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Ward Eyes Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf After Campanelle’s Prix Morny Victory

Stonestreet Stables LLC's Campanelle (IRE) led from start to finish to win the Darley Prix Morny (G1) in style at Deauville in France on Sunday. The victory secured her a guaranteed start in the $1-million Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf Sprint (G2) through the international Breeders' Cup Challenge Series.

The Breeders' Cup Challenge is a series of stakes races whose winners receive automatic starting positions and fees paid into a corresponding race of the Breeders' Cup World Championships, which is scheduled to be held at Keeneland Race Course in Lexington, Ky., on Nov. 6-7.

Campanelle stepped up in class following her victory in the Queen Mary Stakes (G2) at Royal Ascot to score her first Group 1 success in the six-furlong Darley Prix Morny. The 2-year-old filly was quickly into stride and raced prominently under Frankie Dettori to win by two lengths in testing ground conditions.

Royal Ascot Coventry Stakes (G2) winner Nando Parrado (GB) ran another big race to place second, with fellow British challenger Rhythm Master (IRE) a neck back in third.

Campanelle, the 8-5 favorite, remains unbeaten in three starts and provided her trainer Wesley Ward a third win in this race, following the victories of Lady Aurelia in 2016 and No Nay Never in 2013.

Dettori speaking to Sky Sports Racing, said, “I was very impressed with her in the Queen Mary. She has grown since Ascot and has a magnificent long stride. She coped with the ground but is much better on good ground. Wesley was very confident. I knew I had a good filly.”

The daughter of Kodiac (GB) out of the Namid (GB) mare Janina (GB), completed the six furlongs in 1:11.80 over a course listed as soft. She becomes the second horse to gain a “Win and You're In” berth into the Juvenile Turf Sprint this year, joining The Lir Jet (IRE) winner of the Norfolk Stakes (G2) at Royal Ascot on June 19.

Bookmakers Betfair make Campanelle 5/1 for the one-mile Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf (G1), with Wesley Ward eyeing the Cheveley Park Stakes (G1) at Newmarket, before a likely start in the Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf in November.

Ward said: “The Cheveley Park closes on Tuesday and I've spoken with Adrian Beaumont (International Racing Bureau), so we'll nominate for that to keep her options open. With a filly like this, it suits to space her races out. We had Hootenanny finish second in this race and he went on to win the Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf.”

“That would probably be more on the agenda, especially as the Breeders' Cup is on her home track at Keeneland. I think a two-turn mile will suit.”

As a part of the benefits of the Challenge series, the Breeders' Cup will pay the entry fees for Campanelle to start in the Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf Sprint, which will be run at 5 1/2 furlongs over the Keeneland turf course. Breeders' Cup also will pay the entry fees for Campanelle to start in the Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf should her connections choose to enter that race instead of the Juvenile Turf Sprint. Breeders' Cup will provide a travel allowance of $40,000 for all starters based outside of North America to compete in the World Championships. The Challenge winner must already be nominated to the Breeders' Cup program or it must be nominated by the Championships' pre-entry deadline of Oct. 26 to receive the rewards.

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Breeders’ Cup Presents Connections: Chariot Racing World Champ Finds Success With Thoroughbreds

Trainer Ryan Hanson was excited to earn his first graded stakes win with Thoroughbreds at Del Mar recently, saddling Weston to victory in the Grade 2 Best Pal Stakes, but it was hardly the first major horse racing victory for the 39-year-old native of Idaho.

Hanson conditioned multiple graded stakes-winning Quarter Horses, and he is also a World Champion in the sport of chariot racing.

“In my office, the chariot racing photos are the ones that get the most people talking,” the trainer said. “It's the one thing I really miss about being in the northwest; I don't miss the snow or the cold, but I miss chariot racing.”

Both Hanson's father and grandfather also earned World Champion titles in chariot racing, which is conducted by hitching two horses side-by-side and competing over a quarter of a mile. Hanson won the title in 2006, just before the family moved to Southern California.

“It's a really, really huge family activity, but it's still ultra-competitive,” Hanson explained. “By the time I was doing it, we were claiming Quarter Horses from Los Alamitos, hooking them on the chariot and racing in Idaho.”

Unfortunately, it was hard to make a living during summertime Quarter Horse racing in Idaho, and chariot racing is exclusively a winter activity. Hanson's father James “Jim” Hanson moved the family racing operation to Los Alamitos in 2006, and everyone pitched in to help climb the ranks.

A jockey for his father from age 16, Ryan Hanson outgrew those boots and became his father's assistant and top exercise rider. Eventually Hanson took the horses under his own name, saddling 2013 AQHA World Champion Distance horse Honoroso, who the family had claimed for $6,250 in 2012.

Ryan Hanson in a 2006 chariot race

In 2015 Hanson went home to Idaho for the summer, racing at what turned out to be the final season in Boise. Returning to Southern California that winter, Hanson made a change. He took a job galloping Thoroughbreds for trainer Robertino Diodoro, and worked his way up to assistant.

