Spendthrift Farm's Kingsbarns (c, 3, Uncle Mo–Lady Tapit, by Tapit) made it a perfect three-for-three in a dominating, front-running performance in Saturday's GII Twinspires.com Louisiana Derby at Fair Grounds. 'TDN Rising Star' Disarm (Gun Runner) was second; 'TDN Rising Star' Jace's Road (Quality Road) was third.
Well-backed at odds of 9-2 from a 6-1 morning-line quote, Kingsbarns was sent to the front by Flavien Prat from post six and led the way through easy fractions of :24.71 and :49.60 with Jace's Road shadowing in second. Kingsbarns began to shake free from the aforementioned Gun Runner S. winner as they straightened and streaked under the wire a powerful, 3 1/2-length winner. Disarm, making only second start of the year, ran well to rally from sixth to complete the exacta.
Kingsbarns was a game debut winner going a one-turn mile at Gulfstream Park Jan. 14, then aced his two-turn debut versus six overmatched optional claiming rivals at Tampa Feb. 12. He was favored on both occasions.
Pedigree Notes:
Kingsbarns, an $800,000 2-year-old purchase by Spendthrift Farm out of the Tom McCrocklin consignment at last year's Fasig-Tipton Gulfstream Sale after breezing a quarter in :20 3/5, becomes the 49th graded/93rd stakes winner for leading sire Uncle Mo. Broodmare sire Tapit is now responsible for 41 graded/84 stakes winners. Kingsbarns is bred similarly to GI Belmont S. winner Mo Donegal (Uncle Mo), who was produced by the Pulpit mare Callingmissbrown. Lady Tapit, a half-sister to GI American Oaks Invitational S. heroine Gozzip Girl (Dynaformer), is also responsible for a 2-year-old colt by Union Rags and a yearling colt by Gun Runner. She was bred to Munnings for 2023. Lady Tapit RNA'd for $675,000 as a KEESEP yearling. Spendthrift also went to a sale-topping $1.2 million at the Gulfstream Sale for the McCrocklin-consigned Ruby Nell (Bolt d'Oro), who has finished second in both of her tries thus far at Santa Anita this term.
Saturday, Fair Grounds TWINSPIRES.COM LOUISIANA DERBY-GII, $1,000,000, Fair Grounds, 3-25, 3yo, 1 3/16m, 1:57.33, ft.
1–KINGSBARNS, 122, c, 3, by Uncle Mo 1st Dam: Lady Tapit (GSP), by Tapit 2nd Dam: Temperence Gift, by Kingmambo 3rd Dam: Shapiro's Mistress, by Unpredictable 1ST BLACK TYPE WIN, 1ST GRADED STAKES WIN.
($250,000 Ylg '21 FTSAUG; $800,000 2yo '22 FTFMAR).
O-Spendthrift Farm LLC; B-Parks Investment Group, LLC (KY);
T-Todd A. Pletcher; J-Flavien Prat. $600,000. Lifetime Record:
3-3-0-0, $657,300. Werk Nick Rating: A+++. *Triple Plus* Click for the eNicks report & 5-cross pedigree. Click for the free Equineline.com catalogue-style pedigree.
2–Disarm, 122, c, 3, Gun Runner–Easy Tap, by Tapit. 1ST BLACK TYPE, 1ST GRADED BLACK TYPE. O/B-Winchell
Thoroughbreds LLC (KY); T-Steven M. Asmussen. $200,000.
3–Jace's Road, 122, c, 3, Quality Road–Out Post, by Silver
Deputy. ($510,000 Ylg '21 KEESEP). O-West Point
Thoroughbreds and Albaugh Family Stables LLC; B-Colts Neck
Stables LLC (KY); T-Brad H. Cox. $100,000.
Margins: 3HF, 2 3/4, 2. Odds: 4.50, 7.80, 6.20.
Also Ran: Shopper's Revenge, Sun Thunder, Instant Coffee, Tapit's Conquest, Cagliostro, Baseline Beater, Denington, Curly Jack, Single Ruler. Click for the Equibase.com chart and the TJCIS.com PPs. VIDEO, sponsored by TVG.
While the first Saturday in May is still six weeks away, the trail to the GI Kentucky Derby reaches its boiling point in New Orleans Saturday with the conclusion of the Fair Grounds prep series–the GII Twinspires.com Louisiana Derby. One of a pair of Derby points races happening within 20 minutes of one another Saturday, the Louisiana Derby offers 100-40-30-20-10 points and all but guarantees the winner a slot in the gate at Churchill Downs May 6.
