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Kentucky Derby winner tests positive for banned substance

HORSE RACING: MAY 01 Kentucky Derby
Brian Spurlock/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

(NEW YORK) — Kentucky Derby winner Medina Spirit has tested positive for a banned substance, according to trainer Bob Baffert. 

The Kentucky Derby Horse Racing commission notified Baffert and the team that the horse tested positive for 21 picograms of betamethasone.

“We did not give the horse [betamethasone], no one here gave it to him” Baffert said at a morning press conference at Churchill Downs in Louisville, KY.  Betamethasone is a joint injection/anti-inflammatory medication.

Baffert announced they will be doing their own investigation. 

The tested sample was drawn after last week’s Kentucky Derby.  Baffert says that Medina Spirit is still the Derby winner until further DNA samples are drawn and investigation is completed.

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