While Chrome's owner lashed out like a sore loser, the point was that the Triple Crown indicates by the word "
triple" that it is a series of
three races. Sitting out and resting the horse during the first 2 races doesn't seem like a series completion.
The Belmont Stakes is an American grade I stakes Thoroughbred horse race held every June at Belmont Park in Elmont, New York. It is a 1.5 miles (2.4 km) horse race, open to three-year-old Thoroughbreds. Colts and geldings carry a weight of 126 pounds (57 kg); fillies carry 121 pounds (55 kg). The race, nicknamed The Test of the Champion, is the third and final leg of the U.S. Triple Crown. It follows five weeks after the Kentucky Derby, and three weeks after the Preakness Stakes, on a Saturday between June 5 and June 11. The 1973 Belmont Stakes and Triple Crown winner Secretariat holds the mile and a half stakes record (which is also a track and world record on dirt) of 2:24.
Belmont Stakes - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia