Clark Brewster | Horse Racing Free Tips

Pacific Typhoon Wins Second OKC Turf Classic, Four Years After His First

Pacific Typhoon first won the $130,000 OKC Turf Classic, presented by Choctaw Nation, in 2017, when he was a 4-year-old. Fast forward to 2021, the now 8-year-old gelding enjoyed a youthful resurgence to win the event a second time at Remington Park in Oklahoma City, Okla.

Owned by Carol Nelson of Mannford, Okla., Pacific Typhoon has made six consecutive starts in the Turf Classic (2016-2021), winning twice, running second (2018), fourth (2020), fifth (2016), and 10th (2019). A son by Don't Get Mad from the Stormy Atlantic mare My Stormy Elaine, Pacific Typhoon used his front-running style to perfection, finding enough stamina to lead throughout and then pull away once challenged down the stretch.

After setting early fractions of :23.95 for the quarter-mile, :48.58 for the half-mile, 1:12.89 for three quarters of a mile, and then 1:37.78 for one mile, Pacific Typhoon was tested in the stretch by Quarky who had followed him around the firm course, before pulling within a head of the leader. Pacific Typhoon found more to get away late to a 1-1/2 length victory under jockey Lane Luzzi.

“It was almost like he was waiting for some company,” Luzzi noted. “He had his ears pricked down the backside the whole way. Once he was engaged a little bit, he turned on to a gear that I didn't know he had until about the eighth pole. For me, it was a real thrill.”

Trained by Austin Gustafson, Pacific Typhoon crossed the finish in 1:44.20. Quarky held second while Khola was a rallying third, 2-1/4 lengths back.

Dismissed in the betting at 40-1 odds, Pacific Typhoon paid $83 to win, $30.60 to place, and $22 to show. Quarky (2-1) returned $4.20 to place and $3 to show. Khola (6-1) paid $5.60 to show.

The remaining order of finish in the Turf Classic was Half Ours to Keep (4th), Sweet Medicine (5th), Morhawk (6th), Quality Rocket, the beaten wagering favorite at 3-2 odds (7th), Gospel Musketeer (8th), Georgia Deputy (9th), Yip Yip Kip (10th), and Tommyhawk (11th).

The Turf Classic win was the 11th career score for Pacific Typhoon from 50 starts with four seconds and six thirds. He made $78,000 for his second win in the event to boost his lifetime earnings to $406,183.

Veronica Griggs trained Pacific Typhoon when he won the Turf Classic in 2017. The gelding was bred in Oklahoma by Clark Brewster of Tulsa, Okla.

The Turf Classic win was the second for owner Nelson. It was the first in the race and in the Oklahoma Classics for Gustafson. Luzzi won his second career Oklahoma Classics race by scoring his first Turf Classic.

The Oklahoma Classics is a $1,000,000 series of stakes races devoted to Oklahoma-bred Thoroughbreds.

Remington Park racing continues Saturday, Oct. 16 with the first race at 7:07 pm Central.

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Baffert Seeks $162K in Legal Fees from NYRA

Even though trainer Bob Baffert has secured only a preliminary injunction in his ongoing lawsuit against the New York Racing Association (NYRA) that allows him to race at New York's three major tracks pending the final resolution of the case, his attorneys filed a motion in federal court Aug. 25 seeking $162,086 in legal fees and expenses from NYRA based on the claim that Baffert is due that money as the “prevailing party.”

The three attorneys Baffert engaged for work on this case have billed him at rates between $450 and $975 hourly, according to court filings in which the lawyers detailed their costs. NYRA on Wednesday countered with its own court filing, which came in the form of a “notice of motion to dismiss” the original complaint. Essentially, that response was NYRA's way of telling Baffert's legal team that the case is not yet over.

According to a schedule that had been ordered back on July 22 by Judge Carol Bagley Amon of United States District Court (Eastern District of New York), NYRA had until Aug. 27 to “serve, but not file, its motion to dismiss.” Oral arguments for that motion aren't even scheduled until Nov. 16.

In a civil complaint filed by Baffert June 14, the seven-time GI Kentucky Derby-winning trainer had alleged that NYRA's banishment of him since May 17 over the issue of his repeated equine drug violations violates his constitutional right to due process.

On July 14, the eve of the lucrative Saratoga Race Course season, Amon granted Baffert a preliminary injunction, writing in her order, “I find that Baffert has established a likelihood of proving that NYRA's suspension constituted state action, and that the process by which it suspended him violated the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution.”

Yet Amon also wrote, “although NYRA's actions have functionally deprived Baffert of his trainer's license, NYRA has not formally suspended that license. In sum, it is not likely that Baffert will be able to prevail on his claim that NYRA had no legal authority to take the action that it did.”

In Tuesday's filing on behalf of Baffert, his attorneys wrote, “Baffert qualifies as a prevailing party in this suit because the Court entered a preliminary injunction against NYRA enjoining it from enforcing its indefinite suspension of Baffert from all of its thoroughbred racetracks…”

The filing continued: “Under any view of the case, Baffert has fully prevailed on all of his due process claims asserted under Section 1983….It further cannot be disputed that the Court's Opinion altered the legal relationship between the parties by nullifying NYRA's suspension of Baffert–he is no longer barred from participating in NYRA races and he has entered horses at Saratoga as a direct consequence of the Court's order. As a result, Baffert has essentially achieved his main objective in this litigation [and] the Court's preliminary injunction is to Baffert the functional equivalent of a final judgment on the merits with respect to his claims and relief sought.”

