Charlton Baker will saddle Glass Ceiling for a start in Saturday's $300,000 Princess Rooney Invitational (G2) at Gulfstream Park knowing that his multiple graded-stakes winner will face a most imposing rival in defending champion Ce Ce.
The Princess Rooney, a seven-furlong “Breeders' Cup 'Win and You're In' sprint for fillies and mares, certainly offers owners and trainers a lot of incentives for challenging the reigning female sprint champion, who is rated as the 4-5 favorite in Saturday's Summit of Speed headliner.
“Ce Ce doesn't need any introduction. She is who she is. If you run your race and you're not good enough, you're not good enough. That's it,” Baker said. “But it's a Breeders' Cup 'Win and You're In' and it's a Grade 2. With her pedigree we're thinking about her future.”
Glass Ceiling, who was claimed by Baker and Michael Foster for $40,000 at Belmont in May 2021, has already greatly enhanced her value as a future broodmare by capturing this year's Barbara Fritchie (G3) at Laurel and the Distaff (G3) at Aqueduct. The 5-year-old daughter of Constitution has won five races, three stakes, for her new connections.
“She was a 4-year-old at the time [of the claim], and some horses don't get going until they're 4 or 5. I think she's found a comfort level – she's kind of a nervous filly – and has improved from there,” Baker said. “As she got older, she got better.”
Glass Ceiling, who is rated second in the morning-line at 7-2, is expected to be forwardly placed under Edgard Zayas during the early running of the Princess Rooney.
“She can be closer [to the pace] now. She used to come from behind. Her speed has gotten better, as far as putting her into contention,” Baker said.
Jacks or Better Farm Inc.'s Spirit Wind will concede experience to her five rivals in Saturday's $300,000 Princess Rooney Invitational (G2) at Gulfstream Park, but the 3-year-old homebred filly has earned her way into the Summit of Speed headliner with three dazzling victories this year.
The Ralph Nicks-trained daughter of Bahamian Squall has won her three races by a combined 23 lengths. After graduating by 15 ½ lengths Feb. 18, the Florida-bred filly captured the March 19 Any Limit Stakes by 2 ½ lengths and the Musical Romance against older state-breds by five lengths.
“She's had a good year. She's put three pretty good races back-to-back-to-back,' Nicks said. “Her first race was beautiful to watch. The second one, she might have bounced a bit off the first one. She came back and reproduced her first race the third time.”
Spirit Wind is a half-sister to Sing Praises, who captured two legs of the 2014 Florida Sire Stakes series – the $350,000 In Reality and the $100,000 Dr. Fager. She ran once as a 2-year-old, finishing second at 4 ½ furlongs, before going to the sidelines for more than nine months.
“We had hopes for her. She ran well in her first race last year. She came back and was working well,” Nicks said. “I don't know if she gave me the 'wow' stuff in the mornings as she has in the afternoons, but that's the difference between the ones that aren't morning glories.”
In the end, things work because they work. We try stuff, often if not always with the best intentions, and see whether it gains our trust. Lived experience, among horsemen and fans, will eventually tell us whether an experiment has failed or whether, once every generation or so, we might have struck a game-changing seam of gold. The Breeders' Cup was one such; and, who knows, maybe a similar hostility from vested interests will ultimately prove the furnace in which HISA can be forged into another.
That may seem a long way off, from both sides of the fence. But someday we'll look back and know whether or not this was a moment when enough people, recognizing the steepening gradient of viability, began to embrace the kind of duties that must accompany the privileges of a life with Thoroughbreds in 2022.
Both in terms of the cost of doing something, and the risk in doing nothing, the stakes are pretty enormous. In this era of bitter polemics, it's unsurprising that people are harnessing broader ideologies to their respective positions. As a result, however, there's a tendency to become so consumed by means that we lose sight of the ends. Things work because they work–not because they are assembled by federal factories or state artisans.
One good example is the piecemeal evolution, over the years, of the racing calendar. In my homeland of England, what has come to feel like a sacrosanct cycle actually obeys the social routine of Victorian aristocracy: Royal Ascot dovetailed with the London “season” of debutantes' balls; the imminent garden party of Goodwood is followed, just down the road, by the Cowes sailing regatta; while the Ebor and St Leger meetings at York and Doncaster were sited conveniently for grouse shoots on the northern moors. In the same way, Saratoga only became the addictive ritual it is today because the capitalist barons had found sanctuary, at an upstate spa, from the broiling city summer.
