Pipsy earns career-best 97 BSF for G2 Intercontinental victory
- Pipsy earns career-best 97 BSF for G2 Intercontinental victory
- Firm ground key to Donegal Momentum’s G3 Poker victory
- Mythical’s victory over males in Listed Tremont earns 93 BSF
- Nearing 3,000 wins, O’Neill hopes to annex G1 Met Mile with Raging Torrent
- Think Big has connections dreaming big ahead of G1 Jaipur
- ‘All class’ Sassy C W impresses Rivelli
Woodford Thoroughbreds’ Irish-bred Pipsy improved to 2-for-2 as a 4-year-old with her pacesetting score in Thursday’s Grade 2, $200,000 Intercontinental, a 5 1/2-furlong Mellon turf sprint for older fillies and mares on Day Two of the Belmont Stakes Racing Festival, at Saratoga Race Course.
Trained by Will Walden, the Kodiac bay set the pace under Jose Ortiz through splits of 21.74 seconds and 44.20 over the firm footing, finding more in the lane to prevail by a half-length over the rail-rallying favorite Future Is Now, in a final time of 1:00.98. The victory registered a career-best 97 Beyer Speed Figure.
“She came out of the race great,” said Walden. “I think her gate speed is one of her biggest weapons, her ability to go fast early and relax. I thought Jose did a great job having her relax in front at the quarter pole, and the eighth pole when
Future Is Now came up her inside, she had more left.”
Walden did not envision a pacesetting trip, but he was pleased it worked out. Pipsy entered from a forwardly-placed two-length score in a Keeneland allowance in April when making her seasonal debut.
“She has really turned the corner from age three to four like we hoped, but you can never expect that,” Walden said. “I thought it was a tremendous effort; she is an impressive filly.”
Walden indicated Pipsy could spend her summer at the Spa with an eye towards the Grade 3, $175,000 Caress on July 19. Prior to the Intercontinental, her lone effort in New York was a closing score in the Grade 3 Soaring Softly last May at Belmont at the Big A – her first start in the barn since being purchased for $929,489 at the 2023 Tattersalls December Mare Sale.
“We will enjoy this right now and we will get together with Mr. [John] Sykes and see what he wants to do,” Walden said. “We will also see what the filly tells us she wants to do, then go from there.”
Walden said he will have a sizable group alongside Pipsy for the Saratoga meet, including Grade 2-winning sophomore colt Minaret Station and the talented 4-year-old New York-bred gelding Rhetorical.
“We have 16 stalls,” Walden said. “I would say one of the more interesting horses would be the two-turn turf gelding and colt I have. The colt being Minaret Station who won the Grade 2 Bourbon Stakes at Keeneland. He will run in the [Listed] American [Derby at Churchill Downs] hopefully at the end of this month and then will come up for the Grade 1 Saratoga Derby Invitational in August. Then the gelding Rhetorical is a New York-bred, a super talented horse who will come up to Saratoga.”
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Firm ground key to Donegal Momentum’s G3 Poker victory
Trainer Tom Morley had been pointing Donegal Racing’s Donegal Momentum towards the Grade 3, $300,000 Poker for several months, hoping for everything to not only go the right way to get the son of Uncle Mo in the starting gate, but for firm turf on the day of the one-mile test for older horses during the Belmont Stakes Racing Festival at Saratoga Race Course.
The stars aligned on Thursday and Morley got his wish as Donegal Momentum bounded through the Saratoga stretch over the lush, firm inner turf course en route to a 1 3/4-length triumph over the late-running Intellect for his first graded stakes victory.
“Everything went right yesterday,” Morley said Friday morning at his Saratoga barn. “Executing these plans is very difficult, and God often has a say in it. It was a huge relief to get that opportunity yesterday. He got his favored distance and surface, and he finally got a firm turf course. I always believed when he got all three of those things he would show what kind of horse he was, and he did that yesterday.”