Currently 10th on the leaderboard–the highest of the runners in the field–Instant Coffee (Bolt d'Oro) took the win in the second local prep race of the season–the GIII Lecomte S. Jan. 21–after ending his juvenile campaign with a victory under the Twinspires in the GII Kentucky Jockey Club S. for trainer Brad Cox.
Cox has swept the Fair Grounds prep races thus far with Jace's Road (Quality Road), winner of the Gun Runner S. Dec. 26. The Louisiana Derby will the his first start since a fifth in the GIII Southwest S. at Oaklawn Jan. 28.
Making just his second start since being named a 'TDN Rising Star' at Saratoga last fall, Disarm (Gun Runner) makes his stakes debut Saturday off a second against allowance/optional claiming company at Oaklawn Feb. 19.
“He needed that race and he needs this,” said trainer Steve Asmussen. “He's a talented horse playing catch up. From where we were at, I only felt we could get two runs in him (before a possible start in the Kentucky Derby), and the mile-and-three-sixteenths distance will move him forward. He's a horse who will stay on nicely but he needs some racing. He has a high talent level and deserves this chance.”
Undefeated in a pair of starts, Spendthrift Farm color-bearer Kingsbarns (Uncle Mo) also makes his stakes debut for trainer Todd Pletcher.
Turfway Serves Up 'Well Done' Derby Prep
Bolt d'Oro has another potential leading contender on the trail in Turfway's GIII Jeff Ruby Steaks S. with GIII Kitten's Joy S. heroine Major Dude also flying the Spendthrift Farm colors. Having contested his last four races on the turf, including another graded-stakes win last fall in Belmont's GII Pilgrim S., the colt tries the tapeta for the first time for a chance at the 100-40-30-20-10 points on offer.
An experienced dirt horse, Two Phils (Hard Spun) leaves Fair Grounds for Turfway after contesting the last two preps in New Orleans-coming in second to Instant Coffee in the GIII Lecomte S. Jan. 21 and third when last spotted behind Angel of Empire (Classic Empire) in the GII Risen S. Feb. 18.
“At one point the horse did a two-minute lick for me one time over a synthetic surface and it was almost an eye-opening move,” said trainer Larry Rivelli of Two Phil's. “I've been trying to think of the easiest spot for the money and I think this will be the spot. If he absolutely hates the surface, that's on me. I'm sort of putting myself out there saying that I think he will run well over it. Working a half-mile or five-eighths is a lot different than running a race. That's when you find out if a horse doesn't like a surface. I'm pretty confident he will like it but like anything else in racing there could be a chance he doesn't like it. I didn't think he'd like the mud at Churchill (in the Street Sense) until he did.”
One contender who has experience over the surface is Congruent (Tapit), who faded to sixth behind Major Dude in the Kitten's Joy but rebounded with a win over the tapeta in the local prep, the John Battaglia Memorial S.
Art Collector Looks To Stay On Top
The newly-crowned GI Pegasus World Cup winner, Art Collector (Bernardini) looks to keep rolling into New Orleans in the GII New Orleans Classic S.
He'll face another son of the late Darley great in Gary and Mary West's West Will Power, entered off a pair of runner-up efforts in the GI Clark S. and the GII Razorback H.
The field also includes GSW Pioneer of Medina (Pioneerof the Nile) and GI Claiborne Breeders' Futurity winner Rattle N Roll (Connect).
Hoosier Philly Right Back At It
Already sitting in eighth place on the Road to the Kentucky Oaks, Tom Amoss's Hoosier Philly (Into Mischief) cares more about redemption than points in Saturday's GII Fair Grounds Oaks.
“I still think she's the best horse I have ever had in my barn,” Amoss said after his filly was a well-beaten third last time out in the GII Rachel Alexandra S. Feb. 18.
She'll be challenged by a formidable pair in the Rachel Alexandra winner, 'TDN Rising Star' Pretty Mischievous (Into Mischief), and Silverbulletday S. victor The Alys Look (Connect), who defeated GISP Chop Chop (City of Light).
While all three fillies are in the top 10 in points standings, the Fair Grounds Oaks does award a further 100-40-30-20-10 points towards the GI Kentucky Oaks.
No matter where you start from, the choice on Saturday is the same for everyone: do you head southeast, or Southwest? Okay, if you happen to be in Key West, you'll uniquely have to head a little way north to join the party in Miami. For many of us, however, the compass needle will instead be quivering towards to the GIII Southwest S.
The big bucks are obviously at Gulfstream. But it tells you plenty about the inside-out values of this business that even a prize exceeded in the U.S. by a single other race would not quite fund the docket signed on behalf of Zedan Racing Stables, up the road at OBS last April, for a son of Uncle Mo. And it's in Hot Springs that we'll start to find out whether even those giddy stakes might yet yield a dividend.
