“I'm extremely proud of her race. That obviously was an impressive race and that would put a [big] number on it,” Asmussen said. “I'm very happy with how she came out of the race yesterday. I'm unbelievably impressed with her and I honestly didn't expect anything less.”

While the GI Ballerina H. Aug. 26 at Saratoga is the likely next target for Echo Zulu, neither Asmussen nor Winchell Thoroughbreds' racing manager David Fiske ruled out a future start against males.

“It probably has everything to do with how Gunite [by Gun Runner, who is entered in Saturday's GI Alfred G. Vanderbilt H.] does in the division with the common ownership,” Asmussen said. “But I'm definitely not scared to run her against anybody. We'll do whatever is best for the other horses that Winchell and L and N own.”

Winchell and Asmussen also campaign MGSW and MGISP Wicked Halo (Gun Runner), who won last weekend's Twin Bridges S. at Ellis Park.

“The plan last week was that if Wicked Halo ran well and Echo Zulu ran well, they would both show up in the Ballerina,” said Fiske. “We'll try to keep everyone healthy and go on down the path. People are speculating that Echo Zulu should go to the [GI] Breeders' Cup Sprint and pass the [GI Breeders' Cup] Filly and Mare Sprint. We do have Wicked Halo, but I don't know what we would do with Gunite because he could win the Sprint, too.”

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Before Leone and other Italian directors like Sergio Corbucci set about redefining the Old West in Europe, traditional domestic westerns featured clean-cut leads like John Wayne, Alan Ladd, Gregory Peck, Gary Cooper, and Jimmy Stewart in films by directors like John Ford and Howard Hawks that clearly delineated the good from the bad and ugly. Not so Leone, who made the genre surreal and messy, and for him the good wasn't as easily distinguishable from the bad and ugly.

Clint Eastwood, Leone's star, was an anti-hero gunslinger with five-day stubble on a perpetually squinting face, a cigarillo between his lips, and a signature poncho draped over his tall frame.

When he flipped the poncho over his left shoulder, he was ready to draw the Colt Navy holstered on his thigh, and when he did, any gunfight was over in the blink of an eye. He was faster than fast–and unbelievably so.

Racing in 2022 was messy and surreal and was a Sergio Leone film in my mind, not a John Ford movie with clear-cut heroes and bad guys. Flightline was the star, playing the Eastwood role. No one was faster.

Here's the year's Good, Bad, and Ugly, boiled down in three acts.

The Good
The Good was Flightline (Tapit), wasn't it? He was good, but not so in the traditional sense for some, because he didn't race often like their racing heroes from the past. His detractors have grumbled, too, that he's not competing in 2023 because his connections are cashing out on his massive stud value. Some conspiracy theorists on social media have gone so far as to insinuate the $4.6 million share purchased by an undisclosed buyer at auction at Keeneland was engineered by the colt's ownership group to inflate his value. In reality, the share was bought fair and square by Travis Boersma, the billionaire co-founder of Dutch Bros. Coffee, with Coolmore the underbidder. In fact, Boersma has since purchased another share in Flightline.

As for how good Flightline was, the results of the recent Gl Malibu and Gll San Antonio add to the tale: Taiba (Gun Runner), beaten 8 3/4 lengths in third by Flightline in the Gl Breeders' Cup Classic, won the former by 4 1/4 lengths; and Country Grammer (Tonalist), second by 19 1/4 lengths to Flightline in the Gl Pacific Classic, won the latter by 4 1/2 lengths. At the time, the Pacific Classic impacted me in a way I haven't felt in a long time, and when Lane's End asked me to write the entry for Flightline for its annual stallion brochure, I wrote of that race in particular and said, in part:

He was a hot Santa Ana wind blowing in from the San Diego mountains that day. He not only fried the competition in the Pacific Classic but also the ability to think straight in the immediate aftermath. It was difficult to coherently put into words what was seen and felt as Flightline crossed the line. There was something unsettling about it, something that asked, “Is this real?”

