SIMPSONVILLE, Ky. _ Walk into Brenda's Country Cafe and step into a warm, aromatic world that can't quite decide if it's a restaurant, a museum, a coffee shop filled with grease-stained overalls or someone's living room.
There's no sign on the front of the cafe, other than a faded, barely readable tribute to McDowell's Grocery. Outside, a dusty RC Cola machine sits idle. The best guess on the last time it worked? The Jimmy Carter administration.
In this place, there's one rule.
"Some people come in and ask for a menu," explained owner and den mother Brenda Ried, garnished with a knowing smile. "You eat what I'm cookin'. If you don't like it, go to McDonald's."
When you sit at a table, Brenda informs a newbie that "you better come over here, because I'm not coming over there. Today we've got ham, scalloped potatoes, peas, cornbread muffins and white bean soup. Sound good?"
In between fork-fulls of ham, they're talking Kentucky Derby. So, seemingly, is everyone in the state. The folksy analysis side-steps all the convoluted arguments and dives right into the meat of the matter.
These are no-nonsense people. Brenda might be no-nonsense-iest of them all.
"It's the right call," said Brenda, standing table-side in an effort to convince a customer to dig out a brownie or two from the pan she's marching around the room. "That horse got out there. If you've got rules, you've got to follow them."
That horse is Maximum Security, owned by Gary and Mary West. He crossed the finish line first in Saturday's soupy Derby _ only to see the garland of roses plucked from Mary West in the winner's circle 22 minutes later, when stewards ruled on objections from two jockeys.
Chaos followed. Gary West initially told the Union-Tribune an appeal was "doubtful," though swiftly changed direction and vowed to go to federal court if necessary. On Monday morning, NBC's "Today" show ran an interview with West, with the owner saying his horse would not run in the Preakness Stakes while labeling Churchill Downs "greedy" with a claim of risking the safety of horses and jockeys with giant fields.
At the cafe, opinions remain divided _ on the Derby, not the ham.
"Half the people who come in here thought (the decision) wasn't worth a (damn)," said Brenda, analyzing the leanings of her mismatched-silverware crowd. "But rules are rules, right?"
That's hard to argue, aligning with a unanimous survey of trainers who roamed the backstretch barns at Churchill on Sunday.
Those with dissenting thoughts lean mostly on the sympathetic and historical aspects of the Derby. No other horse finishing first in a race that began in 1875 has lost the roses because of a competitive foul. Many cling to the assessment that sports events, including and especially the Derby, should be decided on the track or field _ rather than inside secretive replay rooms.
One customer polishing off Brenda's potatoes reminded that horse racing also has to consider more than just one Derby. Horse racing remains in peril after 23 deaths at Santa Anita since Christmas. It has jarred and terrified the sport to its socks.
If jockey Tyler Gaffalione had not subtly redirected War of Will, an inch or two here or there when quarters cramped the most, diners thought the race could have ended with a sad scoop of tragedy.
"That would'a been all kinds of bad," one patron said.
The cafe, about a 15-minute drive due east of the Louisville, Ky., outskirts, is the kind of place where lunch is made with love, but feelings aren't spared because truth qualifies as tough-love here, too.
Silver-haired, iconic trainer Bob Baffert laid out the complexity of all in a handful of words to Sports Illustrated's Tim Layden. Baffert said: "No one calls an objection in the Derby. It's always a roughly run race. Sometimes you've got to take your ass-kickings with dignity."
The first part supports West and Maximum Security. The last part indicates the billionaire philanthropist, at this point, should toss in the towel. Is defending integrity calling the foul? Or is defending integrity appealing and fighting for what you believe is right?
Eye of the beholder stuff, this.
There's more. Bill Mott, the trainer of eventual winner and 65-1 longshot Country House, admitted that he urged his jockey Flavien Prat to file an objection because he heard another rider say Maximum Security needed to, in racing speak, come down.
Is Mott, who had the most to gain on the way to the first Kentucky Derby win of his career, a sore loser? Is West a poor sport for not accepting the outcome? All of it remains wildly complicated and debatable.
Except to Brenda.
"They did right," she said.
Kentucky racing regulations state that appeals are not allowed to stewards. So, West plans to appeal directly to the oversight commission. The executive director of the commission, though, has called the situation "cut and dried."
That means we'll find out if West's pledge to take court action was inflamed reaction in the immediate days that followed or a real knock-down, drag-out that the Derby and horse racing has never seen.
At the aging cash register, you leave Brenda a $5 tip.
"Well thank you, honey," said Brenda, tucking it into her bra. "I got a place for that."
This Kentucky Derby could linger for a long time.
"It's crazy," Brenda said. "A little like me."