Donegal Momentum, whose best previous finish in a graded event was a third in the Grade 1 Hollywood Derby in November at Del Mar, set the tempo of the Poker under Hall of Famer Javier Castellano, marking splits of 24.34 seconds, 48.09 and 1:11.53. Major Dude stalked in third throughout and made mild progress in the stretch with Intellect getting going late, but Donegal Momentum’s giant strides carried him through the wire a comfortable winner in a final time of 1:34.22. He earned a career-best 96 Beyer Speed Figure for the effort.
“What a result,” Morley said. “He looks absolutely fantastic – I just had Hall of Fame Australian and South African trainers hang out with me this morning, and when they saw him in the stall, they couldn’t believe how well this horse looked the day after a race. He ate up last night, he’s very happy, and he definitely knows he won yesterday. He’s got a lot of character, this horse.”
With his first graded stakes victory secured, the long-term goal for Donegal Momentum is the Grade 1, $750,000 FanDuel Fourstardave on August 2 at the Spa, a “Win and You’re In” for the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Mile in November at Del Mar.
The Poker was the second win at the Festival for the Morley barn, who sent out Rainbow’s End Stable’s Outsource to a tremendous 56-1 upset score in a state-bred turf allowance going 1 1/16 miles on Wednesday in his grass debut.
The Honor A.P. bay was running first off the $30,000 claim and trailed in last-of-10 and 11 lengths off the pace in the early stages, but showed a powerful turn-of-foot with a six-wide move in the stretch to get up just in time and edge Leon Blue by a nose. The effort garnered a career-best 80 Beyer.
“He’s in great shape. It didn’t surprise me that he ran well – he’s trained very well and moves just like a grass horse. It did surprise me that he won, and I think it surprised everyone to be honest,” Morley said, with a laugh.
On Friday, Morley sends out Patricia Moseley’s homebred Curbstone in the Grade 2, $250,000 Belmont Gold Cup going two miles on the grass, a distance and surface the son of Street Sense has already performed strongly over when a close second to last year’s Gold Cup-winner The Grey Wizard in the John Forbes Memorial in October at Far Hills.
“I hope it doesn’t rain because I think he’s at his best on firm ground,” Morley said. “Two miles isn’t scary for him at all, and everyone else has to prove they get the distance.”
Morley’s stakes action at the Festival closes out on Sunday with Santa Rey Stable and Rainbow’s End Racing Stable’s Paula’s a Star in the six-furlong $150,000 Jersey Girl for sophomore fillies. She was last seen finishing a fading third in a 5 1/2-furlong optional claiming sprint on April 18 at Laurel Park.
“She’s doing great. You can draw a line through the race at Laurel as she didn’t ship well,” Morley said. “It was great to get her up here on Monday and she’s been through the paddock two times and will go through again tomorrow. I’ll tweak a little of the saddling procedure and saddle on the walk. If she gets out onto the track having not overexerted herself in the preliminaries, then I think she’ll run a pretty big race.”
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Mythical’s victory over males in Listed Tremont earns 93 BSF
Arindel’s Florida homebred filly Mythical skipped the opportunity to face her own kind in Thursday’s $150,000 Astoria and instead supplemented to the Listed $150,000 Tremont and kicked off the card by easily besting males in the 5 1/2-furlong sprint for juveniles on Day Two of the Belmont Stakes Racing Festival at Saratoga Race Course.
Trained by Jorge Delgado and piloted by Emisael Jaramillo, the St Patrick’s Day bay bumped with a rival at the break but was quickly in front through splits of 22.20 seconds and 44.97 over the fast main track. She opened up by two lengths at the stretch call and was urged through the wire a 3 1/2-length winner in a final time of 1:03.57. The winning effort garnered a 93 Beyer Speed Figure, easily besting the 67 awarded to Sassy C W for her win two races later in the Astoria.
Brian Cohen, president of the Florida-based Arindel, said they supplemented to the boys’ race in order to avoid a speed duel with Astoria-winner Sassy C W.
“That other filly looked like she was lightning fast and she was going to have to be so much harder pressed. It just seemed like going to the other race was a better set up for her,” Cohen said. “I think she could have won both races, but it would have been much harder on her. At this stage, for her second race, we didn't want to do that to her yet.