Joan Didion, that great American writer from California, once said this about the Santa Ana winds: “The Pacific turned ominously glossy during a Santa Ana period, and one woke in the night troubled not only by the peacocks screaming in the olive trees but by the eerie absence of surf. The heat was surreal. The sky had a yellow cast, the kind of light sometimes called 'earthquake weather.'”

Didion's words capture the otherworldly essence and collective disbelief of what was witnessed at Del Mar. It had been, after all, only Flightline's fifth race. Previously, he'd dominated a field of Grade l winners by six lengths in the one-mile Gl Metropolitan H. at Belmont. His only other stakes outing before the Met Mile came in the seven-furlong Gl Malibu S. at Santa Anita, which he won by 11 1/2 lengths.

In the days following the Pacific Classic, as the magnitude of accomplishment settled in, journalists waxed lyrically about Flightline's performance, but the most telling verdicts came from unsentimental makers of figures and ratings: 126 from Beyer, the fastest in almost 20 years and the second-best ever; -8 1/2 from Thoro-Graph, the best in its history; -2 from Ragozin,
an indicator of highly elite class; and a ranking of 143 from the internationally respected Timeform, which places Flightline tops among American horses of all time and within range of the publication's highest-ever weighted horse, Frankel, at 147.

Flightline was clearly special.

The Bad
The handling of HISA was bad–twice over. There's no way to sugarcoat this. The bill was first passed without industry consensus when Sen. Mitch McConnell, Republican and then Majority Leader in the senate, tacked it on to the year-end spending bill in 2020, and after a part of it was found unconstitutional last year, Sen. McConnell, now Minority Leader, once again attached an amendment to it to the spending bill last month with corrective language that's supposed to address the issue the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals found objectionable, which is that government power was delegated to a private entity without adequate government supervision.

Sen. McConnell, in this role, plays the part actor Lee Van Cleef did in the Leone film, the hired gun Angel Eyes. Part of the entry for Angel Eyes in Wikipedia reads: “A ruthless… mercenary… always finishes a job for which he is paid.” Who hired–lobbied is the polite word–Sen. McConnell? Pro HISA advocates, including The Jockey Club, a mostly Republican organization. And why is this ironic and even surreal? Because many of the constitutional issues being litigated in courts around HISA are anti-Republican stances about states' rights and regulatory measures. And many of the federal justices ruling on these issues were named to the bench by Republican Presidents, whose appointments were supported by Sen. McConnell and most Republicans.

What happens if another conservative judge rules against HISA in one of several suits on the table at the moment? You already know: Sen. McConnell will be back to tack another amendment to the spending bill a year from now. He's got plenty of Democrats in the senate who will support him on this, but his own party is highly critical of him for putting forth measures that are anathema to conservatives.

Sen. McConnell and his posse should have had this right from the beginning, with industry consensus and a clear understanding that any challenges to HISA would come from McConnell's own party and be adjudicated by justices put in place by them.

The Ugly
Who will be the champion 3-year-old colt of 2022? Will it be Epicenter (Not This Time), who won one Grade l race last year, or will it be Taiba, the winner of three? I tweeted this recently from the WTC company account, @Sirewatch:

“In the matchup for Eclipse 3yo between Epicenter vs. Taiba, the winner is Ron Winchell. He owns Epicenter and is a major shareholder in Gun Runner, the sire of Taiba.”

Winchell is a leading man from a John Ford film, a John Wayne type of winner.

Taiba is owned by Amr Zedan, a Saudi businessman, and trained by Hall of Famer Bob Baffert, both of whom are Sergio Leone characters, perhaps a composite in this case of the Eli Wallach role of Tuco, a wanted Mexican bandit in “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.”

Things certainly got ugly for Zedan and Baffert after their Medina Spirit (Protonico) tested positive for betamethasone after the 2021 Gl Kentucky Derby, and events have snowballed from there, including the Churchill Downs ban of Baffert and the subsequent lawsuits filed by Zedan and Baffert in response. All of this translated to negative publicity and quite likely cost Medina Spirit an Eclipse Award.

