Mizzen Mast | Horse Racing Free Tips

Caravel Captures the Caress

Caravel (Mizzen Mast) carried the colors of her breeder, trainer and now co-owner Elizabeth Merryman to six victories in her eight previous starts. Irad Ortiz climbed aboard Caravel sporting the silks of her new part-owner Bobby Flay for this Saratoga debut and she took her career to the next level with a decisive score in the GIII Caress S. Saturday.

Backed to even-money favoritism off a pair of stakes wins, Caravel was away well from her rail draw and settled to track from third off pacesetting New York native Robin Sparkles (Elusive Quality), who zipped through a :21.64 first quarter. Robin Sparkles turned for home in front with Jakarta (Bustin Stones)–who was only running for purse money–just off her flank and Caravel ranging up in the three path. Caravel found another gear in mid-stretch, powering past the leader to win going away. In Good Spirits (Ghostzapper) rallied late to be second and Robin Sparkles held third.

“The whole turn, she was on the bridle waiting for the time to go,” Ortiz said. “I wanted to make sure to go around the horses like she did last time at Monmouth [winning the Goldwood June 25]. I was able to get in the clear and as soon as I asked, she gave me a really good kick–a good turn-of-foot.”

“I don't know if she's improved, but I think people understand how she needs to be ridden, and the trip is better now,” Merryman said. “I said to [Irad Ortiz, Jr.] just be as quiet as you can leaving the gate because the least twitch of the reins and she's going. It's pretty amazing. You watch Saratoga and just think it's the place to be. To come up here with a filly like that, it's amazing.”

With Flay now the majority owner, Caravel will be transferred to Graham Motion following this victory.

“He's watched her train pretty much every day. He's just been so nice and classy and sweet about her,” Merryman said of Motion. “Bobby Flay now owns a majority interest in her and we made a plan when he was interested in buying to make that change. That was something I was in agreement with from the time of the sale of the majority of her. Graham is in the next barn to me at Fair Hill [in Maryland]. It'll all be good.”

She continued, “Hopefully, the goal is the [GI] Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint and Graham has so much experience going that route. It seemed like a really smart thing to do from my perspective as well. Not that I don't think I could handle it, but with the change in the ownership, Graham has a system that works great and he's been through all that.”

Opening her account with a trio of victories, including the Lady Erie S. last summer, Caravel checked in third in that Pimlico's Hilltop S. in October and returned to winning ways in the state-bred Malvern Rose S. back at Presque Isle Oct. 22. Third in Belmont's License Fee S. Apr. 30, the PA-bred rallied to victory in The Very One S. in Baltimore May 14 and romped in Monmouth's Goldwood S. June 25.

Pedigree Notes:

Caravel is the 24th graded winner for Mizzen Mast and one of 61 black-type scorers by that Juddmonte sire. The winner is the first foal out of Zeezee Zoomzoom, a daughter of SW & MGSP Zee Zee (Exchange Rate). Her 3-year-old filly Tipsy Chatter (Bourbon Courage) broke her maiden earlier this year for Merryman. The 9-year-old mare is also responsible for an unraced juvenile gelding named Witty (Great Notion), a yearling colt by Holy Boss and a 2021 colt by Great Notion. Zeezee Zoomzoom was bred back to Street Boss.

Saturday, Saratoga
CARESS S.-GIII, $200,000, Saratoga, 7-24, 4yo/up, f/m, 5 1/2fT, 1:02.38, fm.
1–CARAVEL, 122, f, 4, by Mizzen Mast
                1st Dam: Zeezee Zoomzoom, by Congrats
                2nd Dam: Zee Zee, by Exchange Rate
                3rd Dam: Emblem of Hope, by Dynaformer
   1ST GRADED STAKES WIN. ($330,000 RNA 3yo '20 WANOCT).
O-Bobby Flay & Elizabeth M. Merryman; B/T-Elizabeth M.
Merryman (PA); J-Irad Ortiz, Jr. $110,000. Lifetime Record:
9-7-0-2, $367,872. Werk Nick Rating: A++. Click for the
   eNicks report & 5-cross pedigree.
2–In Good Spirits, 118, f, 4, Ghostzapper–Mon Arch Lass, by
Arch. ($200,000 Ylg '18 FTSAUG). O-Bal Mar Equine, LLC;
B-Stonestreet Thoroughbred Holdings LLC (KY); T-Albert M.
Stall, Jr. $40,000.
3–Robin Sparkles, 120, f, 4, Elusive Quality–My Sparky, by
Dehere. ($30,000 Ylg '18 SARAUG). O-Michael Schrader;
B-Hibiscus Stables (NY); T-Bruce R. Brown. $24,000.
Margins: 2HF, HF, 3/4. Odds: 1.00, 9.00, 1.30.
Also Ran: Tass, Flower Point, Jakarta. Click for the Equibase.com chart, the TJCIS.com PPs or the free Equineline.com catalogue-style pedigree. VIDEO, sponsored by TVG.

