The Show for May 12, 2026: Water for Project Blue, a local Kentucky Derby contender and more

Tucson leaders unanimously rejected the construction of a massive data center last year amid concerns about water use. But the developers of Project Blue used some Tucson water anyway. Plus, a Chandler couple’s experience at the Kentucky Derby, watching a horse they own race.

Transcript

MARK BRODIE: Hi, I’m Mark Brodie, co-host of The Show, an original production from KJZZ. Every weekday we bring you the latest news and culture from across the state. You can find much more at theshow.kjzz.org. Here’s today’s episode.

LAUREN GILGER: Good morning and welcome to The Show here on KJZZ 91.5 in Phoenix. I’m Lauren Gilger.

MARK BRODIE: And I’m Mark Brodie. Coming up, the U.S. Navy is commissioning a new version of the USS Arizona. We’ll hear from someone who’s been back East to check on its progress.

LAUREN GILGER: And a longtime Valley restaurant critic is retiring. What’s left of criticism in the Valley?

MARK BRODIE: But first …

LAUREN GILGER: Tucson leaders unanimously rejected a massive data center dubbed Project Blue last year amid outcry from the community with concerns about water, power, and resources that they didn’t want put toward a data center. It was a heated moment that came to a head during an August county meeting.

PAUL CUNNINGHAM: Your honor, I think we gotta take the vote.

REGINA ROMERO: Let’s—let’s vote.

UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Ms. Uhlich?

KARIN UHLICH: Aye.

UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Mrs. Lee?

NIKKI LEE: Aye.

UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Mr. Dahl?

KEVIN DAHL: Aye.

UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Mr. Cunningham?

PAUL CUNNINGHAM: Aye.

UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Vice Mayor Santa Cruz?

LANE SANTA CRUZ: Aye.

UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Mayor Romero?

REGINA ROMERO: Aye. Item passes. Thank you all.

But despite that vote, the project is still being built. Developer Beale Infrastructure got the zoning they needed from Pima County instead and announced they would build the data center to be air-cooled instead of water-cooled.

But now Tucson says a contractor working on the construction of Project Blue has been using Tucson water anyway and they’ve revoked their permit to do it.

Jim Nintzel is covering it for the Tucson Sentinel and joined The Show to talk more.

LAUREN GILGER: Good morning, Jim.

JIM NINTZEL: Good morning. Thanks for having me on, Lauren.

LAUREN GILGER: Thank you for coming on. So tell us how this story about the use of Tucson water here came to light, Jim. Like, the city doesn’t seem to have known that their water was being used in a way for the construction of Project Blue?

JIM NINTZEL: That’s right. Some protesters were out at the construction site, which is outside of the city of Tucson near our county fairgrounds, and they noticed that the contractors were spraying down the dust that has, you know, goes along with the construction process.

And they asked the city, "Hey, where are they getting this water?" And the city did some looking into it, and they discovered that Tucson Water had granted a permit to tap into the water line in order for the contractor to do that. And the contractor was putting the water into trucks and hauling it out to the construction site and using it to spray down the dirt.

And the city decided, "Hey, listen, you can’t be using our water in that manner." The city manager wrote a letter to the Project Blue folks at Beale Infrastructure and said, "Not only are we mad that you’re using our water, we’re taking that permit back and we expect you to give us back 2 acre-feet of water in water credits."

LAUREN GILGER: Right. So this letter from the city manager was pretty strongly worded. Let’s just back up and have you remind us a little bit, Jim, about how this all came to be, because Project Blue was so controversial at the city level even though it sounds like city leaders initially were pretty gung-ho.

JIM NINTZEL: They were. This was something being worked out by both Pima County and the city of Tucson. Pima County actually owned the land and sold it to the developer. They also rezoned it for this.

The next step was the city was going to annex the property, and then the developer was going to build a big pipeline leading out to the area to extend the city’s reclaimed water system — the water that’s been through the reclamation process after going through the sewer system. And there’s a lot of that around Tucson. It’s very expensive, so it’s hard for them to sell, but the Beale folks were going to purchase that and use it to air-cool the facility.

And once word got out about this, there was just a tremendous blowback in the community, and the city decided to pull the plug on that particular deal. However, Beale said, "You know what? We’re going to move ahead with this anyway, and instead of using the water to cool the system, we’ll use an air-cooling system."

