Glass Slippers Takes Rail Trip To Become First European To Win Turf Sprint

Glass Slippers (GB) justified a long flight from her European base with a brilliant performance under a patient ride by jockey Tom Eaves to win the Grade 1 Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint Saturday. The 4-year-old filly hung well back, tucked along the rail behind the majority of the field through the backstretch and around the turn, appeared to have nowhere to go until a gap opened up, allowing Eaves to quietly ease her closer to the pace. Still, Glass Slippers was forced to wait behind dueling Wildman Jack and Into Mystic in front, hemmed in to her right shoulder by Extravagant Kid. She found another gear and burst through a narrow gap inside of Extravagant Kid, charging forward to challenge Wildman Jack, easily putting him away and holding off a wall of late challengers led by Wet Your Whistle. The final margin was a half length.

“It's just brilliant,” said Eaves. “We arrived on Monday and we exercised her on the turf  track all week. We also walked it a couple of times. I spoke to Ryan Moore beforehand for some advice on how to ride the track. What a training performance. She's been great all year so come to and win it's unreal. She's raced round a bend before but the plan was to go on the instead and ride for a bit of luck. We had a great run through which doesn't always work but it did today. To have a Breeders' Cup winner Is amazing and a day I won't forget. She'll be in training again next year.”

The win is the first in the Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint for a European-based horse.

Wet Your Whistle was second, followed by Leinster. Glass Slippers paid $22.40 to win.

The final time for the five and a half furlongs was 1:01.53.

Kevin Ryan trains Glass Slippers for owner/breeder Bearstone Stud Limited. She is the daughter of Dream Ahead and Night Gypsy (GB) by Mind Games (GB). The filly came to this race off a narrow second-place finish in the G1 Prix de l'Abbaye de Longchamp on Oct. 20, and a win prior to that in the G1 Flying Five Stakes at the Curragh.

“Awesome. I'm ecstatic,” said Ryan. “To come and compete against the best sprinters in the world and beat them is just amazing. She's been great all week. Every day getting fresher and cantering on the turf track every morning. I said to Tom earlier in the week now you're going quicker running into bend let's see how she changes her legs and straight away no issues at all in the bend. I knew then we were in business. We decided going on a brave ride up the inner and go the shortest route and if it didn't work such is life. Today was our day.”

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Glass Slippers Makes History For Europe in the Turf Sprint

Bearstone Stud’s Glass Slippers (GB) (Dream Ahead) became the first European invader to win the GI Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint, weaving her way through traffic to score a late-charging victory at Keeneland Saturday. Sent off at 10-1, the bay filly settled well slightly behind midpack as longshot Into Mystic (Into Mischief) took the field through an opening quarter in :21.26 while prompted by Bombard (War Front) and Texas Wedge (Colonel John). She inched closer along the rail on the turn and cut the corner into the straight and she was shoulder to shoulder with Imprimis (Broken Vow), both ready to strike following a half in :43.81. While Imprimis’s lane was abruptly closed off by Leinster (Majestic Warrior), Glass Slippers found a seam and charged to daylight before holding off the late-closing Wet Your Whistle (Stroll). Leinster, favored at 4-1, settled for third after racing prominently throughout.

Glass Slipper is the fourth female to beat the boys in the Turf Sprint.

“What a training performance,” winning rider Tom Eaves said. “She’s been great all year, so come to and win it’s unreal. She’s raced round a bend before, but the plan was to go on the inside and ride for a bit of luck. We had a great run through, which doesn’t always work, but it did today. To have a Breeders’ Cup winner is amazing and a day I won’t forget.”

Of the result, winning trainer Kevin Ryan said, “Awesome. I’m ecstatic. To come and compete against the best sprinters in the world and beat them is just amazing. She’s been great all week. Every day getting fresher and cantering on the turf track every morning. I said to Tom earlier in the week, ‘Now you’re going quicker running into bend let’s see how she changes her legs’ and straight away no issues at all in the bend. I knew then we were in business. We decided going on a brave ride up the inner and go the shortest route and if it didn’t work, such is life. Today was our day.”

Glass Slippers won last year’s G1 Prix de l’Abbaye de Longchamp. She opened 2020 with a fifth-place effort in the G1 King’s Stand S. at Royal Ascot in June and was second in the July 31 GII King George Qatar S. before winning the Sept. 13 G1 Derrinstown Stud Flying Five S. at The Curragh. She missed by just a neck when second in her defense attempt in the Prix de l’Abbaye last time out Oct. 4.