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Caravel Passes Robin Sparkles In Stretch To Win Caress At Saratoga

In her last start with breeder and part-owner Elizabeth Merryman as trainer, Caravel bided her time behind front-running Robin Sparkles, went to the outside around the final turn, and then sprinted down the center of the Saratoga turf course to win the Grade 3 Caress Stakes. The win brings Pennsylvania's reigning Horse of the Year to three victories in four starts in 2021.

Under jockey Irad Ortiz, Jr., Caravel broke well, settling in behind Robin Sparkles and Jakarta, who was running for only purse money after an inadvertent scratch Saturday morning, as the field ran down the backstretch at Saratoga Race Course in Saratoga Springs, N.Y. Robin Sparkles, with Jose Ortiz in the saddle, held a length and a half lead going in the final turn, as Irad took Caravel to the outside for her stretch run.

With Jakarta in second on the rail, Robin Sparkles maintained her front runner status through the first part of the stretch, with Caravel sprinting down the stretch to her outside. In the race's final yards, Caravel passed Robin Sparkles to take over the lead and draw away to win by two and a half lengths. Robin Sparkles held on for third behind a surging In Good Spirits, who was second. The final time for the 5 1/2 furlongs was 1:02.38.

Tass, Flower Point, and Jakarta rounded out the field. Caravel paid $4.00, $2.70, and $2.10. In Good Spirits paid $5.70 and $2.80. Robin Sparkles paid $2.10.

Find this race's chart here.

The Mizzen Mast filly went into the G3 turf sprint off of victories in the Goldwood at Monmouth Park and the Very One at Pimlico Race Course, performances that led Bobby Flay to purchase a majority interest in Caravel from Merryman. From here, Caravel will join the barn of trainer Graham Motion.

“Bobby Flay now owns a majority interest in her and we made a plan when he was interested in buying to make that change,” Merryman said after the Caress. “That was something I was in agreement with from the time of the sale of the majority of her. Graham is in the next barn to me at Fair Hill [in Maryland]. It'll all be good.”

“Hopefully, the goal is the Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint and Graham has so much experience going that route. It seemed like a really smart thing to do from my perspective as well. Not that I don't think I could handle it, but with the change in the ownership, Graham has a system that works great and he's been through all that. It'll be a good way to go. I'll still own part of her.”

“The whole turn, she was on the bridle waiting for the time to go.” Irad Ortiz, Jr. told the NYRA Press Office after the race. “I wanted to make sure to go around the horses like she did last time at Monmouth [winning the Goldwood on June 25]. I was able to get in the clear and as soon as I asked, she gave me a really good kick – a good turn-of-foot.”

Bred in Pennsylvania, Caravel is a 4-year-old gray filly by Mizzen Mast out of Congrats mare Zeezee Zoomzoom. With this victory in the G3 Caress, Caravel has seven wins in nine lifetime starts, for career earnings of $367,872.

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Caravel Using Friday’s Goldwood As Springboard To Ambitious Summer Schedule

Elizabeth Merryman isn't convinced she has seen the best from Caravel, a 4-year-old filly she bred, owns and trains.

But she's hoping Friday's inaugural $75,000 Goldwood Stakes at Monmouth Park is another step toward finding out where the ceiling is for a turf specialist she feels will be the best horse she has ever had.

“This race will tell me a lot,” said Merryman. “A month from now there are four filly and mare turf sprints within a five-day period. There's one at Colonial (the Andy Guest on July 26), one at Saratoga (the Grade 3 Caress on July 24), one at Woodbine (the Grade 2 Royal North on Aug. 1) and one at Pimlico. This will give me an indication (of where to go next).

