Space Blues Rockets To Lead In Late Stretch To Take Breeders’ Cup Mile

In the last race of his career, Space Blues (IRE) goes out a winner in the Grade 1 Breeders' Cup Mile at Del Mar Thoroughbred Club in Del Mar, Calif. After a delayed start, the Godolphin bred and owned horse overtook frontrunner Smooth Like Strait in the final furlong to win by a half-length.

Space Blues was one of two Godolphin runners sent postward in a full field of 14 for the Mile, but Master of the Seas, in post one, reared up in the gate twice, hitting his head on an overhead bar. With that, much like Friday's incident with Albahr in the Juvenile Turf, Master of the Seas was a late scratch, leaving only Space Blues to contest in the blue silks.

“Yeah, well, we, Yogi said it best. It's deja vu all over again. About the time you don't think something can happen just come around the next day. Certainly didn't see this coming,” Godolphin racing manager Jimmy Bell said in the post-race press conference. “But as William and Charlie both say, we got to appreciate these horses. This is a live situation and these things happen. It's a part of the race. We all hate to see these things but it just goes to show you that there's just so many uncontrollable events.

After the field reloaded, the break was a clean one, with Smooth Like Strait going to the lead in the race's opening strides, with Blowout and Space Blues running second and third. After a first quarter in :23.51 and the half mile in :47.38, Smooth Like Strait maintained a one-length lead down the backstretch, with Space Blues and William Buick on the rail in third.

On the far turn, Buick moved Space Blues to the outside, as Smooth Like Strait looked poised to go wire to wire. The Godolphin horse turned on the jets midstretch and wore down Smooth Like Strait to win by a half-length. Ivar came on to finish third, with Raging Bull fourth.

The final time was 1:34.12. Find this race's chart here.

Space Blues paid $6.20, $4.60. and $3.40. Smooth Like Strait paid $9.00 and $6.20. Ivar paid $11.40.

“I'm absolutely delighted. He's been a fantastic horse and will now be retired to stud. William gave him a great ride in the perfect position throughout. Space Blues has been a great servant and it's another well-deserved win. I'm thrilled for team Godolphin both here and back home at Moulton Paddocks in Newmarket and obviously His Highness Sheikh Mohammed. It was an interesting race beforehand with Master of The Seas being scratched but we're getting used to that now! Rules are rules and we have to abide by them,” said trainer Charles Appleby after the Mile.

“Coming here I knew I had some very good rides. Space Blues traveled to America very well and Charlie has been delighted with all of our horses coming into the races. We know how tough it is to come here and everything needs to pan out for you to win. He's a great little horse and I don't think he's had the recognition he deserves. A mile round here suits him down to the ground. I was a bit nervous going into the race as I wanted to give the horse what he deserved,” winning jockey William Buick told the Del Mar Press Office after the race.

As for Master of the Seas, Appleby gave an update on the colt's condition: “Master Of The Seas is fine and James is fine. And I say deja vu, so I'm getting used to this sort of speech now, but the most important thing is he came back safe.

Space Blues is by Dubawi (IRE) out of the Noverre mare Miss Lucifer (FR). The 5-year-old horse has four wins in six starts in 2021, including the Group 1 Prix de la Foret at Longchamp in France and the Group 2 City of York Stakes at York in England, for a lifetime record of 11 wins in 19 starts and career earnings of $2,585,725.

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Breeders’ Cup Presents Connections: Lobo In Love With His Keeneland Turf Mile Winner

Good horses seem to arrive in threes for trainer Paulo Lobo.

Opening weekend at Keeneland delivered results that may have Lobo saddling three Breeders' Cup contenders this year, as Brazilian-bred In Love powered to an authoritative lead in the stretch of the Grade 1 Keeneland Turf Mile while accomplished stablemate Ivar, another Brazilian-bred, finished fourth. The victory earned In Love a spot in the G1 Breeders' Cup Mile at Del Mar on Nov. 6, and Lobo said Ivar (who won Keeneland's Shadwell Turf Mile last year) may go to the Mile as well if he can get a spot. Ivar finished fourth in last year's Breeders' Cup Mile. In September, Argentine-bred Imperador held off a late bid from Arklow to win the G2 Calumet Turf Cup at Kentucky Downs, earning a spot in the G1 Breeders' Cup Turf.