“As much as it is amazing to win at Saratoga, we wanted to pick the right spot for her and this just seemed like the perfect spot,” he added. “We haven’t won up at Saratoga for a while, we’re down south for the most part but we’re growing, and we want to be up there more. We’re breeding a lot of New York-breds and we want to support that program as well as down here. It was great to get that win and get the ball rolling for the rest of the summer.”
Mythical is now 2-for-2 following a frontrunning 8 1/2-length romp sprinting 4 1/2-furlongs on April 17 at Gulfstream Park.
Cohen indicated Mythical exited the race in good order and is likely to return to the Spa for a start in the Grade 3, $175,000 Adirondack on August 3. The outfit has another filly, the Carlos David-trained Evolution, that could point to the Listed $150,000 Schuylerville on July 4 at Saratoga, while recent maiden winning colt Monster for trainer J.F. D’Angelo is a candidate for the $150,000 Skidmore, a 5 1/2-furlong turf sprint for 2-year-olds on August 16 at the Spa.
“I think the timetable of the Adirondack fits better [for Mythical] and I have another filly [Evolution] that I’m pointing for the Schuylerville,” Cohen said. “Monster is one that we’ll probably get up there soon. Between this filly [Mythical] and that colt [Monster] it’s been an incredible year for us.”
Mythical is out of the winning Brethren mare Lailoni, whose dam Dat You Miz Blue was a graded stakes-winning New York-bred. Brethren stands in Florida for Arindel.
Arindel will look to continue their Festival success on Sunday with a pair of 2-year-olds for trainer Amelia Green in second-time starting filly Nacho Problem [Race 1] and colt Chalky White [Race 3]. Arindel’s Delgado-trained Genie is among the entries in Race 3, but will start instead in Race 3 on Thursday in New York when live racing returns to Belmont at the Big A.
Nacho Problem [post 4, Christopher Elliott, 4-1ML] adds blinkers for the restricted 5 1/2-furlong maiden sprint following a distant third in her May 3 debut sprinting five furlongs at Belmont at the Big A in a race won by well-regarded Kadabra by a neck over Gena B, who finished second in the Astoria.
Nacho Problem, by Arindel’s New York-sire Waiting, is out of the winning Arindel homebred Brethren mare Nacho Mama – a half-sister to multiple stakes-winner Bernie the Maestro [74-18-12-11, $694,317] and Unicorn Girl, the dam of 2021 Champion Male Sprinter Jackie’s Warrior. Her second dam is stakes-winner Horah for Bailey.
“Amelia is adding blinkers for this race, and she thinks that will definitely help her out,” Cohen said. “She’s out of a mare that has the track record [50.86] at Gulfstream for 4 1/2-furlongs, so she’s supposed to be precocious, and that mare’s sister had Jackie’s Warrior. It’s just been a really good family. So, we’re hoping but we know it’s not easy to win at Saratoga.
“This has been a great family for us, and we have a couple other mares that look to be throwing precocious babies,” he added. “When we first started getting into breeding, one of our initial mares was Horah for Bailey, so it would be great to see Nacho Problem run big up there for us.”
Chalky White [post 1, Dylan Davis, 9-2ML], by Practical Joke and out of the Astern mare Race, was a $55,000 purchase at the 2023 Keeneland November Breeding Stock Sale. He was a prominent fifth in his May 9 debut at Churchill Downs and has worked swiftly for Sunday’s 5 1/2-furlong maiden, including a bullet half-mile in 47.41 seconds on June 2 over the Spa main track.
“He’s been working like he’s a really good horse,” Cohen said. “He got caught up in a bit of a speed duel [first out] and maybe that’s not exactly what he wants. Amelia is still 50-50 on whether or not he might want to be a turf horse, but we’re giving him another shot on the dirt because of how well he worked.”
Genie, a New York-homebred by Arindel’s New York stallion Waiting and out of the More Than Ready mare Given Time, had his last three works at Monmouth Park, including an easy half-mile in 51.60 on June 1.
He will go in the 5 1/2-furlong New York-bred maiden on Thursday at the Big A with Hall of Famer Javier Castellano listed to ride from post 3.