The champion 3-year-old colt of 2021 was Godolphin's Essential Quality, who won two Grade l races, the same as Medina Spirit. Except Medina Spirit also defeated older horses by winning the Gl Awesome Again – something his rival didn't do – and finished ahead of Essential Quality the two times they met, in the Derby (Essential Quality was fourth) and the Breeders' Cup
Classic (Medina Spirit was second to Knicks Go and Essential Quality was third).

The resilient Zedan and Baffert are somehow back again with Taiba, but how will voters respond this time? Will they snub Zedan and Baffert again and go with Epicenter, who had a fine campaign that included a win in the prestigious Gl Travers? Or will they jettison both dirt colts and go for Godolphin's Modern Games (Ire) (Dubawi {Ire}), who won two Grade l races on turf against older horses? Don't scoff, there's been some chatter about that on social media among potential voters.

Owner and handicapper (and economics professor) Marshall Gramm recently noted on Twitter the similarities of Taiba, Epicenter, and Modern Games to the trio of Snow Chief (three Grade l wins), Ferdinand (one), and Manila (three, all on turf) from 1986. Snow Chief won the Eclipse that year, but Manila, an outstanding turf horse, was the best of the three. Back then, however,
turf racing didn't have the same stature it now seems to hold with some voters.

These days it's hard to agree on anything. Consensus is elusive. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly are seemingly interchangeable, depending on viewpoint. And facts seem to matter less than opinion. That's the chaos that Leone captured in 1966, and it's very much alive now.

Welcome to 2023.

Sid Fernando is president and CEO of Werk Thoroughbred Consultants, Inc., originator of the Werk Nick Rating and eNicks.

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The million-dollar son of Tapit exceeded all the pre-race hyperbole, displaying beyond a doubt he was more than the flavor of the month with a memorable victory in the Grade 1 Runhappy Malibu Stakes, opening day headliner at Santa Anita on Sunday.

Despite a slightly slow start and bumping with second choice Dr. Schivel in the seven-furlong race, Flightline never took a deep breath, winning by 11 ½ lengths, widening as he crossed the wire, getting seven furlongs in 1:21.37.

Coupled with his first two victories by a combined margin of 26 lengths, the three-year-old bay colt has won his three starts by a combined 37 ½ lengths, a tad over 12 lengths per race.

“He came out of the race good,” said John Sadler Monday morning. Sadler conditions Flightline for Hronis Racing LLC, Siena Farm LLC, Summer Wind Equine LLC, West Point Thoroughbreds and Woodford Racing LLC.

“We're not looking at anything yet,” Sadler added, when asked about Flightline's next possible race. “We don't have any plans yet. It's too early for that,” although in a post-race TV interview he did mention the Saudi Cup and the Met Mile.

“The bigger picture point I was trying to make is that he could run in any race, but we haven't honed in on anything, obviously,” Sadler said.

“The horse is on a different level. All has to go right, but we might be looking at a historic-type horse before it's all over.

“We celebrated Christmas a day late.”

Indeed, and the celebration was further validated this morning when it became known that the freakishly good colt by Tapit had earned an astronomical 118 Beyer Speed Figure—best in America for 2021.

“It's the top Beyer of the year, surpassing the 114 posted by Flightline (Sept. 5) and Baby Yoda (Sept. 4) in separate races in September,” said Santa Anita Morning Line Maker Jon White. “Of course, Baby Yoda finished a distant second to Flightline yesterday.”

And so now, it is with great anticipation that horseplayers, not to mention racing secretaries everywhere, await Flightline's next assignment.

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“It's crazy,” said Baby Yoda's co-owner Adam Wachtel. “It's hard to rationalize or accept. It's highly unusual to see something like this. He ran for $10,000 nine weeks ago and for him to go out an accomplish what he did in such a short period of time is just not something that you see. It makes you shake your head.”

Wachtel admits he wasn't paying any attention to Baby Yoda when the 3-year-old gelding made his debut May 30 at Pimlico for trainer Charles Frock and owner Gerald Burns. Baby Yoda won by eight lengths that day, but posted a moderate Beyer number of 69.

