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In His New York Swan Song, Golden Oldie Greeley And Ben Looks For 26th Career Win In Gravesend

Forty-two starts into his career and with 25 wins, Greeley and Ben (Greeley's Conquest) is in top form as he will look to close out 2023 with a win over four rivals in Saturday's Gravesend S. at Aqueduct. It will, however, be his last ever start at an NYRA track, where horses who are 10 or older are not allowed to compete. That's fine with his connections. They can race him next year at just about anywhere else and are confident that the story of one of the true iron horses in the sport will continue for some time.

“I think he's a long way from being done,” said trainer Horacio De Paz.

It's easy to see why De Paz doesn't think that age has caught up with Greeley and Ben and why he'll be bringing the horse back off of just one week's rest in the Gravesend. Greeley and Ben won last year's GIII Fall Highweight H. at the advanced age of eight and, after a layoff of nearly 12 months, has come back running this year. After finishing sixth in an allowance race at Laurel, he's won two straight, including the Dec. 23 Dave's Friend, also at Laurel.

Greeley and Ben began his career racing for trainer John Ortiz and won six times before being claimed for just $10,000 on March 7, 2021 by Karl Broberg. He won 13 of 17 starts for Broberg before he was claimed again and wound up in the barn of David Jacobson. He made three starts for Jacobson, his last in a 2022 $40,000 claimer at Saratoga. It was there that he caught the attention of his current owner, Darryl Abramowitz.

“His age didn't bother me,” Abramowitz said. “This game is about dreams and taking chances. I thought that for $40,000 the worst-case scenario was we'd have to drop him into a $20,000 claimer and we'd win and get our money back. You only live once.”

So Abramowitz spent the $40,000 to claim a horse who was eight at the time and, at least according to his Beyer numbers, was starting to slow down. Little did he know that the future for the gelding would include four wins in his next seven starts and two stakes wins, including his first graded stakes victory in the Fall Highweight.

“He's a combination of Mike Tyson and Cal Ripken,” Abramowitz said. “He's an iron horse and he's a fighter.”

Greeley and Ben | Coglianese

After winning the Fall Highweight, Greeley and Ben disappeared, but that would not prove to be the end of his career.

“He's an old war horse and as time has gone on he has come up with a few leg issues,” Abramowitz said. “Nothing serious. He just needed the time to heal up. Would other people spend 352 days on the shelf and spend all that money while he wasn't racing? I don't think so. I could have brought him back earlier, but if we did, we'd have to have dropped into a lower level of claimers. We coaxed him along and gave him the time that was necessary. He's sound and he's solid right now. With the way he's going he could keep running for another two years. This guy loves to run. He just thrives on it.”

Abramowitz initially had the horse with Jeffrey Englehart and then moved him into the barn of Faith Wilson for the Fall Highweight. The next move was to give him to De Paz, who has had him since September. Greeley and Ben could do no better than to finish sixth in his return race, but De Paz was not discouraged.

“When we got him he had to build back the foundation that he had lost,” the trainer said. “He carries good flesh, so we had to work past that. In his first race back, we figured we'd give him a race rather than just breezing him. We thought a race would do him more good than breezing him every week. That first run showed he still wanted to compete. He just got tired.”

Twenty-two days later, he won the allowance and followed that up with the win in the Dave's Friend, which upped his career earnings to $981,138. After that start, De Paz and Abramowitz started searching for a race. On whether they should enter him in the Gravesend, it came down to the question of, why not?

“That we're running here doesn't have anything to do with the rules in New York,” Abramowitz said. “We were watching nominations for this race and knew there would be a small field and I didn't think the race would be that difficult. At Laurel, he ran three solid furlongs. It was like having a spectacular workout. For the first three furlongs he was in the back just enjoying himself and having a good time. I knew he was going good and Horacio told me he's better than ever and is going extremely good. We looked at all the factors, like the $150,000 purse, and decided to give it a go.”

Abramowitz is so bullish on the gelding's future that he said if the horse runs well in the Gravesend he will consider sending him to the Middle East–Saudi Arabia and Dubai.

First though, they have to get past the Gravesend. On paper, Greeley and Ben is stepping up in class and could have a tough time in the six-furlong stakes. But Abramowitz doesn't think that will be the case.

“He fits in this race and I think he might surprise a lot of people,” the owner said.

Win or lose, Greeley and Ben's place in the sport has already been assured. Where else can you find an active 9-year-old who is still at the top of his game and has won more races than he has lost?