“There's a really good filly in this race (Miss Auramet) who has done nothing wrong that she has not run against yet. So we'll see.”

The Goldwood, set for five furlongs on the grass, has attracted a field of eight and headlines a six-race twilight card. Miss Aurament, trained by Kathleen O'Connell, comes off an impressive win in the slop in the Politely Stakes on May 30 at Monmouth Park. That race was originally scheduled for the turf.

Caravel's credentials, though, stack up with any of the fillies or mares in the race. She is 5-for-7 lifetime with two thirds, with her only defeats coming on a yielding turf and a good turf.

The Pennsylvania-bred daughter of Mizzen Mast-ZeeZee ZoomZoom by Congrats was set to go in Tuesday's Power By Far Stakes at Parx until the race was taken off the turf.

“Her training hasn't been smooth to this race since we were supposed to go Tuesday,” said Merryman, whose 14-horse stable is based at Fair Hill Training Center in Elkton, Md. “We'll see how she handles the adversity, with everything not being quite right.”

Merryman was convinced there was something special about Caravel from the outset and chose not to rush her as a 2-year-old, allowing her to go through a series of growth spurts before hitting the racetrack.

Her anticipated debut hardly went as planned, however. She broke 10th and last in a five-furlong Maiden Special Weight turf dash at Penn National on June 20 last year. And then something remarkable happened. She rallied from last for most of the race to win going away by 1¼ lengths.

“Not only did she break last, she was steadily dropping back,” said Merryman. “I was watching the race thinking `My gosh, I really like this filly. How can she be this bad? How can I be so wrong?' And then it just clicked for her. It was amazing to see.

“The thing is, she has always been good from the gate. I think she was just caught off guard.”

Caravel went on to win four of her five starts at 3 and is coming off a victory in the The Very One Stakes at Pimlico on May 14 in her second start at 4.

“She has come back a little bigger and stronger,” said Merryman, who has been training since 2004. “She carries a bit more weight now and looks a little more robust.”

A winner of $212,872 from her seven career starts, Caravel drew post position 1 for the Goldwood Stakes.

“The post is not a big deal with her. She kind of dictates what she wants to do,” said Merryman. “You don't have to send her and you don't have to take her back. You just have to sit as chilly as possible and let her tell you where she wants to be.”

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Trainer Liz Merryman Has High Hopes for Homebred Filly

It's a rare feat to get to the winner's circle on one of the biggest weekends in racing with a horse bred, owned and trained by the same connection, but Elizabeth Merryman did just that when her speedy filly Caravel (Mizzen Mast) gave a gutsy performance at Pimlico to take The Very One S. by a nose on Preakness weekend.

Many would consider the juggling act between the foaling barn and the training center to be an impossibility, but Liz Merryman says for her, it's the best way to produce a racehorse.

“I love working with a horse that has no mystery to what happened before I got them,” she said. “You know everything about them, you know why they do what they do and it's really rewarding. It's my favorite way to train a horse.”

Did last Friday's victory mark Caravel as the most successful homebred Merryman has brought up?

“Definitely,” the Fair Hill-based trainer said.

And for the cherry on top, Merryman picked up Caravel's dam for free.

Zeezee Zoomzoom (Congrats), a $135,000 2-year-old purchase out of a dual stakes winner, broke her maiden on the Saratoga turf as a 3-year-old in 2015. After she dropped to the claiming ranks the next year, a bowed tendon ended her racing career.

A friend of Merryman's heard the filly was up for grabs.

“I was looking for another broodmare and my friend called me from Florida,” Merryman recalled. “She said the owners were just looking for a good home for her, either as a riding horse or a broodmare, but she told me she thought the filly would make me a nice broodmare. I looked her up and she had a weird page. There were very few horses on it, but the ones there could really run. All the way down, there were nice, strong broodmare types.”

So Merryman agreed to take the filly and shipped her from Florida to Kentucky, for a date with Juddmonte's Mizzen Mast, and then on to her farm in Pennsylvania.

“I never saw her until she was pregnant with Caravel,” Merryman noted with a laugh.

Zeezee Zoomzoom's first foal immediately showed promise.

“She was the only foal I had that year since my other mare wasn't in foal, so she was kind of raised as an only child,” Merryman said. “She always had a great personality and was really nice-looking and correct. I thought she was special from day one, I just didn't know she would be this special.”