He came back in a first-level allowance race at Pimlico and ran third, but this was the race that got Wachtel to take notice. He is always on the lookout for horses that are off the radar but running fast numbers. Baby Yoda ran a 10 1/2 on the Ragozin Sheets, which, Wachtel felt, was good enough to compete against all 3-year-old sprinters not named Jackie's Warrior (Maclean's Music).

“We look at numbers with Len Friedman of Ragozin data,” Wachtel explained. “We go over horses each week. Forget about the race where he broke his maiden for $10,000. I didn't even look at that. When he finished third in the 'a other than' in Maryland he ran a great race. A friend of mine says that I buy a lot of Rocky Balboas. This guy fit into that category. The sire was a darn good race horse. I know he hasn't been an exciting stallion. But there was enough there and I really liked the replay.”

Wachtel had his vet go over the horse and had his agent reach out to the Maryland connections. Within a few days he had acquired Baby Yoda for an undisclosed price. Whatever it was, it is no doubt among the most anyone ever paid for a son of Prospective. Now standing in Korea after beginning his stud career at Ocala Stud, Prospective's biggest win came in the 2012 GII Tampa Bay Derby.

The new ownership group, which also includes Pantofel Stable and Jerold Zaro, sent Baby Yoda to Hall of Fame trainer Bill Mott and kept its fingers crossed. Ironically, they had the Florida-bred pegged as a future turf horse and entered him in a starter allowance at Saratoga on the grass, but the race did not fill. Plan B was a dirt starter allowance July 17 and the result was a 1 1/4-length win.

Baby Yoda fans | Sarah Andrew

At that point, Wachtel's expectations were still not sky high. Winning a starter allowance only proves so much. But, after talking to Mott, he started to look at things differently.

“After Mott had had him for about 10 days, two weeks, I asked him, 'Bill, what do you think about this horse?' He said, 'I love him.' I said, 'Come on, really?'” Wachtel said. “Bill said it again. He told me that the horse was really neat, had a lot of talent and was a runner. Bill doesn't usually make statements like that, so for him to say what he did made me think this horse might really be alright.”

The Sept. 4 allowance brought together a deep field of 10 and several among the group seemed to have potential. Ridden by Jose Ortiz, Baby Yoda won by 4 1/4 lengths and completed the 6 1/2 furlongs in 1:14.33. The time of the race took on a whole new level of significance when the Beyer number came out. The only other horse to run a 114 Beyer this year is Flightline (Tapit). His big figure, ironically, also came in a first-level allowance race, a sprint at Del Mar the day after Baby Yoda's race. Among 3-year-olds, Essential Quality (Tapit) is next on the Beyer list, with a 109 from his victory in the GI Belmont S. Knicks Go (Paynter) ran a 113 Beyer in the GIII Prairie Meadows Cornhusker H.

Baby Yoda's Ragozin number in the Saratoga allowance was a 4 3/4.

“I've been doing this a long time and have had a lot of good horses but that, what he did, kind of blew me away,” Wachtel said. “I was unbelievably impressed and thrilled.”

Wachtel is reasonable enough to know that there's every chance this fairy tale will go off in another direction.

“Is he a freak or will he regress from that race? I don't know,” he said.

Nonetheless, the plan is to give Baby Yoda the type of test that a 114 Beyer seems to deserve. Wachtel said the next race will be in a stakes and said the GI Vosburgh S. and the GII Stoll Keenon Ogden Phoenix S. at Keeneland are among the possibilities.

“I've always been a guy who looks at data and how fast they have run,” Wachtel said. “Every race he has run over his last three races have been really fast and, the other day, he did it easily. I will rely on my Hall of Fame trainer to tell me how well he is doing. If he continues to train well, why not take a shot with him in a stakes?”

Why not? It's not logical that a $10,000 maiden claimer could win a graded stakes race, but what about this story is?

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Trained by Brad Cox, the now four-time Grade 1 winner arrived at the nine-furlong Whitney, which offered a “Win and You're In” berth to the Breeders' Cup Classic, off a sharp in-hand victory in the Grade 3 Cornhusker on July 2 at Prairie Meadows.

Knicks Go captured the Grade 1 Breeders' Cup Dirt Mile in November at Keeneland and the Grade 1 Pegasus World Cup in January at Gulfstream Park.