“It's a tremendous story,” De Paz said. “He's run at all these different racetracks and has run for different trainers and he's been honest for everyone who has had him. He's just a special horse.”

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For Blue-Collar Claimers, Black-Type Thanksgiving Feast

The Week in Review by T.D. Thornton

The annual Claiming Crown races were two weeks ago. But a surprise black-type feast for blue-collar campaigners took place over Thanksgiving weekend, when horses once claimed for tags as low as $10,000 and $16,000 ran away with three of five stakes at Laurel Park, and an 8-year-old gelding bought last year for $10,000 topped a blanket-finish trifecta of previously claimed sprinters in the GIII Fall Highweight H. at Aqueduct.

The relic known as the Fall Highweight–in which nominees are assigned weights scaled several notches above today's norms–is very much a throwback concept. So it was only fitting that the 109th edition of this six-furlong sprint was won by an old-school, powerhouse grinder under a 130-pound impost.

Greeley and Ben (Greeley's Conquest), who tied for second-winningest horse in North America in 2021 with 11 trips to the winner's circle, scored his seventh win this season Nov. 26. That runs his lifetime record to a hefty 23-7-2 from 39 starts.

This earner of $882,698 has been an overachiever since the outset. Written off at 94-1 odds in his Oct. 15, 2016 debut at Keeneland, Greeley and Ben just missed, running second, beaten a head.

Proving the effort was no fluke, he won start number two, and even though he didn't progress to stakes as a juvenile or sophomore, he kept company at allowance levels against contemporaries who eventually ran in the 2017 GI Kentucky Debry and future editions of the Breeders' Cup.

Although Greeley and Ben was a six-time winner by the start of 2021, there were no takers the first two times the strapping bay showed up for a $10,000 tag at Oaklawn Park. This was likely because of the gelding's precipitous drop out of a $32,000 claiming win at Churchill Downs. Was the downward plunge in class by then-trainer John Ortiz a red flag or a bluff?

Trainer Karl Broberg was willing to gamble $10,000 to find out, and when he dropped a slip on behalf of his own outfit (End Zone Athletics) the third time Greeley and Ben was entered at that level (after previously winning and running second), he had no idea the gelding would blossom into a three-time stakes winner for him, bankrolling roughly 45 times that initial claiming investment in purses at Oaklawn, Prairie Meadows, Remington Park, Delta Downs, Fair Grounds, and Sam Houston.

Broberg's stunning run with Greeley and Ben would last until Apr. 24, 2022, when he dropped the gelding from Grade III sprint company into a $62,500 optional-claimer at Oaklawn. Pounded to 2-5 favoritism, Greeley and Ben won again that afternoon at Oaklawn, but was claimed by trainer Melton Wilson.

After running second and fourth in stakes this past spring and summer at Monmouth and Delaware for trainer Bonnie Lucas, Greeley and Ben was auctioned for $80,000 at July's Fasig-Tipton sale for horses of racing age.

The gelding spent time in the barns of David Jacobson and Jeffrey Englehart through the fall, and while Greeley and Ben had to get used to new surroundings every few weeks, his output remained consistent: Claimed for $40,000 out of a win at Saratoga Sept. 4, he then ran second while not entered for a tag in an optional $55,000 claimer at Laurel Oct. 8.

It is the last four weeks, though, that are emblematic of what Greeley and Ben is all about. On Oct. 29, he finished a very credible fourth–beaten only three-quarters of a length at 20-1 odds–in the GIII Bold Ruler S. at Aqueduct, coming off Lasix (as required in New York stakes races) for the first time in his career after making all previous 36 starts on it.

Twelve days later, on Nov. 10, Greeley and Ben got wheeled back in a $10,000 starter allowance, also at Aqueduct, and won as the crushing 1.5-to-10 fave.

Then on Saturday, firing back in 16 days, the gelding was more or less dismissed by bettors at 7-1 odds in the Fall Highweight. Jockey Manny Franco patiently saved ground at the fence, and when Greeley and Ben cut the corner for home, he was full of run.

The competition counter-punched, though, and Greeley and Ben tenaciously had to reclaim the lead not once, but twice in deep stretch after getting headed. He prevailed by a neck in a furious photo finish with the two favorites right behind him, separated by head bobs. The 98 Beyer Speed Figure for the no-Lasix stakes score represented a career best for the 8-year-old.

Darryl Abramowitz owns Greeley and Ben, and the Fall Highweight was the first graded stakes victory for New Jersey-based conditioner Faith Wilson, who has only been a licensed trainer for 18 months.