These have become cherished staging posts in our sporting year by achieving an organic connection not just with us, but also with each other. In its understated way, for instance, you could say that last weekend's GIII Ohio Derby embarked us on the second half of the sophomore campaign. Regrouping Classic protagonists like Zandon (Upstart) and latecomers like Jack Christopher (Munnings) will soon be converging along such roads as the one leading through the GII Jim Dandy and GI Travers.
(Click the arrow below to listen to this column as a podcast)
This schedule has matured in the habits of professionals and public alike. And I have yet to hear anything remotely coherent, among those who renewed their tiresome complaints about the Triple Crown schedule because a freak Derby winner did not risk exposure in the Preakness, about how they would avoid instead butting right into races like the GI Haskell. If you stretch out the Triple Crown, you instead create a logjam in these barely less storied races, which allow both precocious and later-developing sophomores to circle back together.
And, actually, what we see this weekend shows us what happens when you start pulling at the ball of wool. Because two of the biggest names around, both sons of Into Mischief, resume Saturday after a prolonged absence occasioned by pursuit of the winter riches nowadays available in faraway deserts.
His disappointing performance in the G1 Saudi Cup leaves Mandaloun still in the curious position of having two Grade I wins on his resumé without ever passing the post first in a Grade I race. It has also required him to take a long break before the GII Stephen Foster S., a likely stepping stone to the GI Whitney–in which race he might well encounter Life Is Good, who has similarly been stuck in the workshop since his derailment in the G1 Dubai World Cup, and now resurfaces in the GII John A. Nerud S.
Now nobody could sensibly object to the growth of international racing, a transparent boon to our sport. But the people putting up these huge prizes halfway round the world, in what always used to be a period of rest and recuperation for elite American horses, plainly have an agenda of their own. And we've seen the dismal consequences for some of those venerable spring races in California, in particular.
Everybody is perfectly within their rights to go after all that eye-watering desert bounty. But let's not lose sight of the connection between the welfare protocols at Santa Anita, which we celebrated last week, and the competence of the breed to service the program. Because we will not be meeting the standards we inherited from our predecessors, if modern champions are either campaigned like Flightline (Tapit), who is being widely credited with “greatness” after racing for an aggregate 5 minutes and 12 seconds; or disappear to the desert in the winter, then needing months to recover before tentatively contesting only a couple of races before the Breeders' Cup. (That's if they recover at all: Arrogate, for instance, plainly reached the bottom of the barrel in Dubai.)
Life Is Good | Dubai Racing Club
Arguably all those dirhams caused Life Is Good to overreach, in terms of his stamina potential, earlier than would have been the case had he stayed home for a campaign that reserved that test for the Breeders' Cup. One way or another, a single performance in Dubai has prompted a pretty abrupt relegation, by most observers, below Flightline. For now, however, I'd resist the idea that Speaker's Corner (Street Sense) will offer Life Is Good a reliable line on the relative merit of Flightline. For Speaker's Corner to be rolling up his sleeves again, just three weeks after meeting that horse in the GI Met Mile, suggests that he can't possibly have left everything out on the track that day.
Two races in three weeks! Whatever next? And both against authentic monsters, in an era where the graded stakes program has become so diluted that you really have to go looking for trouble to find it.
To all the familiar reasons for that syndrome–the foal crop, the super-trainers, the training in cotton wool–we must add the fact that many of our very best horses are taken right out of the game, for several months, by a shattering winter migration.
There's nothing inherently wrong with these desert races. On the contrary, they provide a fascinating melting pot. They're bringing together horses from radically different racing environments, arguably more successfully than the Breeders' Cup or Royal Ascot. Being wholly extraneous, however, they are unraveling a domestic calendar that had over the decades achieved a wonderful national coherence and dynamism from the accretion of local habits and loyalties.
We're seeing now, in a different context, how very hard it is to try and do something like that overnight. We can't turn back the clock on international racing, and nor should we want to–any more than we should stem the tide of progress with HISA. But we should remember that the pageant woven by so many generations past, in the domestic calendar, isn't just a cultural heritage. It is a parallel legacy to that of the breed itself, as a trusted means of testing its physical competence.
We have to retrieve that functionality: streamline racing capacity, in terms of the program; and expand equine capacity, whether as breeders or trainers or both. Otherwise the horses we send out to the desert will bring back with them a drought to wither some of the Turf's most fertile acres.
It was likely the final day of training for all of the participants in Saturday's $750,000 Stephen Foster (Grade 2). All seven contenders took to the Churchill Downs track to gallop Friday morning.
