NEW ORLEANS – By the time you read this, Steve Asmussen might have sent out his 10,000th North American winner. No one ever has done this, obviously, as Asmussen, 57, is the all-time North American leader in training wins, 9,997 through Tuesday. Among active trainers, Jerry Hollendorfer, 76, has the next-highest total, 7,757. Todd Pletcher, who is 55, has roughly half the number of Asmussen wins, while 87-year-old D. Wayne Lukas is closing on 5,000 career winners. In other words, it’s not even close. The sheer volume of victories could blow your mind. Imagine winning one horse race every day for 27 years. Even that won’t quite get you to 10,000. “I’m amazed, I really am,” said Asmussen, who never fails to mention longtime assistants Scott Blasi and Darren Fleming when talking about his own accomplishments. You wonder how many of the 10,000 Asmussen would trade for just one win in the Kentucky Derby. Asmussen, as he endlessly has been told the last few years, never has won the race. Derby-wise, the last nine months have proven especially frustrating. Asmussen trained the 2022 champion 3-year-old, Epicenter, who came to the Derby in peak form and ran the best race among 20 entrants. But Epicenter caught the wrong wave in the Derby race flow, moving at the half-mile pole into a furious pace, which left him vulnerable to a sneaky late run from an inferior foe, Rich Strike. Asmussen came into the 2022 Derby believing he had the best horse and came out of it, shocked, feeling the same way. :: KENTUCKY DERBY 2023: Derby Watch, point standings, prep schedule, news, and more Last October, on the other side of Derby season, Asmussen at Keeneland debuted a 2-year-old colt named Extra Anejo. Owned, like Epicenter, by Asmussen’s longtime client, Ron Winchell’s Winchell Thoroughbreds, Extra Anejo had cost $1.35 million at auction. He was worth every penny. In a long one-turn race, appearing every bit the true route horse, he won by 9 1/2 lengths and got a 92 Beyer Speed Figure. Extra Anejo went on to post three timed workouts, but instead of another start, he underwent surgery to remove a bone chip in a hind ankle late last year. Cleared in January to resume training, the colt is mixing morning jogs and gallops at Fair Grounds, still among the most promising horses in his class. “He’s an Adonis,” Asmussen said. But it’s mid-February now. Extra Anejo still has fitness to gain before being permitted even mild fast work. Never say never, but the Kentucky Derby comes the first Saturday in May and the calendar stays fixed. Still, you don’t have to squint to see Asmussen isn’t out of the picture yet. He runs three horses – Silver Heist, Private Creed, and Harlocap – on Saturday at Fair Grounds in this weekend’s key Derby prep, the Risen Star Stakes. Another talented Asmussen sophomore, sharp Fair Grounds debut sprint winner First Defender, stretches to two turns in a first-level allowance race earlier on the card. Disarm, perhaps second in the stable only to Extra Anejo in terms of raw talent, makes his first start since Saratoga on Sunday at Oaklawn Park, where Red Route One and Gun Pilot are set to contest the $1 million Rebel Stakes on Feb. 25. Shoppers Revenge, by Tapit out of Breeders’ Cup Distaff winner Stopchargingmaria, notched an easy second-start maiden route win Jan. 14 at Oaklawn. “I think that we have a lot to prove with some extremely talented horses,” Asmussen said. This might be a good year to have a large arsenal of developing 3-year-olds. Standouts in the division are sparse. Forte, champion 2-year-old, has gotten onto a regular workout pattern in Florida, while Cave Rock, beaten as the favorite by Forte in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile, finally had his first 2023 workout earlier this week. Neither is anything near a cinch to be the same sort of horse at 3 as they were at 2. Newgate got hurt after posting a 100 Beyer winning the Robert Lewis Stakes. Derby preps the last two weekends have underwhelmed. Cave Rock, Newgate, and several other extremely talented colts are trained by Bob Baffert, who remains banned from Derby participation this year. Owners of Derby hopefuls in his barn are faced with moving their stock to a different trainer if they want to accumulate qualifying points for the Derby. That’s what has happened with Risen Star entrant Harlocap, who arrived at Asmussen’s Fair Grounds stables earlier this week after working for Baffert on Feb. 11 at Santa Anita. Asmussen’s trio is among a full field of 14 in the 1 1/8-mile Risen Star. Clearly, no one fears unbeaten Victory Formation, not even his own trainer, Brad Cox, who entered two others, Angel of Empire and Tapit’s Conquest. Private Creed’s six starts, including a good third in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf Sprint, have come on grass. “He works well on dirt. I wanted to try him on it,” Asmussen said. Silver Heist debuted with a sprint win, then was an even third in a Jan. 21 dirt-route allowance at Fair Grounds. “He’ll move forward,” Asmussen said. :: Take your handicapping to the next level and play with FREE DRF Past Performances - Formulator or Classic.  Sterner stuff could be surfacing in Arkansas. Red Route One, a late-running second to divisional powerhouse Arabian Knight in the Southwest Stakes, might’ve been best in the Nov. 26 Kentucky Jockey Club, where he encountered compromising stretch traffic – part of the peril of being a one-run closer. “He’s getting better at the right time,” Asmussen said Monday. “His work yesterday was easily the best he’s put in.” Disarm, who Asmussen said possesses “limitless potential,” came out of his eye-catching Saratoga maiden win, a loaded race, not quite right in his hind end. He got plenty of recovery time and might need his comeback start Sunday, Asmussen said. First Defender, Gun Pilot, Shopper’s Revenge – the raw ability is there. It remains to be seen what these horses become. Asmussen already has become the winning-most trainer in American racing history. Roughly 10,000 things can go right or wrong for a 3-year-old between mid-February and early May. You never know when it’s going to be your year. :: Want to learn more about handicapping and wagering? Check out DRF's Handicapping 101 and Wagering 101 pages.