All three runners are co-owned by Bonne Chance Farm and Stud R.D.I. LLC.

“It's my first year to try to take three horses,” Lobo said. “I'm very happy. You need to enjoy the moment. It's not easy to have three good horses in the barn at the same time.”

Although it will be Lobo's first time taking multiple shooters to a Breeders' Cup, it won't be his first appearance there.

Lobo is a fourth-generation horseman who grew up going to the racetrack with his father in his native Brazil. He has a brother who is an auctioneer and an uncle who is a veterinarian. Training horses was a foregone conclusion for him, and he's happy about that. Lobo began as an assistant to his father in 1987 and hung out his own shingle eight years later, quickly becoming the youngest trainer in Brazil to win a race at the age of 26.

But for Lobo, the dream was always to train in the United States.

Trainer Paulo Lobo

“Since I started, way back in '87, I always wanted to try here in America,” he said. “Following the good horses, the good trainers, the good jockeys. I don't know, something inside me, I always wanted to try it here.”

He came to this country at the start of 2001. At the time, he was the American outpost for a Brazilian owner who had bought five yearlings out of the Keeneland September Yearling Sale in fall 2000. One of the five was a filly Lobo said he knew was special from the start.

“She was an exceptional filly,” he said. “Since the beginning, since when I started to breeze them, she was very precocious. She won first time out at Del Mar at a mile, very impressively. The first half-mile, when she worked for me, I was very pleased with her.”

That bay filly turned out to be Farda Amiga, would win the 2002 G1 Kentucky Oaks and G1 Alabama before finishing second in the Breeders' Cup Distaff that year. She won the 2002 Eclipse Award for Champion 3-Year-Old Filly, giving Lobo a red-hot start to his American career. The next year, he had graded stakes winner Quero Quero in his barn, who brought him a win in the G2 Honeymoon Breeders' Cup Handicap and seconds in the G1 Milady Breeders' Cup Handicap, G3 Wilshire, and G3 Las Cienegas. Another year later, he brought Pico Central (BRZ) over from South America and developed one of the most dominant sprinters of the 2004 season, recording G1 victories in the Carter and Metropolitan Handicaps and Vosburgh Stakes in New York and G2 San Carlos Handicap in California.

A trainer simply couldn't hope for better advertising at the start of their career than three horses competing in the graded stakes levels so convincingly.

“Even in my best dream, no [I couldn't have imagined that start]” he said.

Lobo trained in California and in New York before transitioning to his current base in Kentucky. Since many of his clients still have ties to South America's racing and breeding industry, he's accustomed to taking horses like In Love who start their careers south of the equator and are asked to transition to America. He said there's no real pattern to finding out which South American imports will succeed in the States and which won't, and there isn't a particular track or circuit that seems inherently better at helping them make the transition.

Most of the time, Lobo said the trainer or manager in Brazil will tell him which horses on a plane load they think is the most talented on their home turf, but Lobo has found it could easily reverse once they step onto American soil. The lesser of two competitors could thrive while the other may struggle with the tighter turns and fizzle. It takes Lobo four or five months to really know what he's got.

“The transition is not easy,” he said. “Some really good horses, sometimes they don't ever show up. It happens.”

In Love, Lobo said, was one who came to him with a respectable, if not dazzling resume at home, and then took some time to settle in. He was from the same crop as Imperador and Ivar, and they were all turned out together when they were young. The trainer who sent Lobo the horse had the highest hopes for In Love, but it took him some time to validate that faith.

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Although he won an allowance at Keeneland impressively last year, In Love ran relatively disappointing races in the next three starts. Lobo took him to Arlington Park in search of friendlier competition and noticed the horse dawdled on the lead, focusing on his competitors to his inside instead of the wire. Lobo added blinkers and saw a big improvement with a victory in the TVG Stakes at Kentucky Downs one month prior to the Turf Mile.

True to the horse's name, Lobo said In Love is a kind soul around the barn, making his job easier. He feels good about the horse's chances in the Breeders' Cup Mile. If anything, he thinks In Love could be just as happy running farther – someday.

“He's bred for more distance, this horse,” he said of the son of the Sunday Silence stallion Agnes Gold. “No doubt about it – he can go a mile and a quarter, even a mile and a half. But he's working well this way, let's keep it this way.”