Cohen, who has a home in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., said he’s impressed with the New York-bred program and the potential of racing at the new Belmont Park.
“The breeding program is phenomenal,” Cohen said. “We’re standing a stallion, Waiting, from another family of ours that started it all in Wait a While and Wait a While had Wait No More, who was a sale topper at Saratoga [$1.575 million at the 2012 Fasig-Tipton New York Saratoga Select Yearling Sale]. She had an American Pharoah colt [Waiting] that we were so high on but had an issue on the farm and couldn’t make the races. As good looking as he is and with the pedigree there…once we decided to go out to New York, we decided to send him up because we’re so confident in him and that family. We’re pretty happy with the early results.”
Cohen another great reason to race in New York is that he’s also a big fan of NYRA’s America’s Day at the Races TV program.
“We love the whole broadcast that FOX has put together. It’s great to watch and we want to be a part of that,” Cohen said. “We can’t speak highly enough about how great that program is and we’re a big fan of all the personalities on there. As soon as it comes on, we start watching.”
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Nearing 3,000 wins, O’Neill hopes to annex G1 Met Mile with Raging Torrent
As he closes in on another career milestone, trainer Doug O’Neill does so having won prestigious races around the globe including two-thirds of the Triple Crown and five in the Breeders’ Cup, with more than $170 million in purse earnings.
A finalist for induction to the National Museum of Racing’s Hall of Fame since 2021, O’Neill sits four wins away from 3,000 for his career. It is a number he could reach this weekend with seven horses entered in six races over the next three days, including millionaire Raging Torrent in Saturday’s Grade 1, $1 million Hill ‘n’ Dale Metropolitan Handicap at Saratoga Race Course, a “Win and You’re In” for the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile in November at Del Mar.
In addition to Zhang Yuesheng and Craig Dado’s Raging Torrent, the recently turned 57-year-old O’Neill has one horse entered Friday, three on Saturday and two Sunday at his home base of Santa Anita.
“I don’t really think about it, but it is a pretty phenomenal number and just a credit to an unbelievable staff and a great group of owners,” O’Neill said Friday, his first morning in Saratoga since arriving Thursday evening. “We’ve been blessed to have some really good horses and win a lot of races. Hopefully we can keep it going.”
Raging Torrent galloped 1 1/2 miles over the Oklahoma training track Friday morning, the first time in more than a week that O’Neill had seen the bay son of Maximus Mischief, who had a maintenance half-mile breeze in 50.99 seconds Monday on the main track.
“The colt looked phenomenal this morning, his appetite’s great, he showed great energy on the track. I’m very, very happy and very optimistic,” O’Neill said. “He’s doing really, really well. He settled in well here and he had a nice little breeze over the track. We’re excited. Hopefully we get lucky.”
In 2012, O’Neill won the Kentucky Derby and Preakness with I’ll Have Another, who was scratched on the eve of the Belmont Stakes with a leg injury and subsequently retired. O’Neill added another Derby victory in 2016 with Nyquist, and also campaigned Hall of Fame multi-millionaire Lava Man.
O’Neill would love to add a race with the cache of the Met Mile, which this year includes four-time Grade 1 winner White Abarrio, earner of nearly $7 million in purses, and three-time Grade 1 winner Fierceness, the 2-Year-Old Champion Male of 2023 that is a perfect 3-0 at Saratoga. Frankie Dettori will ride Raging Torrent from outermost post 5 at 123 pounds, three fewer than topweight White Abarrio.
“The Met Mile is always so extremely difficult to win, but this year having horses like Fierceness and White Abarrio in there, it’s even extra prestigious,” O’Neill said. “So, it’s going to be fun and I’m very excited. I really think Raging Torrent is up to it if all goes well.”
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Think Big has connections dreaming big ahead of G1 Jaipur
Godolphin’s Kentucky homebred Think Big, the 6-5 morning-line favorite for Saturday’s Grade 1, $500,000 Jaipur at the Belmont Stakes Racing Festival at Saratoga Race Course, arrived on Wednesday in good form and settled nicely since, much to the pleasure of conditioner Mike Stidham.
