The Preakness Stakes are kicking off this afternoon at nearby Pimlico, and a Cochranville horse detective has the inside scoop on which of America’s best racehorses are cut out to handle a run for the Triple Crown.

Equine athletic psychologist Kerry Thomas often goes face to face with the talented thoroughbreds, watching for the slightest twitches, tics and flickers that might give away about the horse’s mental fortitude,  a feature in The Wall St. Journal explained.

“He takes note of herd dynamics and ‘jostling of hierarchy’ when horses are near each other, behavior he learned to pay attention to over hours observing wild horses in Wyoming and Montana,” the article stated. “It isn’t unlike the way basketball teams size each other up when players shoot rounds before a game.”

And the $20-a-copy evaluation he provides before race day has highly ranked the sensory abilities of the most recent four Kentucky Derby winners prior to this year’s race.

“Just like any athlete, the ones who can handle stress and perform under pressure excel on a consistent basis,” he said in the article.

And there are few places where stress and pressure are greater for a horse than on the dirt at Pimlico or Churchill Downs.

Read much more about Thomas’ background, his Thomas Herding Technique and what other handicappers think of the approach in The Wall Street Journal here. You can also find a preview of the Preakness Stakes here.

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Top photo credit: 139th Preakness Stakes via photopin (license)