“It's really hard to make a living in Idaho,” Hanson explained.

Two years later, Diodoro left California, and Hanson felt he didn't really have a choice but to try to make a go of it on his own. He hung out his shingle over a single horse, True Ranger, a $12,500 claimer.

That chestnut gelding may not have won a race for Hanson, but he did hit the board in most of his starts at Santa Anita and Del Mar. Hanson would win just one race in 2017, with a horse he co-owned with his father named Poshsky, but he started to make his presence felt on the Southern California circuit.

In 2018 Hanson began to train for outside clients, first in partnerships between his father and Robin Dunn. Dunn recommended Hanson to an owner named Chris Drakos, who had actually lived 15 minutes away from Hanson in Idaho, but the two had never met face to face.

Drakos took a chance and sent Hanson four horses, and the two are now co-owners of Grade 2 winner Weston.

Weston and Drayden Van Dyke after the Best Pal

“It was nice of Robin and dad to partner with me, but I wasn't able to make it on that alone,” Hanson explained. “I'm so appreciative of Drakos, because not too many people want to give a young guy a chance, and he did.”

Hanson started winning a few more races, and today he conditions a 25-horse string at Del Mar alongside his wife, Michelle Yu. Yu works afternoons as an on-air handicapper at Santa Anita, and the couple have two children under the age of four.

“They're my pride and joy,” Hanson said. “They get to come with us to the ranch, and before COVID, they'd come to the track in the afternoons as well.”

Every morning, seven days a week, Hanson rides at least 10 horses over the track before heading out to a ranch in Pico Rivera, where he, Yu, and a couple exercise riders spend another two hours or so starting babies and riding out the young horses in the river bottoms.

“Riding them yourself, I just thing you get a better feeling of the horses, you can see how they're doing,” Hanson said. “When I'm getting on them, I can make split-second decisions. When I'm out there we take them two at a time, so if I see the horse next to me doing something and think he needs to do something different, we can make that decision on the track right then.

“I do think Quarter Horses are a bit smarter than Thoroughbreds, because the Thoroughbreds you have to get out on the track every day. We try to do something different with them every day, gallop in a different way, or jog them, just something different to keep them thinking differently.”

Weston, a $7,000 purchase at the Keeneland September yearling sale, was one of those started through Hanson's program at the ranch.

“Honestly, he was miserable to break and miserable to ride,” Hanson said. “We brought him in (to the track on) April 1, and I remember thinking I couldn't wait to get him into the track and geld him. It didn't really help.”

Hanson rode the 2-year-old son of Hit It A Bomb for his first several workouts but didn't think too much of the gelding, so he decided to turn the reins over to exercise rider Emily Ellingwood. Now Ellingwood gallops Weston every day, and the gelding seems pleased with the new arrangement.

He won his debut on June 21 at Santa Anita by 1 1/4 lengths, then came back on Aug. 8 to win the G2 Best Pal by a neck.

“I was happy to win it for Ryan Hanson,” jockey Drayden Van Dyke told Del Mar publicity after the race. “He's such a kind man and a good horse trainer. And this horse showed some class, too. Ryan told me he never got to paddock him (prior to the race), but he was just standing in there like an old pro. I knew I got there in the end and I'm real glad I did.”

Hanson was thrilled, of course, but the pragmatic trainer not sure what the next step will be with Weston.

“I'm happy we got the race, but I don't know how good of a horse he is,” Hanson said honestly. “We caught the right field, and we were very ready. I'm not happy that we don't have another place to go with him besides the Del Mar Futurity, but if he continues to do well, I want to take advantage of it.”

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Laurel Park: Retired Jockey Trujillo Scores Initial Win As Trainer

Ejetero LLC's Voodoo Valley tracked pacesetting Chuck's Dream into mid-stretch, surged to the lead inside the eighth pole and drew off by 2 1/4 lengths to give ex-jockey Elvis Trujillo his first career victory as a trainer in Saturday's second race at Laurel Park in Maryland.

A 5-year-old gelding racing first time for Trujillo, Voodoo Valley ($15.60) ran one mile in 1:39.36 over a fast main track to earn his second career triumph from 22 starts in the claiming event for 3-year-olds and up.

It was the fourth career starter for the 36-year-old Trujillo, who ran sixth with Mystic Times in Friday's fifth race at Laurel. The Panama native was second with Confusion Baby Boy and fourth with Eje Gama in his training debut Aug. 9 at Monmouth Park.

Trujillo was not in the winner's circle for Voodoo Valley's photo, choosing to stay back at the barn with Ejetero's Lady Rozina, who ran fifth in Saturday's fourth race. Trujillo has eight horses stabled on the Laurel backstretch.

“It feels so good, brother. It's amazing. Everybody is watching and everybody is jumping. I am so happy,” Trujillo said. “It's so good. It's good for me, it's good for my family. It's good for everybody.”