Meanwhile, in Maryland…

Friday's 5 3/4-length trouncing of the $75,000 Politely S. for Maryland-breds at Laurel was administered by another on-the-rise claimer once bought for $10,000.

Fille d'Esprit (Great Notion) is now 12-for-23 lifetime, and has won five stakes so far in 2022, including open-company races while winning her division of the MATCH series and the $100,000 Maryland Million Distaff. Since that Aug. 21, 2020, claim, the 6-year-old mare has been trained by John Robb and owned by the partnership of C J I Phoenix Group and No Guts No Glory Farm.

Saturday at Laurel featured three open-company stakes for $100,000, and two them were won by relative bargains at the claim box.

Swayin to and Fro (Straight Talking) captured the Safely Kept S. by 3 1/4 lengths at 6-1 odds for Baxter Racing Stable and trainer Mario Serey, Jr. The win came exactly six months to the date of that outfit claiming the 3-year-old filly for $16,000 out of an 8 1/4-length maiden romp. Including the win on the day she was claimed, Swayin to and Fro is now 6-for-10 on the year, with two stakes victories.

Armando R (Blame) was another runner you could have bought out of a winning effort for $16,000, which is exactly what current owner Ronald E. Cuneo and trainer Damon Dilodovico did a year ago, on Nov. 28, 2021. This 6-year-old gelding has since won through his '2x' allowance condition, and in the span of the past 60 days has won two hundred-grand listed stakes at Laurel, the off-grass Japan Turf Cup S. at 10 furlongs in the slop Oct. 1, and the Richard Small S. over nine furlongs on fast dirt Nov. 26.

Six for the road…

News quiz: Can you name the jockey who won six races in one day of racing over the holiday weekend? In case you need a hint, his last name contains only four letters and ends in a Z.

If you guessed the mid-Atlantic based Angel Cruz, you are correct.

But Cruz is probably not the first jockey you thought of. You'd also be correct if you guessed Luis Saez, whose six wins at Churchill Downs on Saturday rocketed him to the top of the meet standings there and to the top of the national news cycle.

No disrespect to the world-class Saez, but Cruz rarely gets much ink in the press, which is why we're highlighting him here.

Plus, Cruz's feat was a little more unique because he had to hit the road to earn his six-pack.

On Friday afternoon, Cruz, who is currently second in the Laurel standings, won the $75,000 Howard and Sondra Bender Memorial S. aboard Maryland-bred Alwaysinahurry (Great Notion).

Cruz then commuted roughly 90 minutes west to ride under the lights at Charles Town Races, where he swept races two through six (and barely lost the eighth race, running second with his only other mount of the night).

Serving up a fitting moniker for a horse who just completed a six-pack, the name of Cruz's final winner Friday was Always Drinking (Speightster).

Monday walk in the 'Park'

It wouldn't seem right to complete a column about the upward mobility of lower-level claimers without getting in a mention about Beverly Park (Munnings), the continent's winningest horse so far in 2022. The 5-year-old will be aiming for win No. 13 in his 28th start of the year Monday when he goes up against starter-allowance company in the sixth race at Mahoning Valley.

That Nov. 28 race is restricted to horses who have started for a claiming tag of $8,000 or less over the past two calendar years. Beverly Park won a N2L $5,000 claimer by 15 lengths at Belterra Park back on July 8, 2021. Next time out, he was claimed for $12,500 by his current owner/trainer, Norman Lynn Cash, whose horses race under the name Built Wright Stables.

Beverly Park has not started for a tag since being claimed, feasting exclusively on starter allowances, optional claimers in which he was not entered for a tag, and in the $100,000 Ready's Rocket Express on the Claiming Crown card two weekends ago.

In the span between Cash's claiming him and a second-place finish at Charles Town Nov. 19, Beverly Park is 19-for-35 with $453,688 in purse earnings (roughly 36 times that original $12,500 claim investment). His lifetime record stands at 22-7-4 from 44 starts.

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Former Claimer Greeley And Ben Named Remington’s Horse Of The Meet

Greeley and Ben has been named Remington Park's Champion Horse of the Meeting for the 2021 fall thoroughbred meeting, ending a three-year reign for the all-time winningest horse here, Welder.

Greeley and Ben, owned by End Zone Athletics of Mansfield, Texas, and trained by Karl Broberg, not only was Champion Horse of the Meet, but has to be considered for claim of the year in the country. Broberg picked him up for a mere $10,000 at Oaklawn Park in a waiver claiming race on March 7 this year and all he did was win 10-of-12 after that for Broberg and his conglomerate of End Zone Athletics. Greeley and Ben has earned $296,277 with 11 wins from 15 starts in 2021.