Now, anyone who spends as much as $2.3 million on a colt that has clocked :9 4/5 under tack will typically do so in the hope of putting him right where we find 'TDN Rising Star'Arabian Knight now–as the current No. 1 in colleague T.D. Thornton's GI Kentucky Derby “Top 12”. As things stand, however, his trainer remains ineligible to bank the 20 starting points available to the winner of this race. And there's a curveball, this time, in that any Derby candidate in the Bob Baffert barn must move out by the end of February. That's over a month earlier than when Baffert had to send out his refugees last year.
With his lawyers trying to break those chains next week, we can leave for another day what has for everyone become a rather wearisome sub-plot. For now, it will be compelling simply to see how Arabian Knight responds to some talented and rather more seasoned opposition, having presumably learned little in outclassing a field of maidens at Keeneland. It's obviously encouraging that his closest pursuer that day has done so well since; and we saw, last year, how adeptly Baffert educated another expensive 2-year-old purchase for the same owners, Taiba (Gun Runner), so that he could win the GI Santa Anita Derby for his new trainer, with only a similarly undemanding debut behind him.
(To listen to an audio version of this story, click the arrow below)
True, the first Saturday in May still came too soon for Taiba. Arabian Knight, however, is miles ahead of that curve and he's going to learn plenty from this whole experience, however it plays out, after boarding a plane to run a second turn for the first time. Unsurprisingly, he has been laying a foundation of powerful works back in California, but he must square up to a rival in Corona Bolt (Bolt d'Oro) who has, despite a rather upright head carriage, looked extremely fast and professional in two sprints.
If these two instinctive talents are likely to resemble sparkling new sabres, sending sparks flying until one is finally forced clattering onto the floor, then they need to keep Corona Bolt's barnmate Jace's Road (Quality Road) in the corner of their eye. For here is a rival who knows the difference between a mere duel and a pitched battle; one who's been learning self-defense and strategy at the marine training camp.
Yes, he too flashed raw talent with a 'Rising Star' sprint debut. But it was as long ago as September that he started on the kind of life lessons that still await Arabian Knight. Sampling the Derby surface in the GIII Iroquois S., he got drawn into pursuit of a couple that turned out merely to be hauling each other to the ground. But whereas they dropped out accordingly, Jace's Road bravely renewed battle with the closers and grabbed a place.
After that chastening rite of passage, his next start made it possible to wonder which way Jace's Road was going: his whole demeanor was irritable, and his mood cannot have improved as he trailed home splattered in slop. But then came the Gun Runner S., over the same course as this race, and suddenly he had it all figured out. He broke sharply, went bounding along in the lead and opened up late for a decisive score.
Brad Cox, who additionally saddles Hit Show (Candy Ride {Arg}) here, has an absolute cavalry to sieve down on the Classic trail. Last weekend he saddled Instant Coffee (Bolt d'Oro) for that efficient score in the GIII Lecomte S., as well as two fillies that finished over a dozen lengths clear of the rest in the Oaks trial. It feels very much as though Cox has now entered upon an even more potent cycle, after his four winners at the 2020 Breeders' Cup invited all the top programs to conclude that if they couldn't beat him, they may as well join him.
Instant Coffee runs in the same silks as Cyberknife, who gets the chance to stage his very own, flesh-and-blood stallion promotion in the Pegasus. Knowing Spendthrift, he's likely to enjoy a heroically lascivious lifestyle over the coming months. If only somebody could get him to understand the situation, he'd be the bet of all time.
Actually, I suppose the chances are that he's already operating on some primal sense of the benefits reserved for the herd leader. Anyway, be that as it may, this will be Cyberknife's 11th start in 13 months since he broke his maiden, so he evidently has the hardware to have sustained another campaign on the track. But we all recognize that he stands to make much more in his second career than in his first, even if he tops up an account already through $2 million by winning the Pegasus.
Certainly Cyberknife has achieved as much as anyone could dare to hope in spending $400,000 for a Saratoga yearling. But while everyone involved will thank him for his sterling service, and will miss him once he has moved on, the reality is that Instant Coffee–while not yet half the racehorse–has already supplanted Cyberknife in the attention of most.
For the Eclipse Awards are all on the mantlepiece now, and even Flightline's only job is to nourish a new dream. And, actually, that's great. Because it's the next dream that will always refresh our appetite for the game; that will have all those mares waiting in line at Spendthrift.
It's this mutual stimulus between racing and breeding, between track and field, that maintains human passion as the driver of the billions invested, not just in our industry, but in our sport. That's why someone will give $2.3 million for a horse bought a few months earlier for $250,000; and also why a fellow can get it into his head, after a fairly random visit to the Bluegrass, to buy himself a horse farm and populate it with a few mares. That's how Corser Thoroughbreds came to buy a young mare by Astrology at the 2019 Keeneland November Sale, carrying a first foal by Uncle Mo, for $285,000. That foal is Arabian Knight.