Breaking from the far outside, Chuck's Dream was sent to the lead and held it through fractions of 24.10 seconds for a quarter-mile and 47.08 for the half, opening up by as many as six lengths while jockey Luis Garcia kept Voodoo Valley in the clear in second. Voodoo Valley began to gain ground midway around the turn and straightened for home with sights set on the leader, steadily grinding away through the lane to gain the advantage on Chuck's Dream, who held second over Just Chill Out.

Voodoo Valley had not run since running fourth in a 1 1/16-mile claimer Aug. 1 over a muddy Laurel track for previous trainer Jonathaniel Badillo.

“He surprised me today,” Trujillo said. “He was training good an everything, but the last time when he finished fourth he had an issue that we had to figure out and take care of. Thank God he got it done today. He ran great and Luis gave him a great ride.”

A 2000 graduate of Panama's Laffit Pincay Jr. jockey school, Trujillo first came to the U.S. in November 2001, landing in Southern California after riding 90 winners in his home country and Mexico City. He spent time on circuits in Chicago, Florida and New Jersey, winning meet titles in 2007 at the former Calder Race Course and 2009, 2011 and 2012 and Monmouth Park.

Trujillo won 2,102 races and more than $70 in purses between 2001 and 2018. He came to Maryland to ride full-time in the fall of 2017 at the behest of his uncle, Laurel-based trainer Jose Corrales, after spending that summer riding in China. Trujillo won 28 races over the next four months, including the General George (G3) aboard Corrales-trained Something Awesome, before injuring his ribs and sternum in a three-horse spill March 10, 2018. Once healed, he considered a comeback to riding before ultimately transitioning into a new career.

In all, Trujillo won 45 career graded stakes, five of them Grade 1, including his breakthrough victory in the 2007 Breeders' Cup Filly & Mare Sprint aboard Maryfield, on whom he also won the Ballerina (G1). His best horse was Presious Passion, teaming up to win six graded stakes and nearly $1.9 million in purse earnings from 2007-10.

Trujillo said he had a lot of help making the career change, including his uncle, his wife Raquel, Badillo and Abel Castellano, the brother of Hall of Famer Javier Castellano who also transitioned from jockey to trainer.

“I feel so good, man,” Trujillo said. “Everybody helped me a lot and supported me so much in making the big change.”

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New Tattersalls Fixture Gets Underway

There’s nothing very familiar about this year, and in an ever-changing sales schedule, a new auction takes place this week at Tattersalls. The mixed August Sale was originally intended to take place over two days but, such was the demand for places, it has been extended to three, starting on Monday at Park Paddocks.

That a sale consisting largely of horses in training has attracted such a large entry so soon after the traditional Tattersalls July Sale is not necessarily a positive sign for British racing. But while some owners are clearly eager to move horses on, the sale was welcomed in some quarters for the fact that it takes place before the start of the yearling sales, thus giving people a chance to reinvest, and we must all hope that is indeed what happens.

The July Sale performed remarkably well this year, with 330 of the 344 horses offered being sold at an extraordinary 96% clearance rate. Tattersalls will be delighted if a similar level of trade is seen this week for the 600 or so horses who will appear once withdrawals are taken into account.

Recent form always counts for plenty at such auctions and the well-related Surf Dancer (Ire) (Lope De Vega {Ire}), who sells as lot 706 from William Haggas’s Somerville Lodge, has a York listed win to his credit this season among his three wins from eight starts.

Among five horses consigned by Ballydoyle is Battle Of Liege (War Front) (lot 386), a 3-year-old brother to Evie Stockwell’s Group 1 winners Hit It A Bomb and Brave Anna who won a novice race last season and is currently rated 82.

Breeders on the lookout for a filly with a decent page will doubtless peruse the drafts from major breeders Juddmonte and Shadwell. Among the draft of 21 fillies, colts and geldings from Prince Khalid Abdullah’s Juddmonte Farms is lot 445, Sophistry (GB) (Make Believe {GB}), an unraced half-sister to G1 Criterium de Saint-Cloud winner Epicuris (GB) (Rail Link {GB}) whose juvenile Frankel (GB) half-sister has been placed in France since the catalogue was printed. Also of dual-purpose or international interest is the 104-rated 5-year-old gelding Crossed Baton (GB) (Dansili {GB}) (lot 423), who was a listed winner at three and four over 10 furlongs.

There is also one wild-card entry, an 80-rated 2-year-old filly who will be sold on Monday as lot 199A. Named Ocean Star (Ire), the daughter of Adaay (Ire) is trained by Archie Watson and won over seven furlongs at Chepstow on Aug. 14 after finishing runner-up in two of her three previous starts.

Tattersalls’ Park Paddocks sales ground will be extra busy this year with the Ascot Yearling Sale having been relocated there on its new date of Sept. 7, followed by the Tattersalls Ireland September Yearling Sale, which is also being staged in Newmarket this year, from Sept. 21 to 23.

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