 

Pedigree Notes:

Terry Holdcroft’s Bearstone Stud purchased Glass Slippers’ second dam Ocean Grove for 20,952gns at the 1996 Tattersalls December sale. That mare’s first foal was Glass Slippers’ dam Night Gypsy.

Glass Slippers is the first American graded stakes winner for her three-time Group 1-winning sire Dream Ahead.

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Imprimis Puts Orseno Back in the Spotlight

You have to have the right horses, manage them properly and get them to the big races when they are at their best.

Those are the sentiments of Classic-winning trainer Joe Orseno, who will saddle Saturday’s GI Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint morning-line co-second choice Imprimis (Broken Vow).

It’s been some time, 20 years to be exact, but this isn’t Orseno’s first trip to the Breeders’ Cup with a live runner. Far from it.

Back-to-back wins at the 2000 Breeders’ Cup-held then as just a one-day, blockbuster eight-race program-put an exclamation point on a career year for the now 65-year-old.

“That year, we won two Breeders’ Cups, the Preakness, and a bunch of Grade Ones, and I just thought it was gonna happen every year,” said Orseno, a former private trainer for Stronach Stables between 1998-2002.

“It’s not like I forgot how to train in the last 20 years,” he added with a laugh. “You have to have the horses.”

Orseno certainly had the horses on that aforementioned Championship Saturday at Churchill Downs. Perfect Sting and Macho Uno reeled off dramatic wins in consecutive fashion beneath Hall of Famer Jerry Bailey, providing Orseno with a rolling double in the GI Breeders’ Cup Filly & Mare Turf and GI Breeders’ Cup Juvenile, respectively. He also tightened the girth on Red Bullet to an upset victory over GI Kentucky Derby winner Fusaichi Pegasus earlier that spring in the second leg of the Triple Crown.

“That was a great day, obviously, for myself, the owners and my whole team, and a few of those guys are still with me,” Orseno reflected of the 2000 Breeders’ Cup.

“I thought I should’ve won one the year before and was very disappointed that Perfect Sting had a rough trip. I was like, ‘Geez, is this really ever going to happen for me?’ Then when she won, it was just like a big weight was lifted. We won a Breeders’ Cup! Wow! Then to come back and win the very next one. What can you say? It was just a great day. Two very good horses. And you know what? We had ’em ready to run that particular day. That’s what it’s about.”

Orseno looks like he has another one ready to run Saturday.

A punchless sixth in last year’s Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint at Santa Anita–Orseno’s first starter at the Championships since 2002–Imprimis underwent a pair of throat surgeries to repair a breathing issue this off season.

“Gene Recio had him on the farm in Ocala and started to hear a little noise once he was back in training,” Orseno said. “We went ahead and scoped him and saw that the first surgery was starting to fail a little bit. We walked him across the street to Equine Performance Center and did another surgery in February. This one worked and he hasn’t looked back since. It 100% has helped him.”

Imprimis crossed the wire a dominant winner in his comebacker for his 6-year-old debut, but had his number controversially taken down to third for causing interference in the stretch in Saratoga’s GIII Troy S. Aug. 8.

“Take the human aspect out of it as far as taking him down, the horse ran his race and he couldn’t have run any better off a 10-month layoff,” Orseno said. “I sent him there to Saratoga and he ran a great race, and I was very proud of that.”

The gelding got his chance at redemption and backed up that strong performance with a visually impressive, come-from-behind score in the ‘Win and You’re In’ GIII Runhappy Turf Sprint S. over the soft going at Kentucky Downs last time Sept. 12.

He’s earned Beyer Speed Figures of 101 and 102 in his two starts this year. Irad Ortiz, Jr, a perfect three-for-three in the irons aboard Imprimis, is booked again to ride this weekend.

Imprimis’s six-race campaign in 2019, led by a course-and-distance tally in Keeneland’s GII Shakertown S., included a trip to Royal Ascot, where he finished sixth in the G1 King’s Stand S.

“This year we chose to do a different path. He didn’t run as much and he’s very fresh,” Orseno said. “He was getting little to no air [last year], and he still tried every single time.”

Produced by the Put It Back mare Shoppers Return, Imprimis was purchased privately by Mike Hall and Sam Ross’s Breeze Easy LLC after beginning his career with a pair of wins for breeder Craig Wheeler and trainer Tim Hills at the age of four.