LAUREN GILGER: Right. OK, so it’s still happening. Have you gotten a response to this latest report, Jim, about the water use from this contractor to tamp down the dust at the construction site? What does Beale Infrastructure have to say to the city manager?

JIM NINTZEL: Beale Infrastructure said, "Hey, listen, we didn’t know we were doing anything wrong. We had our contractor apply for the permit. Tucson Water gave us the permit, and we have been using the water and we’ll pay for the water and the subcontractor will be paying for the water." For the cost of the water, essentially.

LAUREN GILGER: Right. But this has become such a lightning rod in Tucson that it sounds like that’s not going to fly with the city.

JIM NINTZEL: Well, they said that they would be reviewing their legal and political options with the City Council if indeed the 2 acre-feet credits were not submitted to the city.

LAUREN GILGER: How else might Beale Infrastructure get the water for the construction site if not from the city?

JIM NINTZEL: Well, the opponents — the No Desert Data Center organization — has been doing a little research and they have discovered that it appears that Beale has applied for a permit to simply drill on the site that they have through the Arizona Department of Water Resources. So they’re apparently moving forward with a plan to just drill on their own property in order to have the water they need for this particular element of the project.

LAUREN GILGER: Yeah. So let’s back up before I let you go, Jim, and just talk about the broader context that this is happening in, right? Like, data center projects have been and become controversial all over the country. But this one in Tucson really seems to have hit a nerve.

Why do you think that is? Like, what about this particular proposal or the way people went about doing it? Why do you think people in Tucson got so angry about Project Blue?

JIM NINTZEL: I think it had a lot to do with water and the idea that they were going to be using water, which is, you know, a pretty important resource here, especially as we’re looking at what’s going with the Colorado River and the possibility that the CAP may turn off its taps to Tucson or significantly reduce what they’re sending our way.

I think it’s also frustration with the idea that these data centers are using so much energy and so much water — and this is not, the county officials say this is not going to be an AI data center, that could change in the future, presumably. But I think a lot of the concern is that we’re going to be using incredible amounts of both electricity and water to power these things across the country, and we’re developing this artificial intelligence that seems designed to take away a lot of people’s jobs and, you know, for our particular business, flood the zone with an insane amount of AI-generated stories that may or may not be true.

LAUREN GILGER: Very interesting. I mean, the developers of this and other data centers though argue that, you know, it brings some jobs, a lot of economic impact dollars come with these data centers. I mean, do they understand, it sounds like, the concerns from the community or do they think, you know, this is misguided?

JIM NINTZEL: I think they think the concerns are misguided and they’re moving full steam ahead with this. And I think that the community’s response has been pretty dramatic in terms of saying, "Hey, no, we don’t want this thing here," but I don’t know that they’re really going to be successful in stopping it.

There’s another one under construction in the Marana area, also by Beale Infrastructure, and that one was headed for a vote at the ballot after folks collected enough signatures, but the Marana town clerk rejected it, saying that the legal description that was passed around in those petitions was incorrect and they found a basically a legal technicality to boot it off the ballot.

LAUREN GILGER: Very interesting stuff. All right, I’m sure more to come on this front, but we’ll leave it there for now. Jim Nintzel covering this for the Tucson Sentinel. Jim, thank you so much for joining us. Appreciate it.

JIM NINTZEL: Oh, always a pleasure. Thank you so much.

LAUREN GILGER: Good morning. It is The Show here on KJZZ 91.1. I’m Lauren Gilger.

MARK BRODIE: And I’m Mark Brodie.

A famous nautical name with an Arizona connection is a couple of years from getting a new life in the seas.

A group from Arizona recently traveled to Connecticut and Rhode Island to see the future USS Arizona, which is currently being built there. The new submarine could be commissioned by 2029.

The name of the vessel is synonymous with American history; its bombing in Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, was described by President Franklin D. Roosevelt as a date which will "live in infamy."

Nicole LaSlavic, president and CEO of the USS Arizona Legacy Foundation, was on the East Coast tour. She joined The Show to talk more about it.

And Nicole, what did you see while you were there?

NICOLE LASLAVIC: Yes, so correct. We were back — the USS Arizona Legacy Foundation — with delegates from the Greater Phoenix Chamber. And we had the opportunity to visit both the General Dynamics Electric Boat facility in Quonset Point, Rhode Island, as well as their facility in Groton, Connecticut. Both locations are currently building portions of the submarine.