One of Baffert's attorneys, the Kentucky-based W. Craig Robertson, the lead counsel in the case, wrote in a declaration that accompanied the motion that he charged Baffert $475 hourly for his work, and that his hourly fee and those of his firm's associate attorneys ($255 and $220), plus a paralegal ($265), are “well within the range of typical fees charged in commercial litigation cases in this District.”

Another attorney retained by Baffert since the inception of the case, the New York-based Charles Michael, wrote in a separate declaration, “my $975 hourly rate is within the reasonable rate customarily charged by attorneys with comparable experience.”

A third attorney, the Oklahoma-based Clark Brewster, wrote that he billed $450 hourly since being retained July 3, and “the rate charged to Baffert is reasonable with respect to equine matters and the rates fall within the standard range for commercial and equine litigators.”

The post Baffert Seeks $162K in Legal Fees from NYRA appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

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Split Sample Confirms Betamethasone Positive In Kentucky Derby Winner Medina Spirit

The New York Times reported Wednesday morning that a split sample from Bob Baffert-trained Medina Spirit, who crossed the wire first in this year's Kentucky Derby, has confirmed the presence of betamethasone. A statement from Baffert's lawyer, attorney Craig Robertson, said the confirmed concentration was 25 pg/ml.

One week after this year's Derby, Baffert told media that he had been informed initial testing on post-race samples from Medina Spirit had detected the corticosteroid, which is not permitted for use within 14 days of a race in Kentucky. At the time, split sample testing had not yet been completed to confirm the finding.

Attorney Clark Brewster, who represents Medina Spirit owner Amr Zedan, revealed that the University of California-Davis performed the split sample test, which was aimed at confirming or denying the original finding of Industrial Laboratories.

Learn more about split sample testing in this May 21 feature.

Brewster told writer Joe Drape that UC-Davis did not do any further analysis on the sample to see whether it contained other substances that could give clues as to the origins of the betamethasone. (This type of additional analysis is not typically part of a split sample test.) Brewster will request further analysis be done on the post-race samples by a different laboratory.

Robertson released the following statement, which indicated DNA testing would also be done on the sample:

“In response to the inquiries, this will acknowledge that the Medina Spirit split sample confirmed the finding of betamethasone at 25 picograms. There is other testing that is being conducted, including DNA testing. We expect this additional testing to confirm that the presence of the betamethasone was from the topical ointment Otomax and not an injection. At the end of the day, we anticipate this case to be about the treatment of Medina Spirit's skin rash with Otomax. We will have nothing further to say until the additional testing is complete.”

Baffert initially told media he did not know why the horse had betamethasone in its system, and cast suspicion that he was a victim of some kind of tampering or sabotage. Two days later, he announced that Medina Spirit had been treated with a topical cream that contained betamethasone while treating a skin rash on the horse's hindquarters.

Betamethasone is a corticosteroid which is often used therapeutically to assist with reducing inflammation in equine joints, although it is also present in some topical applications like Otomax. Kentucky changed its regulations governing corticosteroid joint injections last August, pushing out the pre-race administration time to 14 days pre-race and removing the drug threshold from its code, meaning no level of the drug is acceptable in a post-race finding. (The commission said at the time that testing could not detect administrations farther than 14 days out.)

In the wake of the Santa Anita breakdowns, Kentucky was one of several states that began requiring private veterinarians to examine horses several days pre-race in addition to the traditional pre-race examination from commission veterinarians. Commission staff had expressed concern that additional pre-race veterinary exams taking place farther ahead of race time could be influenced by the anti-inflammatory effects of corticosteroids and non-steroidal anti-inflammatories.

Baffert has had multiple high-profile therapeutic drug positives in the past year and a half, including one in Kentucky for betamethasone after the rule change when Gamine tested positive following the Kentucky Oaks.

Report: Derby DQ May Come Down To Legal Phrasing

As discussion around Kentucky Derby winner Medina Spirit's positive betamethasone test continues, the attorney for owner Amr Zedan seems to already be preparing a legal challenge for a potential disqualification.

Kentucky regulations spell out penalties for trainers and for owners following a drug positive, depending on the number and class of drug violations for the relevant licensee. The penalties for owners include disqualification and loss of purse, as well as a potential requirement for horses to undergo further examination or testing before returning to racing.

As explained in the Louisville Courier-Journal, there seems to be some debate about what will happen if a split sample comes back positive. Dr. Mary Scollay, former equine medical director for the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission, and Marc Guilfoil, current executive director for the commission, both point out that there is no “mitigating circumstance” language in the owner sanctions for a Class C positive. Stewards are given a range of possible suspensions and fines for trainers with the phrase “absent mitigating circumstances” at the end, meaning they can use discretion within those ranges depending on information they get from the trainer about how the drug became introduced to the horse — i.e., environmental contamination. There is no “mitigating circumstances” language at the end of the penalties outlined for owners in this circumstance.

Attorney Clark Brewster maintains however that the phrase “shall apply” when referring to the disqualification and loss of purse for owners is legally ambiguous. While lay people understand “shall” and “must” to be the same, Brewster points out that there is some variation in interpretation of the two words in legal settings. Brewster argues that stewards should take mitigating circumstances — like whether the drug was intended to advance performance — into account when they make their eventual decision.

Read more at the Louisville Courier-Journal

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