The Florida-bred’s resume also includes wins in the 2018 Jim McKay Turf Sprint S. at Pimlico and the Wolf Hill S. at Monmouth, and the 2019 Silks Run S. at Gulfstream. Hailing from the family of GISWs Miss Shop (Deputy Minister) and Power Broker (Pulpit), he sports a record of 15-8-0-2 and career earnings of $759,948.

“When he’s right, he brings his ‘A’ game,” Orseno said. “I’m going in there knowing that my horse is as good as I can have him and as good as he could be. He’s ready.”

A native of Philadelphia, Orseno grew up not far from the now defunct Garden State Racetrack and went to the races with his father as a kid. He paved his own way into the business, taking out his trainer’s license in 1977. “When I was in high school, I played sports. I didn’t grow up around the horses,” Orseno said.

Based year-round at Gulfstream Park with 40 stalls, Orseno is closing in on 2,000 victories and $50 million in career earnings. Since re-opening his stable to the public in 2002, his runners have grossed seven figures in earnings in every season bar three. Other standouts campaigned by Orseno include GISWs: Golden Missile, also a longshot third in the 1999 GI Breeders’ Cup Classic, Collect the Cash, Roaring Twenties and Tap to Music.

“I’ve always been a hands-on trainer,” Orseno concluded. “The game’s changed a lot since I first came in. [Late trainer] Mickey Crock took me from the ground up and taught me the right way. The horsemen way. I always say, ‘There’s horse trainers and there’s horsemen.’ I always considered myself a horseman.”

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Orseno On Imprimis: ‘A Coach Is Only As Good As His Players,’ But ‘We Have The Right Player’

Breeze Easy LLC's Imprimis jogged twice around the training track at Keeneland Tuesday morning for a scheduled start in Saturday's Turf Sprint with a strong chance to give his trainer Joe Orseno a third career Breeders' Cup success.

“We're going to go to the gate tomorrow, which wasn't in my plans. Seeing we drew post three, I've decided to take him in the gate to stand him,” Orseno said. “I really wanted to be further on the outside. You can't do much about it.”

Imprimis was rated second in the morning line at 4-1 behind Got Stormy, the 7-2 favorite who finished second in the 2019 Breeders' Cup Mile last year at Santa Anita.

“I'm happy to have Irad [Ortiz Jr.] to ride him. He's a quality rider who knows the horse,” Orseno said. “He could get bottled up in there, but he has enough tactical speed for us to really do what we want.”

Imprimis, who has won eight of 15 career starts, finished sixth, beaten just four lengths, in last year's Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint at Santa Anita. After an extended break, the 6-year-old gelding has finished first in his only two starts this year in the Troy at Saratoga and the Kentucky Downs Turf Sprint. The son of Broken Vow, however, was disqualified and placed third for drifting in during the stretch run of the Troy while making his first start in nine months.

“There was a lot of disappointment we didn't get the win. I never thought about the money. Yeah, I would have liked to get a bigger commission, but for me, it was: we did all that off that layoff; we got him ready and got him where we wanted him to be; shipped him to Saratoga and for him to win that way… ,” Orseno said. “They can't take that race away from him. They can take the first-place away, but the race was what I needed to get and that's what we got out of it. It definitely moved him forward for his next race.”

Imprimis was shuffled back in traffic in the stretch run at Kentucky Downs but recovered to mount an impressive drive to score by a neck under Ortiz Jr.

“I had no idea he was trapped down on the inside like that,” said Orseno, noting he didn't have a good vantage point while watching the race. “He just rode him out and around. That move he made doing that, picking up horses of that caliber, I told the owner, 'He has to be one of the choices for the Breeders' Cup off that race.' I think he'll peak for this race.”

Should Imprimis win the Turf Sprint Saturday, Orseno will enter a Breeders' Cup winner's circle for the first time since 2000, when he saddled Perfect Sting for a win in the Filly & Mare Turf and Macho Uno for a score in the Juvenile at Churchill Downs.

“It would mean a lot. When I went on that run with Stronach [Stables], it was five years and I was in it almost every year. We won two of them and were very competitive – we were third in the Classic with Golden Missile [in 1999]. I thought, 'I'll be doing this every year.' When you don't get to come back, you realize what it's about and what it takes,” Orseno said. “I have a conception of what it takes to get a horse ready to do this, but you have to have the horse. A coach is only as good as his players. Right now, we have the right player.”

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