When you think about a submarine, you kind of want to think about it as they form donuts. So, very large rings, and once they complete one section, they will weld a large section to the next section. So over time, eventually you end up with a full submarine.

And so up in Rhode Island, we were able to see parts of the internal structure of the submarine going into the outer perimeter of the submarine. And then once again while we were back down in Groton, Connecticut, we were able to see kind of the middle portion of the submarine at this point, but we have pieces in both locations, so we’re a little ways off from being completed.

MARK BRODIE: So I have been lucky enough to be on a submarine, like a World War II-era submarine. I assume the technology and and other aspects of it have evolved since then.

NICOLE LASLAVIC: Yeah, most certainly. So on a submarine, the technology has evolved quite significantly from World War II submarines, even in the last couple decades. When you think about the control panels, a lot of them are going to more of a touchscreen operation. When you think about the periscope, that’s no longer actually something that you look into, but it’s something that’s, it’s an electronic thing. And so you can see it on a screen; you can have a 360 view.

They also control things through PlayStation handles or game controllers. And so there’s been a forward movement in the technology and realizing what our submariners are used to. They grow up playing games nowadays, and so they wanted to implement what was best for their hand-eye coordination and that was what the Navy determined actually would be best suited for that particular part of the boat.

With regards to the USS Arizona, we are a unique boat in that we are a Virginia payload module boat, which means that we’re going to have 84 additional feet on our submarine. And this will account for four additional vertical tubes that house seven Tomahawk missiles each. And so currently our Tomahawk missile capacity is 12 and this will take us to a total of 40.

And so that’s another technological advancement as well as an engineering advancement that I think Electric Boat has had to have a learning curve because it is essentially a new subsector of the Virginia-class submarine.

MARK BRODIE: So given that, safe to say that when this is ready, this submarine will be going to some of the hottest hotspots around the world.

NICOLE LASLAVIC: Yeah, I would assume so. You know, we don’t have any specifics on where we will be based out of as of right now. Obviously that’s something that will be determined by the U.S. Navy in a handful of years, but I think that, you know, there’s been conversations about possibly having it based out of Pearl Harbor. Obviously there’s a strong significance with the boat being named the USS Arizona and then the USS Arizona BB-39, which was the battleship sunk on December 7, 1941.

MARK BRODIE: So what do the folks who are building this, what do the folks who might be serving on it have to say about both sort of the technological aspects of it but also maybe some of the emotional significance given that, you know, the sinking of the USS Arizona is what in large part led this country into World War II and now there’s a new submarine given the same name?

NICOLE LASLAVIC: Well, I think when you look at the individuals who are working on the boat at General Dynamics, I do think they have a sense of pride in in this and they understand the historical significance of it being named the USS Arizona. In fact, when you walk around, many of them are actually wearing shirts that designate them as working on the USS Arizona. Through various conversations I’ve had with them, they seem to understand the significance of bringing something with such historical value into the future.

Now when I meet with our sailors, it is something that they’ve definitely been educated on. Obviously we are in a very different position than many submarines that come aboard, but that being said, I know that each one of them that I’ve met with and had conversations with, they recognize what the USS Arizona means to the nation. They know that it is of national significance and to honor the men that came before them is something that I think they take a lot of pride in and they recognize the value of giving to your country and what it means to them and what it would have meant to the men that came before them.

MARK BRODIE: So when you talk about what the USS Arizona means to this country, I’m interested to get your perspective on what it means to this state. Because obviously we live in a desert, we are landlocked, no submarines really coming anywhere near Arizona, and yet there really seems to be a sense of ownership of the name and of whichever vessel it is attached to of people who live here.

NICOLE LASLAVIC: Yeah. Well, kind of a fun fact: this is actually the fourth Navy vessel to be named the USS Arizona. And so there were two that were named previous to the battleship. But the battleship was named and it was christened into the U.S. Navy in 1915. And then obviously, you know, with the historical significance of that, we had sailors who were survivors of the battleship BB-39.