Piloted by Joel Rosario on Saturday, Knicks Go led the field at every point of call and drew away in the stretch to a 4 ½-length win, garnering a 111 Beyer Speed Figure.

Cox said he has not yet made plans for the next start for his talented son of Paynter, but he would like to race him once before the $6 million Grade 1 Breeders' Cup Classic on November 6 at Del Mar.

“We'll let the dust settle, but my thoughts would be to give him a race five to six weeks out [from the Breeders' Cup Classic],” Cox said. “I haven't really dug into it yet, the biggest thing is how he came out of yesterday's race. It would be nice to get a race into him between now and then, but where that might be I don't know.

“I was really pleased with how he looked this morning,” Cox added. “He ate up well, so everything is really positive.”

Knicks Go made his first start for Cox in February 2020 with an allowance optional claiming triumph at Oaklawn Park. Following an eight-month hiatus, Knicks Go burst back onto the scene with a Keeneland allowance optional claiming score ahead of a victory in the Breeders' Cup Dirt Mile at the Lexington oval.

Cox said Knicks Go has taken big leaps forward in his 2021 campaign.

“He was a very good horse last year and he's a better horse now,” Cox said. “Last year, he was able to win the Breeders' Cup Dirt Mile against a great group of horses. He had one prep going into that about five weeks out. This year, he's been able to race throughout the winter and rebounded well. He's had three races this summer, so he's been campaigned with more foundation this year, so I just have to think he's a better horse. He's a more accomplished horse and built a nice foundation.”

Boasting a record of 22-8-3-1, Knicks Go has lifetime earnings of $5,368,995.

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Asked about his early Breeders’ Cup opinions, Beyer understandably said he’s against the strong on hype, weak on numbers Princess Noor (Not This Time), who figures to be among the favorites in the Juvenile Fillies.

“The commentators on TV were just riding the Beyer Speed Figures, like, ‘How can this great horse only be getting figures in the 70’s?'” he said. “Todd Schrupp on TVG mentioned her in the same breath with Ruffian, which to me is sacrilege. But the fact is when I look at all of her races, the figures are solid as a rock. When she won her last race [the Chandelier] at Santa Anita, there was a really weak group of male 2-year-olds [in that day’s GI American Pharoah S.] going the same distance. You have a direct line of comparison and her time was just very mediocre, as with her other races, so I always believed in standing by right figures when I can and I’ll be betting against her in the Breeders’ Cup.”

On how his betting habits compare to a younger version of himself, Beyer said, “I bet much less. When I developed the figures I was just about the only person who had speed figures. I had as great an edge as a gambler could want from the mid-70s to the mid-90s. Now that speed figures are common currency and everybody has access to them, I don’t have that. I made hay while the sun shined, in those golden years. Plus there are elements of the modern game that I just don’t like. At the top of the list is the Rainbow 6 and those other copycat jackpot bets. There was nothing that got my juices flowing like a big carryover in a traditional Pick 6. But the jackpot bets are, to me, a sucker bet to fleece the average player. So I’m down on that.”

A longtime critic of drugs in racing and the lax regulatory approach that allows cheaters to prosper, Beyer admitted that he didn’t realize the depths of the alleged criminality that were revealed in this March’s FBI indictments of Jason Servis and Jorge Navarro.

“In all the years that I would write about super-trainers and guys whose performance seemed to defy logic, I had the notion that, the industry is just looking the other way, stewards aren’t cracking down,” he said. “We learned from the case earlier this year that it’s not as simple as that. This was a major criminal conspiracy, with people manufacturing sophisticated drugs, hiding the presence of those drugs in a sophisticated way. It took a year-long investigation by the FBI with wiretaps to nail the cheaters. This was not just a sneaky trainer and a sneaky vet, it was something that needed a major law enforcement effort. So I think the only answer to this problem is to bring in high-powered investigators. Within the industry itself, it wasn’t negligence, we just didn’t have the tools to keep the cheaters at bay.”

