Kentucky Downs Stakes Winner Tiz The Bomb Headlines ‘Win And You’re In’ Bourbon

Phoenix Thoroughbred III's Tiz the Bomb, winner of the Kentucky Downs Juvenile Mile in his most recent start, headlines a field of 14 2-year-olds plus two also-eligibles entered Thursday for Sunday's 31st running of the $200,000 Castle & Key Bourbon (G2) going 1 1/16 miles on the grass.

The Castle & Key Bourbon is a Breeders' Cup Challenge race with the winner earning a fees-paid berth into the Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf (G1) to be run Nov. 5 at Del Mar. The Castle & Key Bourbon will go as the final race on Sunday's 10-race program with a 5:46 p.m. ET post time.

Trained by two-time race winner Kenny McPeek, Tiz the Bomb notched his first victory in his second start, a 14¼-length blowout going a mile on the dirt at Ellis Park. Brian Hernandez Jr. has the mount Sunday and will exit post position 12.

Another Kentucky Downs winner who figures to attract attention is Silverton Hill's Red Danger.

Trained by Brian Lynch, Red Danger has won two of three starts with his most recent score coming in the Global Tote Juvenile Sprint (L) going 6½ furlongs on Sept. 9. Luis Saez, who has been aboard for all three of Red Danger's starts, has the call Sunday and will exit post position 10.

The field for the Castle & Key Bourbon, with riders and weights from the inside, is:

  1. Brit's Wit (David Flores, 118 pounds)
  2. Stolen Base (Flavien Prat, 118)
  3. Dowagiac Chief (James Graham, 118)
  4. Martini'nmoonshine (Tyler Gaffalione, 118)
  5. Rocket One (Julien Leparoux, 118)
  6. Credibility (Edwin Gonzalez, 118)
  7. Fast N Steady (Leonel Reyes, 118)
  8. Waita Minute Hayes (Mitchell Murrill, 118)
  9. On Thin Ice (Corey Lanerie, 118)
  10. Red Danger (Saez, 118)
  11. Heaven Street (Ricardo Santana Jr., 118)
  12. Tiz the Bomb (Hernandez Jr., 120)
  13. Lucky Boss (Irad Ortiz Jr., 118)
  14. Play Action Pass (Edgard Zayas, 118).

Also-Eligibles: Vivar (Florent Geroux, 118), Red Run (Santana Jr., 118).

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Turnerloose, Tiz The Bomb Capture Juvenile Turf Stakes At Kentucky Downs

With the kind of results Joel Rosario was producing at Kentucky Downs on the second day of the short meet in Franklin, Ky., victory in The Aristocrat Gaming Juvenile Fillies came down to either his 2-year-old, Yin Yang, or her stablemate in the Brad Cox barn, Turnerloose, with Florent Geroux aboard.

Rosario finished the day by winning 5 of the 11 races, but he rode in just eight of them. Fortune did not smile on him in the $500,000 filly co-feature, as Turnerloose turned it on down the long stretch to cross the wire five lengths ahead of Yin Yang.

“Look at that, I beat Joel Rosario today,” said a joyful Geroux as he brought Turnerloose back to the winner's circle.

Closing out Monday's holiday program was another $500,000 stakes for 2-year-olds, The Kentucky Downs Juvenile Mile, with 6-1 Tiz the Bomb also using the stretch to his advantage to score a three-quarters-length victory with Brian Hernandez Jr. aboard.

The filly race was more spread out. Behind the top two, sent off at very identical 2-1 odds in the field of nine, it was another 7 1/4 lengths until early pacesetter Verylittlecents and Joe Talamo finished.

“The break, she was very excited there, and didn't get out of there real quickly,” Rosario said. “But she did everything good, and she came running. She's nice, the other horse just got a jump on her. I'm very excited with the way she ran.”

Both of the Cox fillies had broken their maidens at Ellis Park in July. The victory pulled Cox into a tie with Joe Sharp atop the trainer standings, with three apiece.

“Both are very good fillies. I said last week that I liked both fillies, that I thought I'd go 1-2 in the race,” said Jorje Abrego, assistant trainer to Cox, about the pair who are part of the band he was supervising at Ellis this summer. “Turnerloose looked like 'turn her loose' today. She ran well. Yin Yang ran a very good second, so it was very good day for the team.”

Even more excited was Geroux after his first win at the meet, after missing Sunday's opener while riding at Saratoga.

“She was pulling on me pretty much all of the race, she wanted to go,” he said. “So, by the turn, she just kept on going. She was on a mission: she just wanted to take it to them, which was great.”

Turnerloose paid $6, $3 and $2.80, while Yin Yang returned $3.60 and $3. Verylittlecents paid $4 for show in a race timed in 1:36.19 for the mile on a turf course rated as firm.

It was a big win for Turnerloose, owned by Ike and Dawn Thrash, and now Team Cox has to look to her future – and to that of Yin Yang. Turnerloose was a $950,000 purchase at last year's Keeneland September sale, while Selective LLC's Yin Yang sold for $160,000 at the Fasig Tipton sale in October.

“This was big for her, now she's a stakes-winner,” Abrego said. “Now is the time to look for a graded stakes. We'll see how she is tomorrow, and if everything is good, maybe get her ready for Keeneland. Yin Yang just got beat by what, today, was a better horse.”

Not to be outdone, Phoenix Thoroughbred Ltd.'s Tiz the Bomb took a major step forward with his victory in 1:35.83 on the firm turf course.