And they realized over time that with the survivors passing and, you know, the families being, you know, left behind, that the ability to remember was going to fade away with their passing and time. And so they actually went to then-Acting Secretary of the Navy Thomas Modly and said, "Hey, we need to name another vessel the USS Arizona." So it was something that came from the remaining survivors, it came from the family of survivors, and the significance being that if it was lost to time, that they wouldn’t remember.

And so in 2019, that’s when then-acting secretary of the Navy named the USS Arizona SSN-803 submarine. And so it was an opportunity for us to come back to the state of Arizona and say, "Hey, you know, we don’t want to forget the USS Arizona that came before us. We do want to recognize the significance and the remembrance of those men who gave their lives or the men who, you know, ultimately did survive."

And so, you know, even if you go down to the Arizona state Capitol, you can see numerous memorials. You can see the silver set, it’s in the museum that’s in the state of Arizona. I recognize that we are a landlocked state, that we’re a desert state and it’s one of those things you don’t often see sailors walking around the state of Arizona, but I will tell you when we get our crew out here and we have them at community events or schools, it is something that’s quite impactful.

Our citizens have wonderful responses, they’re always engaged, they do say, "Hey, what are you doing here in the middle of the desert?" But you know, it gives them an opportunity to talk about the USS Arizona and what it means to carry the legacy forward.

MARK BRODIE: All right, Nicole. Thanks so much. I appreciate it.

NICOLE LASLAVIC: Yeah, thank you.

MARK BRODIE: Nicole LaSlavic is president and CEO of the USS Arizona Legacy Foundation.

LAUREN GILGER: Good morning, it’s The Show on KJZZ 91.5. I’m Mark Brodie.

LAUREN GILGER: And I’m Lauren Gilger. After 42 years, more than 3,000 restaurant reviews and countless profiles, features and more, Phoenix Magazine food critic Nikki Buchanan is hanging up her signature wig disguise and retiring. And here’s the thing: she is the last full-time at least semi-anonymous restaurant critic left in town. Now she is relinquishing her institutional knowledge, razor-sharp wit and top-notch palette to a host of food influencers and social media stars. And she will be missed. Nikki joins me now in studio to talk about her career, the art of a good review, and the future of this craft.

LAUREN GILGER: Good morning, Nikki. Congratulations on your retirement.

NIKKI BUCHANAN: Well, thank you. And thanks for having me.

LAUREN GILGER: Thanks for coming in. So you really wear a wig when you go to review a restaurant?

NIKKI BUCHANAN: Not necessarily. Actually, I do most of the time.

LAUREN GILGER: Do you really? What kinds?

NIKKI BUCHANAN: I have one on now.

LAUREN GILGER: Do you really? I can’t even tell.

NIKKI BUCHANAN: And I have various styles, it just depends on my mood.

LAUREN GILGER: OK. But this has to do with anonymity, right?

NIKKI BUCHANAN: It does. Although I have found over time that — well, always true if I’m going to some little, you know, mom-and-pop Thai restaurant or some place. They don’t have a PR team, they don’t keep up with all that, they don’t know who I am anyway. It doesn’t matter at all. It’s only somebody that’s sort of in that certain little segment of indie restaurants that are very chef-driven that somebody might be paying attention to that and actually even look on the list of reservations and say, "OK, someone’s coming in." There was a day I never used my own name.

LAUREN GILGER: Ah. Do you use it now?

NIKKI BUCHANAN: Yeah.

LAUREN GILGER: OK. So is this idea of anonymity in restaurant reviews sort of going away? Like, does this exist anymore?

NIKKI BUCHANAN: I don’t think it does that much. I think it’s still important. What I like about it, even though I’m not going to lie to you, I know I just had a retirement party with a million chefs there who all know my face, right? ... So that happens over 40-something years when you work with people in various ways and interview them or whatever.

But I think the thing that’s great about it is you really do get a snapshot of the restaurant as just a normal guy, just a normal person walking in. Are they giving you the same service they’re giving everyone else? Is that experience exactly the same? And I think that’s important. I think it’s valid.

LAUREN GILGER: Yeah. There was a time when you used to do restaurant reviews on "Good Morning Arizona" on Channel 3, right? You’d do them back to the camera. ... Just the silhouette of a wig.

NIKKI BUCHANAN: Right.

LAUREN GILGER: All right, so I want to back up and just talk a little bit about your long career here. 42 years in the Valley doing restaurant reviews is a long time, and you have this like vast institutional knowledge. I mean, over 42 years, four decades, like you’ve seen just massive amounts of change in the Valley. So I have to ask, can you even begin to describe just how much the dining scene here has changed in that time?