Elsewhere on the show, in the West Point Thoroughbreds news segment, the writers discussed the recent string of medication positives coming out of the Bob Baffert barn and what they mean, then gave their first-blush impressions of the Breeders’ Cup pre-entries. Click here to watch the podcast; click here for the audio-only version.

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Piloted by Joel Rosario, the juvenile son of Maclean's Music parlayed his winning effort in the Grade 1 Hopeful into another Grade 1-victory, when displaying his usual frontrunning style early on and extending his advantage throughout the stretch run, sailing home a 5 1/2-length winner.

“We're just celebrating our win,” said Asmussen's Belmont Park-based assistant trainer Toby Sheets. “The horse came out of the race in good shape and we'll go from there. He's a spectacular individual.”

Sheets said Midnight Bourbon, who ran third in the Champagne, also emerged from the race in good shape. The son of Tiznow picked up his second placing in a graded stakes event. He was previously second in the Grade 3 Iroquois on September 5 at Churchill Downs.

“I was very happy with him. He ran his race,” Sheets said.

Jackie's Warrior, now unbeaten in four lifetime starts, earned an automatic entry into the Grade 1 Breeders' Cup Juvenile after winning the Champagne, which is a Breeders' Cup “Win And You're In” event. He will likely arrive as one of the favorites for the 1 1/16-mile event on November 6 at Keeneland, in attempt to give Asmussen his eighth triumph in a Breeders' Cup race.

Bred in Kentucky by J & J Stables, Jackie's Warrior was purchased for $95,000 from the 2019 Keeneland September Yearling Sale, where he was consigned by Taylor Made Sales Agency.

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Cezanne was sent away as an overwhelming 2-5 favorite and posted a final time of 1:16.13. Leading jockey Flavian Prat rode the Kentucky-bred three-year-old colt by two-time Horse of the Year Curlin.

Bob Baffert trains Cezanne for owners Mrs. John Magnier, Michael Tabor, Michael B. Smith and St. Elias Stable.

“Cezanne was credited with a 90 Beyer Speed Figure,” said Jon White, Santa Anita's longtime morning-line oddsmaker. “Considering he was making his career debut as a three-year-old, I wondered how a 90 Beyer stacks up against the debut Beyers for Arrogate, West Coast and Justify. They also debuted at the age of three for Baffert.

And they all went on to be voted an Eclipse Award that same year as the champion three-year-old male (Arrogate in 2016, West Coast in 2017 and Justify in 2018).

“Because there had been so much hype for Cezanne's debut, some probably expected to see him win by a bigger margin and get a higher Beyer. But a 90 is a lot higher than Arrogate's 80 Beyer in his career debut. And keep in mind that after Arrogate's debut, what he did later that year was extraordinary.”

In the first start of Arrogate's career, he finished third in a six-furlong maiden race at Los Alamitos on April 17, 2016. Later in the year he won the Travers by 13 ½ lengths while breaking Saratoga's track record for 1 ¼ miles.

In his final start at three, Arrogate won the Breeders' Cup Classic at Santa Anita beating California Chrome and other older horses.

“What Cezanne's 90 Beyer is comparable to was West Coast's figure in the first start of his career when he got a 91,” White noted.

West Coast began his career by finishing second in a one-mile maiden race at Santa Anita on Feb. 18, 2017. Later in the year he won the Travers and the Pennsylvania Derby before finishing third in the Breeders' Cup Classic at Del Mar.

“Justify's debut Beyer went through the roof, a 104, when he won his first race by a huge margin,” White said. “That really was some performance. Justify showed everyone right from the start what an outstanding equine athlete he was.”

Bursting on the scene early in 2018 at Santa Anita, Justify registered a 9 1/2-length victory in a seven-furlong maiden race on Feb. 18. He subsequently won the Santa Anita Derby and swept the Triple Crown, then was retired after the Belmont Stakes. Justify won all six of his career starts.

“Cezanne raced a bit greenly in his first start and should improve with that race under his belt,” White said. “I also think there's a good chance that he will do well when he goes farther. Baffert has said that he believes Cezanne has the potential to have a big second half of the year like Arrogate and West Coast.

“So it's sure going to be interesting to see what Cezanne can do during the rest of the year.”

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