The 7-year-old gelded son of Greeley's Conquest, out of the Langfuhr mare Traci's Wild, extended his winning streak to nine in a row, taking the $150,000 David M. Vance Stakes at Remington Park on Sept. 26, a race in which Welder ran fifth. It was arguably the toughest David Vance Stakes in history at Remington Park as multiple stakes winner Mr. Money Bags ran second, beaten 2-1/2 lengths. The third-place finisher, Long Range Toddy, had won the $400,000 Springboard Mile in 2018 and followed that up with a victory in the Grade 2, $750,000 Rebel Stakes at Oaklawn in Hot Springs, Ark., in 2019, beating a Kentucky Derby favorite, Improbable, in the process. Long Range Toddy then ran in the Kentucky Derby and was interfered with by the disqualified winner Maximum Security in the turn for home.

The 2021 Vance Stakes also included Share the Upside, who beat Breeders' Cup Sprint winner Whitmore, at Oaklawn two years ago in a stakes there, and, of course, Welder, who finished his career with 16 wins over this racing surface. Welder, owned by Ra-Max Farms (Clayton Rash) of Claremore, Okla., and trained by Teri Luneack, is the only horse to ever win Horse of the Meeting more than once.

The Vance Stakes was the first black-type win for Greeley and Ben. He won his championship at Remington winning both of his starts this season. Nationally acclaimed jockey Joe Talamo came in to ride this champion sprinter in the Vance and Remington's leading rider for the fourth year in a row, David Cabrera, was aboard in an open allowance win here on Sept. 4. The allowance was won by a full length over Empire of Gold, the fourth-place finisher in the Breeders' Cup Sprint, behind Whitmore in 2020.

“When did I know I had a stakes horse on my hands during the streak?” Broberg said on the night of the Vance Stakes. “Tonight, when he hit the finish line. I have worked very hard to keep this horse out of spots like this.”

Talamo was thrilled to get the call to ride Greeley and Ben for the first time in the horse's 26 starts and made a little joke in the winner's circle after the huge victory.

“I'll give you $10,000 for the horse right now,” Talamo said to Broberg. “Maybe more!”

Greeley and Ben earned nine times the price Broberg paid for him in the initial claim – $90,000 for the victory in the Vance.

“I just thought he was a horse that looked like he was worth $10,000,” Broberg said. “If I said there was anything genius to it, I'd be making up a story. I'll still be looking for a $10,000 starter allowance for him.”

The winner covered the six furlongs in 1:09.79 on the fast track and lit the track on fire in his allowance win, going 1:08.88.

Greeley and Ben was also voted the season's Champion Sprinter and Champion Older Male. He was bred in Kentucky by the Millard R. Seldin Revocable Trust.

The Remington Park seasonal divisional champions are selected by ballots submitted by media covering the season and track racing-affiliated personnel.

The post Former Claimer Greeley And Ben Named Remington’s Horse Of The Meet appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

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More Than Meets The Eye In New Orleans’ Thanksgiving Classic

Stop me if you've heard this one before: A Kentucky Derby router and a Breeder's Cup turf sprinter walk into a New Orleans bar on Thanksgiving looking to hustle up a six furlong dirt score. The bartender gives a wink and a nod and says “See that gelding leaning up against the wall. He just came down from Remington Park. Prairie Meadows before that. He's won his last nine and will race anybody as long as there's money on the table.”

We see it again and again–class climber runs into a buzz saw of horses who have been facing our sport's best. How much of a factor does class play in a horse race? Can a horse learn something from his hard-fought wins against lesser? On Thursday, November 25th at 3:12 CT we'll have our answers in the 97th running of the $150,000 Thanksgiving Classic at Fair Grounds Race Course & Slots.

The joke could be on those who bet against him if Necker Island runs to his Kentucky Derby potential. He looked to be struggling when trying turf earlier this year, but both trips were troubled, setting up his backers for overlay scores in his next two races: dirt sprints at Churchill that resulted in career-best speed figures.

“The horse is having a good campaign,” trainer Chris Hartman said. “And I think we have finally found what he likes: sprinting.”

Earlier this month, he beat two game foes in Mucho and Sir Alfred James in the Bet On Sunshine at Churchill Downs. This son of Hard Spun has class and talent to spare, but he is being turned around in 19 days, similar to when he won an allowance race on June 6 and then entered the G2 Stephen Foster this summer, eventually finishing 11 lengths back from winner Maxfield.