NIKKI BUCHANAN: Gosh, no. I mean, I can remember seriously in the ’80s driving around looking for a restaurant. I’m not lying to you. There wasn’t PR like there is now, right? So a lot of people have that.

Now it’s just a completely different ball game. It’s very easy to find out a lot of places that are open. That part is simple. Reviewing doesn’t feel the same. I don’t know, let me ask you guys, does it feel the same? When you read reviews, do they seem the same?

LAUREN GILGER: I think they do in kind of a way, yeah. I would say yeah.

NIKKI BUCHANAN: So you feel there’s still a critical element? There’s still a sense of, "I’m trying to give you the straight shot here."

LAUREN GILGER: Right. But so much of restaurant reviewing today is on social media, right? It’s on TikTok and it’s people who are definitely not anonymous. ... And there’s a pay-to-play aspect that happens in that world as well, right?

NIKKI BUCHANAN: I think so.

LAUREN GILGER: What do you think is lost with the loss of criticism like this?

NIKKI BUCHANAN: I think integrity and honesty. I think what happens is, I feel like my first job is to the reader. They’re coming to me to find out, "Hey, is that place worth going? Tell me if I should go there and tell me why I should or should not."

So that’s my responsibility is to just tell it straight. Do you need to be nasty about it? Sometimes it’s very fun to be or it’s very tempting to be. I mean, I’ve done that, I’m not going to lie, over the years. But mainly you’re just trying to get that information out without just slaughtering someone, but let your reader know what to expect.

LAUREN GILGER: Hard-earned dollars, where do they go?

NIKKI BUCHANAN: Yeah. 100%.

LAUREN GILGER: Can you do that, you think, fairly if you’re not anonymous, if you’re on social media doing, you know, what a lot of food influencers will do today?

NIKKI BUCHANAN: Well, that’s what I’m saying. Immediately, if f you’ve already made contact with them pre-visit and they’re giving you free food, please tell me what is, you know, unbiased about that? It’s a commercial, it’s an infomercial.

LAUREN GILGER: Very different than criticism. And you’re not just the last food critic left in town. There’s very few critics of any kind left in the Valley.

NIKKI BUCHANAN: I guess that’s true.

LAUREN GILGER: Right. Like I wonder what you think about that loss of criticism in general. Like what does having people who have sort of a sharp eye and are watching what happens in our cultural landscape, what do they do for a place?

NIKKI BUCHANAN: Yeah, that’s such a great point. I mean, to me part of what has happened is that citizen criticism has been elevated, right? So every guy has an opinion and they get to express it. And look, I’m not saying — I’m not going to be some elitist and tell you that’s not OK.

But at the same time, those of us who did work at this and made this a career for many years do have a knowledge of not only the chefs and their pedigrees and who they’ve worked for and what they’ve learned, we have eaten a certain dish a million times. We know the paradigmatic best example of that dish and how to gauge that going forward, you know?

And I just think that a lot of average people don’t know that. I know that’s going to sound super snobbish and someone’s, you know, going to object to that, but I think that is the value of a critic. And that’s what a lot of people paid for is somebody to tell me, "Don’t eat that, eat this."

LAUREN GILGER: ... OK, so 42 years is a very long time, but do you have any standout meals in that time? I have to ask.

NIKKI BUCHANAN: Gosh. It’s funny, it would be such a range. I mean, of course, you know kind of what happens on any given day, it’s what was your last one that was really good, you know what I mean? But of course for me, it’s a lot — there’s this, it’s half and half between all the big chefs in town where I’ve had, I still have memorable meals when I go see Nobu now at High Noon. I still — I went to Kevin Binkley’s new chef’s table at his own house. Right, that was insane, especially the bread course which was just nuts, you know?

So all of those kinds of things — ShinBay back in the day when Shinji Kurita was there, my gosh. You know, Chris Gross to go. So all those fancy ones, those are kind of stuck in my head. But I can tell you that at any given moment, there’s so much joy and pleasure in going to some Korean restaurant on the west side and going, "Oh my God, this is so good, and I’m loving every single bite, and it’s so sweet and humble and I — and it’s inexpensive." And there’s just as much pleasure in that.