Juddmonte's Mandaloun, the 2-1 morning line Foster favorite, had a strong 1 ½-mile gallop around 7 a.m. The 2021 Kentucky Derby (G1) winner was ridden by regular exercise rider Edvin Vargas. As the Into Mischief colt galloped past the wire, Vargas had his hands full as Mandaloun appeared to want to chase a fellow galloper about 10 lengths in front of him.
“We couldn't be more pleased with his training into this race,” trainer Brad Cox said. “He's really done well in his lead up to the Foster at home here at Churchill. He's worked several times after the Saudi Cup and I think he'll be on a much preferred surface Saturday.”
Cox also trained Shortleaf Stable's five-time winner Caddo River in the same set at Mandaloun. Caddo River galloped 1 ½ miles and was installed as the second longest priced horse in the 1 1/8-mile race at odds of 10-1.
Grandview Equine, Cheyenne Stable, and LNJ Foxwoods' multiple Grade 2 winner Olympiad was on the track early Friday. The son of Speightstown has trained for three days over the surface under the watchful eye of trainer Bill Mott's longtime assistant Kenny McCarthy. Mott has won 751 races at Churchill Downs and one of them was the Stephen Foster when Ron the Greek scored a 9-1 upset victory over eventual Hall of Famer Wise Dan in the 2012 edition.
Godolphin's multiple graded stakes-placed colt Proxy schooled in the Churchill Downs paddock Thursday and has been galloping over the main track for the past several days. Trainer Mike Stidham's chief assistant T.C. Stuckey has been stationed at Churchill Downs with the 4-year-old colt for about a week. Proxy finished second to Dynamic One in last month's $200,000 Blame Stakes.
It's been 35 years since Hall of Fame trainer D. Wayne Lukas won the Stephen Foster with Red Attack. He hopes his new trainee Last Samurai can break that streak. Owned by Willis Horton, Last Samurai made the short walk from trainer Dallas Stewart's Barn 38 to Lukas' Barn 44 a few weeks ago. Stewart previously campaigned Last Samurai to a 12-1 upset win in the $1 million Oaklawn Handicap (G2). He'll be ridden in the Stephen Foster by 62-year-old jockey Jon Court.
“Anytime you have live mounts it's a little easier to get going,” Court said. “I always try to keep myself both physically and mentally prepared to compete with some of the younger riders in the room.”
Court has never won the Stephen Foster.
Saturday's Stephen Foster Day at Churchill Downs will get underway at 12:45 p.m. (all times Eastern) and feature the Stephen Foster along with a quartet of supporting stakes: the $350,000 Fleur de Lis (GII), $200,000 American Derby (Listed), $200,000 Tepin and $160,000 Kelly's Landing Overnight Stakes. Post time for the Stephen Foster is 5:47 p.m.
Here are the full fields for each of five stakes events from the rail out (with jockey, trainer and morning line odds):
$750,000 Stephen Foster (Race 10, 5:47 p.m.): Caddo River (Ricardo Santana Jr., Brad Cox, 10-1); American Revolution (Luis Saez, Todd Pletcher, 7-2); Olympiad (Junior Alvarado, Bill Mott, 5-2); Title Ready (Brian Hernandez Jr., Dallas Stewart, 15-1); Proxy (Joel Rosario, Mike Stidham, 9-2); Mandaloun (Florent Geroux, Cox, 2-1); and Last Samurai (Jon Court, Wayne Lukas, 8-1)
$350,000 Fleur de Lis (G2) (Race 8, 4:35 p.m.): Super Quick (Joe Talamo, Norm Casse, 2-1); She's All Wolfe (Francisco Arrieta, Donnie K Von Hemel, 5-1); Ava's Grace (David Cohen, Robertino Diodoro, 6-1); Pauline's Pearl (Joel Rosario, Steve Asmussen, 5-2); and Shedaresthedevil (Florent Geroux, Brad Cox, 9-5)
$200,000 American Derby (Listed) (Race 7, 3:55 p.m.): Fowler Blue (Sonny Leon, Doug O'Neill, 15-1); Jr's Gift (Tiago Canuto, Hugo Andrande, 30-1); Search Engine (Edgar Morales, Tom Amoss, 12-1); Kitodan (Gerardo Corrales, Eric Foster, 12-1); McLaren Vale (Luis Saez, Rodolphe Brisset, 4-1); Double Clutch (Corey Lanerie, Rusty Arnold, 6-1); Red Run (Tyler Gaffalione, Steve Asmussen, 5-1); Kuchar (Florent Geroux, Brisset, 5-1); Rattle N Roll (Brian Hernandez Jr., Kenny McPeek, 3-1); War Campaign (Colby Hernandez, Phil Sims, 15-1); and O P Firecracker (Ricardo Santana Jr., Robert Medina, 10-1).