“We're a little bit short on time with this guy but he's in pretty good form right now,” Hartman added. “His energy level is good, he's carrying a lot of flesh, and he's doing really good. We thought best to strike while the iron is hot. I think he'll love that race track.”

When “ol'Necker” runs, as Hartman affectionately refers to him, you can't help but admire his rhythm and swagger. This horse is class in motion. He's the morning line favorite at a lukewarm 3-1. Breaking from rail, Mitchell Murril will be tasked with putting this first-run chestnut in position to eye down his foes late.

Michelle Lovell's five-year-old gelding, Just Might (7-2 ML), has a similar long, strange trip to 6-furlong dirt fixtures.

This near $700,000 earner has run his last three races at this distance and surface, but had only been entered in one dirt contest in his first 27 races. With seven graded stakes races under his belt, one of those being the Breeder's Cup Turf Sprint, coming home in the G2 Phoenix at Keeneland he had the run to win his first.

“He was making a run to the eventual winner in the stretch,” trainer and owner Michelle Lovell said. “I was excited. I thought this horse was going to win this race.”

That would have been a victory against 2021 Breeders Cup winner Aloha West and entrant Special Reserve. And Mucho, whom Necker Island beat by a head last out. But he took a bad step.

“He just grabbed his quarter,” Lovell explained. “He was very tender walking home. In the end, he hit the meaty part of the heel and tore the protective cover. It has healed up nicely. He had a really nice breeze last week, and he shipped down [to Fair Grounds] and he's ready to roll. He better be because it is not an easy spot.”

We know he likes Fair Grounds, having posted his career-best speed figure here. Can his class carry him home? Lovell says he has more than classy company up his sleeves.

“He's learned to fight harder this past year as he matured mentally,” Lovell said. “When I entered him in the dirt stakes at Colonial Downs, I was not sure if he could beat dirt horses. We'd beaten off the turf races but that was a big question. He answered and he did it in a head-and-head battle, nose-to-nose. The year before I don't think he would have fought as hard. That's just an example of when horses win, they get grittier–they grow up mentally and physically and they learn to give more.”

That brings us to the $10k claimer in the corner. The one who has stared down fifty-five horses in his last nine races and beaten them all: Greeley and Ben (7-2 ML). He can win out front or from off the pace, and his last race was his first foray into stakes company. He won by 2 ½ lengths running 3 to 4 wide throughout. This 7-year-old gelding out of Greeley's Conquest has sixteen wins and a half million in purses to show for it. Out of 17 races the past two years, he only finished out of the money once and it was his lone two-turn try. But does Remington Park and Prairie Meadows form transfer to Fair Grounds?

“I'd like to have been able to run this horse [Necker Island] in starter races,” Hartman said. “I think he'd win 12 in a row, too.”

But wait, more competition just walked in. Winner of three out of the last five Thanksgiving Classics, New Orleans native Al Stall Jr. sends the powerful closer Pyron (6-1 ML) to battle from gate 2. Declan Carroll gets the mount after the passing of longtime Fair Grounds rider and friend to all, Miguel Mena. Four wins out of seven tries at this distance, this Candy Ride chestnut likely needs these horses to duel early and fade in order to have a chance.

Watch how this race shapes up early–if Louie Roussel's Went West (8-1 ML) can break from gate 3 and get to the rail, where he does his best running, he might very well bulldoze the field. But this is New Orleans newcomer Jareth Loveberry's first time up.

He'll have to pass another out-classed underdog, Emerald Forest (8-1). The connections claimed this Gemologist gelding for a $15k tag at Fair Grounds last February. With the blinkers off, he will likely be passed early by the speed to his outside, Strike Power (4-1 ML). This son of Speightstown trained by Steven Asmussen won the G3 Swale and placed in the G2 Fountain of Youth, but then faltered against the better in the G1 Florida Derby and did not earn enough points for a spot in the 2018 Kentucky Derby. DeShawn Parker will have this 5-year-old breaking quick out of the 6th gate, but will he save enough for the real running at the end?

The Thanksgiving Classic matches extremely talented horses at the top of their game, finally running at their preferred distance and on their preferred surface.

“You've got a lot of fit and sound horses that impress you in the morning, but when it comes to being eyeballed by a horse that can run as good as them they just cave, they just falter because they don't have the heart, the guts for the fight,” Lovell said. “It separates the boys from the men.”

The 7th race on the day, post time is 3:12 pm CT. The first running of the Joseph R. Peluso Memorial stakes follows at 3:44 pm CT. The first post on Thanksgiving is at noon CT for a 9 race card.

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