cox. “I might have done the same thing.”

Jockey Jevian Toledo sent Ain’t Da Beer Cold right to the front in the Classic, and the five-year-old responded with one of the best races of his career. He maintained a clear advantage for much of the way and dug in tenaciously when confronted in the stretch by Market Maven, with Carlos Lopez up.

[See stretch run video above]

In upper stretch the two rivals were on nearly even terms while separated by two or three paths, with Ain’t Da Beer Cold near the rail and Market Maven to the outside. Inside the eighth pole, Market Maven came down towards Ain’t Da Beer Cold and appeared to bump him. The two drifted back apart before Market Maven again came towards the rail, though there was no contact the second time.

Market Maven was ahead at the wire; the official chart margin was a neck.

Maryland’s rules of the race say that a horse may not “jostle another horse; intimidate another horse; or impede another horse.”

“A horse may be disqualified if it, or the jockey riding it, is involved in a violation of… this regulation,” they read. Under these rules, the foul need not affect the order of finish.

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Cox, whose wife, Kelly, co-bred the horse along with Matt Spencer and, with Spencer and Bonuccelli Racing, co-owns him, said he thinks under Maryland’s standards, it was the right call.

“If you look at it, he does it intentionally, and he did bump me,” the trainer said. “If he doesn’t come over, I was digging back in.”

Ness disagrees, and he believes his horse would have won regardless.

“My phone’s never dinged as many times as after that DQ,” he said. “Those guys [stewards] have a tough job to do. We just feel like it was the wrong call.”

The stewards’ decision to disqualify was unanimous.

Ness indicated that the decision to appeal was made to preserve all of their side’s options and they had not yet decided to follow the appeal through to its conclusion. When cases are appealed to the Commission, that body hears them de novo, meaning the case is heard from the beginning as if it were a new case altogether.

Commission executive director Michael Hopkins said that the hearing had not yet been scheduled but that it would not take place prior to or at the next Commission meeting, which is scheduled for October 31.