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Breeders’ Cup Winner Order Of Australia Returns Stateside For Keeneland Turf Mile

Defending FanDuel Breeders' Cup Mile (G1) Presented by PDJF winner Order of Australia (IRE) returns to Keeneland Saturday as the headliner in a field of 13 in the 36th running of the $750,000 Keeneland Turf Mile (G1).

In addition to the Keeneland Turf Mile, which is a “Win and You're In” race for the FanDuel Breeders' Cup Mile Presented by PDJF at Del Mar on Nov. 6, Saturday's 11-race program will offer two other Grade 1 tests: the 108th running of the Claiborne Breeders' Futurity for 2-year-olds going 1 1/16 miles on the main track and the 24th running of the $400,000 First Lady Presented by UK HealthCare for fillies and mares going a mile on the turf.

The Keeneland Turf Mile will go as the 10th race Saturday with a 5:46 p.m. ET post time. First post is 1 p.m.

Owned by Derrick Smith, Mrs. John Magnier, Michael Tabor and Anne Marie O'Brien, Order of Australia posted a 73-1 upset when he prevailed by a neck in the Breeders' Cup Mile here last November. Trained by Aidan O'Brien, Order of Australia arrived at Keeneland Tuesday afternoon after spending two days in quarantine at Churchill Downs.

Order of Australia has won one of five starts in 2021 and enters the Keeneland Turf Mile off a runner-up finish in the Prix du Moulin (G1) at Longchamp in September. John Velazquez has the mount Saturday and will exit post 10.

One of the horses chasing Order of Australia in last year's Breeders' Cup Mile was Ivar (BRZ), who will seek to become only the third horse to win the Turf Mile in consecutive years.

Trained by Paulo Lobo, Ivar finished fourth, 2 lengths behind Order of Australia, in the Breeders' Cup. In Ivar's lone 2021 start, he was sixth, beaten 2 lengths in the Turf Classic (G1) at Churchill in May.

Joe Talamo has the mount Saturday from post position six.

The field for the Keeneland Turf Mile, with riders from the inside, is: Front Run the Fed (Francisco Arrieta), Argentello (IRE) (Brian Hernandez Jr.), In Love (BRZ) (Alex Achard), Space Traveller (GB) (Danny Tudhope), Tell Your Daddy (Julien Leparoux), Ivar (BRZ) (Talamo), Pixelate (Tyler Gaffalione), Brown Storm (Hector Berrios), Monarchs Glen (GB) (Ricardo Santana Jr.), Order of Australia (IRE) (Velazquez), Diamond Oops (Florent Geroux), Field Pass (Flavien Prat), Somelikeithotbrown (Jose Ortiz). All starters will carry 126 pounds.

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Ivar ‘Has Been Working Steadily’ For ‘Win And You’re In’ Keeneland Turf Mile

When last seen at Keeneland, Bonne Chance Farm and Stud R D I's Ivar (BRZ) ran fourth in the $2 million FanDuel Breeders' Cup Mile (G1) Presented by PDJF for a finish that marked the best placing for a U.S.-based runner in the race.

Trainer Paulo Lobo has the 5-year-old ready for a crosstown trip this weekend from The Thoroughbred Center for the $750,000 Keeneland Turf Mile (G1), a “Win and You're In” race for the Breeders' Cup Mile to be run at Del Mar on Nov. 6.

“He is doing very well,” Lobo said of Ivar, who finished sixth beaten 2 lengths in the Turf Classic (G1) on Kentucky Derby Day (May 1) at Churchill Downs.

“He had a minor setback after that race, but he has been working steadily (since the end of July) and never has missed a work.”

Ivar earned his way into last year's Breeders' Cup with a victory in the Turf Mile here, and a triumph Saturday in the 36th running of the grass test would make him the third repeat winner. The others are Gio Ponti (2010-2011) and Dumaani (1995-1996).

In addition to Ivar, Lobo also plans to enter In Love (BRZ) for Bonne Chance.

“We put blinkers on him and his last race was amazing,” Lobo said of the gelding's 2¼-length victory in the TVG Stakes (L) at Kentucky Downs on Sept. 8.

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