A young Caravel taking a snooze. | Elizabeth Merryman

While Merryman said she will occasionally put a foal through a sale, she never considered it with Caravel.

“I really believe if you're going to make a mare, you should keep the first foal and campaign it yourself to make sure it gets every possible chance to prove itself and the family. She was also bred for the grass and she started cribbing early on. I thought she was a fantastic-looking baby, so I didn't want her to be discounted for being a cribbing turf horse.”

Merryman's hopes for the gray filly grew once she started putting in her first works at Fair Hill.

“One day I told her rider to kind of cruise through the lane and two-minute lick the last eighth to see how she goes. I clocked her at 11 flat and I thought, 'You know what? I think I have a runner.'”

Caravel broke her maiden on debut, going last to first over five furlongs of turf at Penn National. She then took an allowance at the same track before claiming her first stakes win in the Lady Erie S. at Presque Isle Downs.

At that point, the Pennsylvania-bred was getting some attention. After a third-place effort in the Hilltop S., Merryman put her in the Wanamaker's October Online Auction.

“I had a lot of people calling me and I thought I should probably cash in on her,” Merryman said. “I set her reserve at $350,000 and she didn't get to it. I wasn't very sorry. She won a stakes a week later.”

Caravel wrapped up her 3-year-old season with a win in the Malvern Rose S. back at Presque Isle Downs.

From the start of her campaign this year, Merryman was shooting to bring Caravel to Pimlico for The Very One S.

“I knew she was going to need a prep race, but everything kept getting backed up at Laurel and there was no allowance for her in New York really, so I thought I would run her in the License Fee S. and that would be a nice prep for her being three weeks out,” Merryman explained.

When bad weather pushed the race back a week, Merryman decided to keep her filly entered, planning to opt out of a trip to Pimlico on Preakness weekend two weeks later and instead wait until Monmouth opened.

But after Caravel's third-place finish in the License Fee, Merryman wavered in her decision.

“When she came out of that race, she seemed like she had really moved forward,” Merryman said. “She didn't come out tired or stiff and she was training happy, so I thought alright, maybe two weeks is going to be fine.”

Merryman grew more confident in the days leading up to the race.

“The week before, I was so confident in her, and I'm never confident,” she said. “I always second guess myself, but I'd never had a horse come into a race like such a monster.”

Caravel settled along the rail for the five-furlong contest and waited for a hole coming down the stretch. It seemed as though she would have no way to get up and would have to fight to get in the money, but in the final strides before the wire, she slipped through to surge forward and get the bob in a nail-biting three-way photo finish.

“I thought she had finished third when she crossed the wire,” her trainer admitted.

Merryman joins her homebred in the winner's circle for the Malvern Rose S. | Coady

For Merryman, who was born into a prominent racing family and has now passed on the trade to her children, the victory was cause for celebration.

“I had a lot of family there- both my kids, my husband, my sister and her family, and quite a few friends. It was really special and a lot of fun.”

Merryman reports that Caravel came out of the race with flying colors. She doesn't have any set plans for the filly's next start, but is considering options at Woodbine and Belmont.

Caravel's 3-year-old sister Tipsy Chatter (Bourbon Courage) is now in training with Merryman and looking to break her maiden, entered on May 26 at Delaware Park. Their dam also has a juvenile son of Great Notion named Witty, a yearling colt by Holy Boss, and was most recently bred back to Great Notion.

While Merryman admits that Caravel and her siblings are foaled out at another farm, they are back in her hands at three days old. Caravel has not left her owner's care since she first arrived at Merryman's Pennsylvania farm in the spring of 2017.

“We broke her ourselves,” she said. “She's been with us for everything. I love raising them. It's obviously a slow process. Everything goes wrong, there's always sleepless nights, but being able to work with a clean slate, with a horse you know everything about, there's no mystery.”

Merryman said she starts her day later than most at Fair Hill so she can care for her mares and foals before heading to the training center. It makes for hectic days, but it's a process that she has found serves her best.

“I just like to work with horses,” she said. “It's thrilling. A lot of people's lives are pretty mundane and boring. Mine certainly isn't. There's a lot of hard work and drudgery, but there's always something that's going to get your blood up.”

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