LAUREN GILGER: Have you been able to kind of make a restaurant once or twice over your career?

NIKKI BUCHANAN: I would mean certainly people told me that last night. It was so heartwarming to have people say to me, "Man, you really helped me at a time, you know, when I needed that, we were just starting out" or whatever. And I would say to them, "Well, that’s my job." And they’d go, "Well, I know, but it still what — it helped us."

LAUREN GILGER: All right, last 30 seconds for you — which I realize is not enough time for this question — but what will you miss about it?

NIKKI BUCHANAN: Oh gosh. Well, going out to eat. I love to eat. There is no doubt about that. [LAUGHS] So that part, of course, and I think weirdly as much as I b-tch about it, I love writing. And I like the puzzle of writing. So I’ll miss that. And probably I’m going to miss getting a little ass-kissing now and then, too.

LAUREN GILGER: OK. All right, well we will leave it there. That is Phoenix Magazine food critic, longtime food critic here in the valley, Nikki Buchanan hanging up her wig and retiring from the gig. Nikki, thank you so much. Appreciate you coming on.

NIKKI BUCHANAN: Sure. Thank you for having me.

NBC BROADCAST: They’re off in the Kentucky Derby! Renegade getting bunched about on the inside, he did get in a little bit of traffic. Wonder Dean goes out to the front with Six Speed on the outside, and Danon Bourbon is up close with So Happy as well. So it’s these four to set the pace, then Emerging Market ...

MARK BRODIE: That was this year’s Kentucky Derby, as heard on NBC. One of the horses getting out to a fast start there was So Happy; he ultimately finished ninth.

But for my next guest, Hans and Ana Maron, the experience was still a thrill. They live in Chandler and own racehorses, including So Happy; they race under the Saints or Sinners banner. It was also the first horse trainer Mark Glatt had brought to the Derby — and it came a few months after his wife had passed away.

I caught up with Hans and Ana Maron earlier and asked what it meant for him to have a horse racing at the Kentucky Derby.

HANS MARON: Well, I mean, everybody dreams of winning the Kentucky Derby. I — it wasn’t my first dream I — just because I didn’t want to have too far of a lofty goal. I kind of opened up to the Breeders’ Cup just because more, you know, you could have an older horse or a younger horse get in.

With the Kentucky Derby, it’s just so difficult — the window of time to have a 3-year-old ready to go a mile and a quarter is just a really difficult task. So having a horse that, that was — ended up being the second favorite was amazing.

MARK BRODIE: Ana, what was it like watching So Happy race at the Kentucky Derby?

ANA MARON: Oh, it was so unreal. Like, it’s you don’t even feel like you’re there. I think it’s one of those moments what you feel like not until the next day you go, "Oh my God, we did all that." All that in reference to we were owners of a Kentucky Derby horse. And watching him race, of course I was nervous, I was nervous before, that’s usually my way of how I deal with racing and any level of horse racing. But when he was making his turn, his second turn over and he was like second, I thought, "Oh, we got this. ... I really thought we had it." And then we saw it slip away and by then I knew there was no chance we could make it. So I kind of settled down and realized it wasn’t our time.

MARK BRODIE: Hans, was that a letdown to have a horse that was favored to do pretty well and in the end didn’t do as well as you had hoped?

HANS MARON: Yeah, I mean, whenever you lose, you’re a little disappointed. But the reality was the race didn't — the flow of the race wasn’t exactly what we had, you know, imagined in our own heads and you never know when, you know, 18 horses were out there. The flow of the race was a little faster than we had hoped, and So Happy just broke away running and got a little close up a little near to the pace than what we would have hoped.

But in reality, watching the race a few times afterwards — or 100 times afterwards — you know, he gave his best and it just wasn’t good enough on that day. But I will say he handled himself beautifully all week and he’ll be back stronger than ever.

MARK BRODIE: So Hans, you’ve watched the race since it was run?

HANS MARON: Oh, many times. Yes.

MARK BRODIE: How come?

HANS MARON: Just to realize, you know, what really transpired. I mean, in the moment, things were moving so fast and, you know, sure you’re focused on your horse, but once you got to see how the race unfolded. At first — I mean to be honest, the, after about the quarter pole ... the first quarter mile going 22 seconds-plus, I knew we were in a little bit of trouble. It wasn’t exactly where I imagined that we would be sitting.