The son of Twirling Candy, fresh off a pair of Grade 2 wins in Kentucky - the Turf Sprint at Churchill Downs and Shakertown at Keeneland - looks to solidify his position as the nation’s top turf sprinter - and possibly more - this weekend in the Jaipur which offers a “Win and You’re In” berth to the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint in November at Del Mar.
“All good,” Stidham said. “Hopefully we do some good this weekend. He had his third work since Churchill and we shipped him over to Fair Hill last week, where we have some horses, and worked him on the Tapeta. He looked amazing. Just an outstanding work and I couldn’t be happier.”
Based at Delaware Park, 13 miles east of Fair Hill, the 5-for-9 earner of $709,785 went a half-mile in 47.60 over the latter’s all-weather. Speed is no surprise for him, being a son of Twirling Candy and turf sprinter Always Thinking. His sire also counts the speedy Gear Jockey, Two Sharp, Pinehurst, Finley’sluckycharm and Saturday’s rival Ag Bullet among his progeny. Always Thinking won Laurel Park’s Sensible Lady Turf Dash and was fifth in both the Grade 3 Franklin County at Keeneland and Grade 3 Intercontinental at Belmont Park for Tom Albertrani while donning the Godolphin blue. Additionally, his second dam Que Piensa Cat was a Group 1 winner over seven furlongs in Argentina.
“Remember, he is a gelding,” Stidham continued. “That said, it’s nice that it’s a Grade 1, but not as important for him. Our focus is keeping him healthy and in great form and then making as much money and having as much fun with him as we can. There’s this race and a race at Kentucky Downs that are definitely possibilities, as well as big races like at the Breeders’ Cup.”
Stidham did not rule out a trip to the Middle East, which hosts February’s Group 2, $2 million 1351 Turf Sprint in Saudi Arabia and March’s Group 2, $1.5 million Al Quoz Sprint at Meydan - but a different kind of exploratory mission could soon be in order beforehand.
“We aren’t opposed to stretching him out a little further on the grass,” he said. “Maybe seven furlongs or a mile at some point. Those kinds of possibilities make it exciting - he’s the kind of horse that makes you excited.”
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‘All class’ Sassy C W impresses Rivelli
Patricia’s Hope and Carolyn Wilson’s Sassy C W has exited her one-sided victory in Thursday’s $150,000 Astoria in top condition, per conditioner Larry Rivelli. Renowned for his ability with both juveniles and sprinters, Rivelli is impressed by this sharp daughter of first-crop stallion Yaupon.
“She’s a runner and a really nice horse,” Rivelli beamed. “We got her a few months ago and she’s been all class with a good mind since then. We will have to pick our spots from here. I don’t think I’ll necessarily bring her right back to Saratoga, but there are options out there. She is a good, tough sprinter and they aren’t hard to keep fit. Unfortunately for her, there isn’t a huge program for filly sprinters and if we had a big goal at the end of the year, I guess we would have to look at the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf Sprint, but that’s on the grass and we don’t know if she will like that yet.
“We might stretch her out if there aren’t many options out there and we want to experiment, but from what I see, she looks and acts like a sprinter—built like one, for sure,” he continued. “Right now, we will get her back home to Hawthorne and look at a race in four or five weeks.”
While the compact bay charge may not be Spa-bound again anytime soon, Rivelli could possibly head back this way with one of a pair of his top turf sprinters, 2023 Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint champ Nobals and One Timer.
“Maybe we will send one or both of them,” he said. “They’re the kinds of horses who give you options. They’re world-class sprinters who can run on anything and there are a couple stakes races at Saratoga.”
Owned by Patricia’s Hope, Nobals returned to the winner’s enclosure at Churchill Downs on May 24 with a track record-setting performance over 5 1/2 furlongs on firm turf [1:00.96]. Also owned by Vince Foglia’s Patricia’s Hope, along with longtime Rivelli supporter Richard Ravin, consistent Grade 2-winner One Timer was third a day later in similar allowance optional claiming company, his first race of 2025.