$200,000 Tepin (Listed) (Race 6, 3:23 p.m.): Hearty Constitution (Luis Saez, Joe Sharp, 7-2); Patna (Florent Geroux, Brad Cox, 3-1); Verylittlecents (Jon Court, Randy Morse, 8-1); Wicked Halo (Tyler Gaffalione, Steve Asmussen, 9-5); Zawish (Edgar Morales, Helen Pitts-Blasi, 10-1); Runaway Wife (Julien Leparoux, Kenny McPeek, 6-1); and Sandsone (Brian Hernandez Jr., Wayne Catalano, 8-1).
$160,000 Kelly's Landing Overnight Stakes (Race 9, 5:16 p.m.): Awesome Gerry (Gerardo Corrales, Saffie Joseph Jr., 8-1); Heart Rhythm (Giovani Franco, Trisha Duncan, 15-1); Kneedeepinsnow (Ricardo Santana Jr., Matt Shirer, 8-1); Aloha West (Joel Rosario, Wayne Catalano, 2-1); Bango (Tyler Gaffalione, Greg Foley, 5-2); Bob's Edge (Gabriel Saez, Larry Jones, 6-1); Startdfromdabottom (Rafael Bejarano, John Ennis, 30-1); A C Expressway (Florent Geroux, Norm Casse, 12-1); and Miles Ahead (Joe Talamo, Paul McGee, 6-1).
The 1 1/8-mile Stephen Foster is a Breeders' Cup “Win and You're In” event toward the $6 million Classic held at Keeneland on Saturday, Nov. 5. The winner of the Stephen Foster will receive their entry fees paid to the Classic along with a travel stipend if they are located outside the state of Kentucky.
The Stephen Foster will be televised on NBC from 4-6 p.m. The two-hour broadcast also will feature the $160,000 Kelly's Landing and $350,000 Fleur de Lis (G2) in Races 8-9, respectively.
Wagering is available on www.TwinSpires.com, the official ADW of Churchill Downs Incorporated and the Kentucky Derby.
Holiday weekends are often synonymous with exciting race cards and this Fourth of July weekend is no exception with a dozen graded events on tap Saturday that include some of racing's best. The highlight of the day's action is the return of 'TDN Rising Star' Life Is Good (Into Mischief), who is making his first start back since finishing fourth in the G1 Dubai World Cup Mar. 26 in Belmont's GII John A. Nerud S.
A dominant winner of last year's GII Kelso H. and GI Breeders' Cup Dirt Mile and this term's GI Pegasus World Cup Invitational S., Life Is Good spent some time at WinStar after his return from Dubai and has been breezing steadily at Belmont for Pletcher since Memorial Day weekend. Flavien Prat climbs aboard the fleet-footed bay for the first time Saturday.
“Flavien has proven he rides really well in any occasion,” said Pletcher, who indicated this race is a prep for the GI Whitney S. “There might be some similarities to Flightline (Tapit) and Life Is Good, but we'll have a talk about the horse a little bit. He's got kind of a quiet touch, so that should suit him well.”
While Life Is Good will certainly be the heavy favorite, there is one member of this five-horse field who could give him a run for his money. Godolphin homebred Speaker's Corner (Street Sense) kicked off 2022 with a trio of seemingly effortless victories in the GIII Fred Hooper S., GII Gulfstream Park Mile and GI Carter H. He received a 114 Beyer Speed Figure for that win, which trumps Life Is Good's best figure of 110 in the Pegasus. The bay enters this off a third-place finish behind unbeaten sensation Flightline in the GI Hill 'n' Dale Met Mile June 11 and Jose Ortiz takes over the controls from Junior Alvarado, who will be riding for trainer Bill Mott in Kentucky.
The Nerud certainly looks like a match race between these two formidable foes as Repo Rocks (Tapiture), Harvard (Pioneerof the Nile) and War Tocsin (Violence) are overmatched to say the least.
Also on tap at Belmont Saturday is the GIII Dwyer S. for sophomore colts. The regally bred Charge It (Tapit) looks to rebound in this cutback in trip after a poor effort in the GI Kentucky Derby, where he finished 17th. The 'TDN Rising Star'was a green, but good second in the GI Curlin Florida Derby in April and the Run for the Roses may have just been too much too soon. You can count on Pletcher to have the colt ready to roll in this softer spot and his back-to-back bullets on the local training track affirm that. With the colt's regular rider Luis Saez at Churchill Downs for Americanrevolution (Constitution), the Hall of Famer calls on his right-hand man John Velazquez to take over the reins.