So the end of one chapter for Cyberknife will only open a new one. Who knows? Perhaps there's another novice breeder out there, who will end up putting a colt by Cyberknife on the 2027 Derby trail. And if we'll all be older then, and probably no wiser, then those are the kind of dreams–endlessly repeated, ever revitalized–that also keep us young.
For the Brad Cox stable, the road to the GI Kentucky Derby will make a stop Saturday at Oaklawn where Verifying (Justify) will run in an allowance race. It will be his first start since finishing sixth in the GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile. Cox will also send out Judo (Street Sense), who will not be among the favorites in the race. But even if the Cox pair falters, he'll still be loaded. The trainer, whose Mandaloun (Into Mischief) was placed first in the 2021 Derby with the disqualification of Medina Spirit (Protonico), has at least eight legitimate candidates for the Derby. Here's a look at his lineup:
Verifying: A $775,000 Keeneland September purchase, he was second in the GI Champagne S. before finishing mid-pack in the Juvenile.
“Hopefully, the race Saturday will be the start of a big year for him and everything will go well for him on Saturday,” Cox said. “After this race and if everything goes well Saturday we'll look for a Triple Crown prep.”
Loggins (Ghostzapper): Though he finished second behind eventual Juvenile winner Forte (Violence) in the GI Breeders' Futurity, Loggins served notice that day that he is a horse to be reckoned with. Of the two, Forte clearly had the better trip and Loggins was fighting back at the end. Afterward, Cox decided to pass on the Juvenile and freshen the horse up for the Derby. Loggins remains at WinStar Farm, where he went after the Breeders' Futurity for some R & R, but the trainer said he should arrive back at his Fair Grounds barn shortly. Cox remains undecided when it comes to Loggins's next race.
Victory Formation (Tapwrit): In his first try around two turns, Victory Formation won the Jan. 1 one-mile Smarty Jones S. at Oaklawn by three lengths. Having passed the all-important distance test, he should be ready for a tougher assignment. Cox said the colt will go next in either the GII Rebel S. or the GII Risen Star S.
Angel of Empire (Classic Empire): Finished second behind stablemate Victory Formation in the Smarty Jones. His next start will be in either the Rebel or Risen Star.
Instant Coffee (Bolt d'Oro): Was last seen winning the GII Kentucky Jockey Club S. on Nov. 26 at Churchill. That he's already won around two turns and at Churchill Downs are pluses. He will run next in the GIII Lecomte S. on Jan. 21 at Fair Grounds.
“He's doing well,” Cox said. “Since his last run we've been pointing to the Lecomte and have freshened him up a bit. He's been training very well here at the Fair Grounds.”
Jace's Road (Quality Road): Is coming off a huge run in the Dec. 26 Gun Runner S. at Fair Grounds, which he won by 5 1/2 lengths and under wraps. He's been working regularly since and Cox said the GIII Southwest S. will be next for him.
Giant Mischief (Into Mischief): Suffered somewhat of a setback when he couldn't win the Springboard Mile S. at Remington as the 4-5 favorite. Nonetheless, he was second and ran well enough to suggest he still belongs in the Derby picture. Cox said the Rebel will be next.
“He had three runs as a 2-year-old and ran in mid-December,” Cox said. “I feel like he'll only need two starts before the Derby. We'll find out if we can earn enough points and if he's worthy of making it into the Derby.”'
Corona Bolt (Bolt d'Oro): Is 2-for-2 and was an impressive winner of the six-furlong Sugar Bowl S., where he earned a 97 Beyer figure. Can he stretch out?
“He's a good colt,” Cox said. “We will try him in the Southwest and will prepare him at the Fair Grounds for his first run around two turns. There's always a little bit of a question whether they want to go two turns. He's a horse with a lot of speed but he's also intelligent and seems to relax and respond to what the rider wants.”
Though Cox has officially won a Derby, he admits he'd like to get another one and do so with a horse who crosses the wire first. He's optimistic that within this deep group there may be that special horse.
“It is a very good group that we have,” he said. “I felt last summer that we had a very good group of colts. I feel fortunate and am very happy with where we are. But I'm the first to admit there's a long way to go before we get to the first Saturday in May and that things have to go right.
“The Derby is why I get up and do this every day. It means a tremendous amount to me and to everyone in our stable. It means a lot to the owners and the race really helps drive this game. It's the biggest race we have in America. For me, it would be great to win it the right way and cross the wire first.”
1st Dam: Lady Tapit (GSP), by Tapit