She wasn't around to see it, but the late Marylou Whitney would have been thrilled to see her stables' homebred filly, Super Quick, romp to a 14 1/4-length victory in Friday's Grade 3, $150,000 Allaire du Pont Distaff Stakes at Pimlico Race Course in Baltimore, Md.
Trained by Norm Casse and ridden by Florent Geroux, the 4-year-old daughter of Super Saver led at every call, stopping the timer in 1:47.78 for 1 1/8 miles on a fast track after setting fractions of :23.53, :46.39, 1:09.92 and 1:34.87. She paid $6.20 to win.
Exotic West, the 3-2 favorite, rallied from last to finish second under Javier Castellano after a slow start, with Frost Point third, Click to Confirm (the only 3-year-old in the field) fourth, and Into Vanishing rounding out the group of five fillies. Lil Kings Princess was scratched.
The 29th running of the 1 1/8-mile Allaire du Pont for fillies and mares 3-years old and up was the first of six stakes, four graded, worth $1.05 million in purses on a sensational 14-race Black-Eyed Susan Day program headlined by the 98th edition of the 1 1/8-mile fixture for 3-year-old fillies.
Super Quick came into the race off a good third-place finish to Malathaat – last year's Eclipse Award-winning 3-year-old filly – in the G3 Doubledogdare Stakes at Keeneland on April 22. That was her stakes debut.
It took six races for Super Quick to leave the maiden ranks, breaking through last Sept. 19 with a 10 1/4-length romp in the slop at Churchill Downs. She found winning to her liking and won her next two starts, a Keeneland allowance race in October and an optional claiming/allowance race at Churchill in November – the latter by 5 1/2 lengths again on a sloppy track.
Off from November until March, Super Quick returned in March at Fair Grounds, finishing a well-beaten fifth in another optional claiming/allowance event before her stakes debut in the Doubledogdare.
In the Allaire du Pont Distaff, Geroux sent Super Quick to the lead at the start, held a clear advantage down the backstretch and into the far turn, then widened the advantage in the final three-eighths of a mile.
“I never saw anyone. I took a peek at the three-eighths pole and there was already a bit of a gap between my horse and the second-place horse,” said Geroux. “When I called on her at the top of the lane, she gave me another gear. She was all business all the way to the wire. To be honest, Norm thought she'd run a big race. He thought it would be a perfect racetrack for her with the tight turns. She runs the turns very well. He said, 'Just take it to them, and if she wants to open up, let her do it.'”
“We knew early on this morning when Johnny Ortiz's filly [Lil Kings Princess No. 5] scratched, we were going to have a much better shot of letting her get into her rhythm,” said Casse. “I am not so sure she is a need-the-lead-type horse but she is certainly better when she can get comfortable early. And that is what she did today. I have been lobbying for a couple months to get her in a nine-furlong race. Conventional wisdom would say a stretch-out would make it a little more difficult, but I think it's easier for her.
“Truthfully, I could not see the fractions but it seemed like she was just rolling along. I was just letting it sink in. I thought she would run like that today and I am glad she did. I am very proud of her.”
Casse said the Fleur de Lis at Churchill Downs July 2 is a next-race target for Super Quick.
Super Quick was produced from the Cape Town mare, Quick Town, also owned and bred by the Marylou Whitney Stables, which purchased that mare's second dam, Canadian-bred stakes winner Sing and Swing for $280,000 at the 1998 Keeneland November mixed sale.
That acquisition was a homecoming of sorts for a female family that had been part of the broodmare band of Marylou Whitney's late husband, C.V. Whitney, for several generations. That family produced 1975 Kentucky Oaks winner Sun and Snow. Four generations later, the Whitney blood is still running strong.
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