Chad Brown has an intriguing runner in the Dwyer in Peter Brant's Nabokov (Uncle Mo). The $775,000 KEESEP buy earned his diploma at this oval when extended to two turns last time in his second start May 15.
Cox Holds Strong Hand at Churchill
Churchill Downs also offers a pair of intriguing graded events and Brad Cox has a strong chance to take both. He sends out Juddmonte homebred Mandaloun (Into Mischief)–who is making his first start since a well-beaten ninth in the G1 Saudi Cup–in the GII Stephen Foster H., a Breeders' Cup 'Win and You're In' event. The colt was promoted to first via DQ in both the GI Kentucky Derby and GI Haskell Invitational S. last year and crossed the line first in the GIII Louisiana S. in January. Cox also saddles Caddo River (Hard Spun) off a trio of optional claimer scores.
Olympiad | Coady
That pair face some stiff competition from New York in Olympiad (Speightstown) and Americanrevolution (Constitution). The Bill Mott-trained Olympiad is a perfect four-for-four this season, topped by wins in the GIII Mineshaft S., GII New Orleans Classic and GII Alysheba S. Meanwhile, Americanrevolution, who shares the same connections as Life is Good, looks to return to winning ways. Capturing the GI Cigar Mile Dec. 4, the chestnut spent six months on the shelf and was a disappointing fourth in his return in the track-and-trip Blame S. June 4.
The GII Fleur de Lis S. attracted just five distaffers, but two of them are Grade I winners. Cox sends out Shedaresthedevil (Daredevil), whose trio of Grade I wins includes the 2020 GI Kentucky Oaks. The bay was run down last time by this field's other top-level scorer Pauline's Pearl (Tapit) in this venue's GI La Troienne S. May 6. That Stonestreet homebred ran back in the local Shawnee S. June 4, finishing fourth as the heavy favorite behind She's All Wolfe (Magna Graduate).
Sprinters Star at Gulfstream
Female sprinters get a chance to secure a spot in the Breeders' Cup Saturday at Gulfstream in the GII Princess Rooney S., a 'Win and You're In.' Champion Ce Ce (Elusive Quality) won this event last term en route to a victory in the GI Breeders' Cup F/M Sprint and she will be heavily favored to defend her title. Winner of the GII Azeri S. earlier this year, the chestnut was third behind champion Letruska (Super Saver) and last-out GI Ogden Phipps S. winner Clairiere (Curlin) in the GI Apple Blossom H. Apr. 23.
Her biggest competition will come from claim-to-fame Glass Ceiling (Constitution), winner of the GIII Barbare Fritchie S. and GIII Distaff H. The bay enters off a third to Bella Sofia (Awesome Patriot) in the GII Bed O'Roses S. June 10.
Male sprinters get a chance at graded glory in Hallandale too in the GIII Smile Sprint S. The race will go through GI Woody Stephens S. winner Drain the Clock (Maclean's Music), who makes his first start since finishing seventh in the G1 Dubai Golden Shaheen S. Mar. 26.
Delaware & Canada Also Offer Graded Action
Sophomores will be in the spotlight at Delaware Park Saturday with the GIII Delaware Oaks and GIII Kent S. Ruthless S. winner Shotgun Hottie (Gun Runner) looks like the one to beat. The bay receives Lasix for the first time off a third-place finish in Aqueduct's GIII Gazelle S. Apr. 9.
The GIII Kent S. features 3-year-old colts on the grass and the likely favorite is Harrell Ventures' Main Event (Bernardini), winner of the Cutler Bay S. He was last seen finishing ninth in the GII American Turf S. at Churchill May 7. He faces Brad Cox runner Tommy Bee (Medaglia d'Oro), who was second in a trio of listed stakes.
Woodbine hosts four graded events Saturday: the GIII Selene S. for 3-year-old fillies, the GIII Marine S. for sophomore colts, the GII Nassau S. for older fillies and mares, and the GII Highlander S. for older male turf sprinters. Jonathan Thomas could win both the sophomore events with Catiche (Arrogate) in the Selene and Fuerteventura (Summer Front) in the Marine.
Lady Speightspeare (Speightstown), winner of this venue's GII Bessarabian S., faces SW & MGSP Crystal Cliffs (Fr) (Canford Cliffs {Ire}) and GSW Plum Ali (First Samurai) in the Nassau. The Highlander is topped by the Wesley Ward-trained Bound for Nowhere (The Factor), a two-time winner of the GII Shakertown S. at Keeneland.