But at the same time Mike had a split-second decision to make, and if he didn’t go because the horse broke so well, you take the risk of a bunch of horses coming on top of you and squeezing you, you know, down towards the rail. And when you’ve ran in shorter fields, you may not be prepared for what that pressure that was created.

Unfortunately, we just never got a break in the race. I mean we were in great position, you know, turning for home you could think we were live, but in my heart I kind of knew we went too fast too early.

MARK BRODIE: Interesting. Ana, tell me a little bit about So Happy, like what is he like?

ANA MARON: Ah, he is literally always very happy. When we started see ... after we bought him, we had him at Santa Anita. And we always, you know, we live in Chandler and whenever they race we just go over to the races at Santa Anita. And, you know, we have races and then we always go to the barn to kind of see all our horses that we have with Mark Glatt, and he’s always just seriously just so happy.

And I, right before we, after the Santa Anita Derby, I remember talking to his groom, Alfonso. And I remember asking Alfonso, you know, "Just tell me what he’s like." And I was kind of playing your part, I was being the interviewer. And I said, "Tell us," and I remember just filming it. And he says, "He’s just this way all the time. He’s just always so happy. His name suits him." And so I asked him a little bit more about his daily routine and what he likes and he goes, "He loves carrots. He just loves to eat. He’s always happy and loves to eat."

MARK BRODIE: So Hans, what is next for So Happy? Like, is there a chance he could run another high-stakes, big-time race?

HANS MARON: Oh, absolutely. It’s just a matter of where we choose to go. Obviously we’re not going to the Preakness, it was two weeks apart, he did have a little bit of a superficial wound on the back of his leg that occurred late in the race — it didn’t affect the race whatsoever.

But we just decided to fly him back to California and he’s in his stall, he’s in his happy place. And we’ll go back at it here in the next couple weeks, and then we’ll start picking out spots and what’s next for him.

MARK BRODIE: Am I right that you had a pretty significant offer to buy this horse? Like, shortly before the Derby?

HANS MARON: Sure. We did. Yes.

MARK BRODIE: And you decided not to. Is that off the table now? Like are you potentially looking to sell him?

ANA MARON: No.

HANS MARON: No. No, we never put it out there that we were interested, but obviously as you get closer to the Derby, people want to be a part of it and the monetary side of it’s not really that important to those individuals. But we just, again, we decided that the horse was and and the journey for us was more important than dollars.

ANA MARON: Yeah. I remember telling Hans, "Will more money make us happy?" He said yes. No, I’m kidding. He — I said, "You know, this is a dream that he’s actually always sought in the way in a sense of succeeding, doing well in horse racing." And I said, "Here’s your opportunity, why would we, you know, bring in a third party just so they can say they have a horse in the Derby?"

What it takes to get to where we got, in my opinion, is very hard to do as horse owners. And you can’t — in my opinion — you can’t just buy your way in. You didn’t go through the trials and errors of years of buying horses like we have and we currently have 45 racehorses. And, you know, some make it to the racetrack some never make it to — you know, that hardship that hurts like in your heart aches when you buy a horse you can’t get to it to even race. You know, you go through this as owners, and somebody to come in and just throw money at us, that was just for me it was not appealing.

For Hans, he did also state that, you know, Mark Glatt was going through a really difficult time, I’m sure you know, with his wife passing. And what if we got into a third person giving him grief, you know, blaming him for if the horse didn’t win? You know, we just didn’t want those dynamics to ever come into play and ruin the fun for all of us.

MARK BRODIE: All right. Well, Hans, Ana, thank you so much for taking the time to chat and good luck with the horses going forward.

ANA MARON: Thank you. Thank you so much, Mark.

HANS MARON: Appreciate it.

MARK BRODIE: Ana and Hans Maron are the owners of the racehorse So Happy, which competed at the Kentucky Derby.

LAUREN GILGER: Thanks for listening to the Show’s podcast. The Show is produced by Sativa Peterson, Nick Sanchez, Amber Victoria Singer, Athena Ankara, and Ayana Hamilton. The Show was created by Jon Hoban and our executive producer is Amy Silverman. You can find more of the Show and sign up for our newsletter at theshow.kjzz.org. You can also find us on Instagram at @kjzztheshow.