Tiz the Bomb wins the Kentucky Downs Juvenile Mile

“He's got a license to be a good one,” said trainer Kenny McPeek about the colt, who sold for $330,000 at last year's Fasig Tipton yearling sale. “We're thrilled with the way he ran.”

While Play Action Pass and Edgard J. Zayas were setting the early fractions in the field of 10, Tiz the Bomb was in the middle of the pack.

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“He ran well today, the first time on the grass,” said Hernandez. “He put us in the spot and traveled the whole way around there looking like a winner, and got the job done.”

Kiss the Sky, the 2-1 favorite ridden by Jose Ortiz, was just behind Tiz the Bomb, and both colts took a wide path into the stretch for their rallying efforts. But Kiss the Sky, who won a maiden race at Saratoga for trainer Mike Maker in his second start, came up short.

“He ran well, second best,” said Maker, who was leading the Saratoga trainer standings for a good portion of the New York track's summer meeting.

Tiz the Bomb paid $14.20, $5.40 and $4, while Kiss the Sky paid $3.60 and $2.80. Play Action, the 12-1 early leader, was another half-length back in third and returned $6.40.

“They've been bragging on him over at the barn about how well he's been working,” Hernandez said of Tiz the Bomb. “And they were kinda tipping their hand about this performance. Robby Albarado has been working this horse in the mornings. He said that all of a sudden he turned the corner going the right way, and he showed it today.”

McPeek said Tiz the Bomb, who has won two of his three initial starts, might return to dirt in Keeneland's Grade 1 Breeders' Futurity.

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Hit It a Bomb Colt Rolls in KD Juvenile Turf Mile

KENTUCKY DOWNS JUVENILE MILE S., $497,500, Kentucky Downs, 9-6, 2yo, 1mT, 1:35.83, fm.
1–TIZ THE BOMB, 120, c, 2, by Hit It a Bomb
                1st Dam: Tiz the Key, by Tiznow
                2nd Dam: Cabbage Key, by A.P. Indy
                3rd Dam: Mayville's Magic, by Gone West
($330,000 Ylg '20 FTKSEL). 1ST BLACK-TYPE WIN. O-Phoenix
Thoroughbred, LTD; B-Spendthrift Farm, LLC (KY); T-Kenneth
McPeek; J-Brian Joseph Hernandez, Jr. $294,500. Lifetime
Record: 3-2-0-0, $326,291. *Third stakes winner for second-
crop sire (by War Front).
2–Kiss the Sky, 120, c, 2, Twirling Candy–Kiss Is a Kiss, by
Broken Vow. ($140,000 RNA Ylg '20 KEESEP; $290,000 2yo '21
OBSMAR). O-Paradise Farms Corp., David Staudacher &
Skychai Racing LLC; B-Sierra Nevada Racing, LLC (KY);
T-Michael J. Maker. $95,000.
3–Play Action Pass, 120, c, 2, Cairo Prince–Light of a Star, by
Muqtarib. ($150,000 Ylg '20 FTKSEL). O-August Dawn Farm;
B-Newtownanner Stud (KY); T-Robert Medina. $47,500.
Margins: 3/4, HF, 3 1/4. Odds: 6.10, 2.20, 12.30.
Also Ran: Red Run, Nobals, On Thin Ice, Longshadow, Fan the Fire, Rumble Strip Ron, Call Me Gusto. Scratched: Red Knobs.
Tiz the Bomb was the recipient of a head's-up ride from Brian Hernandez, Jr. and finished best of all to take out Monday's $500,000 Kentucky Downs Juvenile Turf Mile. Settled in the latter third of the field as they made the descent from the highest part of the course, the bay improved into midfield passing halfway and traveled nicely into the false straight. Hernandez gave some thought to going around rivals approaching the final quarter mile, but opted for an inside passage, and the duo finished willingly for the victory. Favored Kiss the Sky outgamed Play Action Pass for second. A debut seventh sprinting over the Churchill main track May 14, Tiz the Bomb scorched a group of Ellis Park maidens to the tune of 14 1/4 lengths in a rained-off test over a mile July 2. As a $330,000 purchase out of the Fasig-Tipton Selected Yearlings Showcase a year ago, Tiz the Bomb was easily the most expensive of 12 yearlings sold by his sire in 2020. He has a yearling half-sister by Free Drop Billy and a weanling half-brother by Mor Spirit. His dam was bred back to Gormley this year. Click for the Equibase.com chart or VIDEO, sponsored by TVG.

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Hernandez Bags Four Winners At Ellis Park

Jockey Brian Hernandez Jr. won on four his five mounts Friday on Ellis Park's eight-race card in Henderson, Ky., including with the promising 2-year-old colt Tiz the Bomb. The race he lost? Gus Gus, owned by trainer Ian Wilkes' wife, Tracey, and Hernandez's wife, Jamie. The two couples also bred the 2-year-old gelding.

But Gus Gus' second place in a $30,000 maiden-claiming race in his career debut was special in its own right. He's a son of Fort Larned, with whom Wilkes and Hernandez teamed to win the $6-million Breeders' Cup Classic in 2012 and two other Grade 1 races. In fact, Fort Larned gave Hernandez his first Grade 1 winner in Saratoga's Whitney Handicap, after which he was back riding at Ellis Park the next day.

“It was a good day,” Hernandez said of Friday's haul. “We rode five, and the first one was second. Which was pretty cool because it's a horse that Ian and I bred and we race. He was second today in the third race. And the rest of them, they all ran true to form. We got lucky and had a four-win day…. Third day of the meet and to get a four-win day, it's big.”

More on Gus Gus later. Here are the races Hernandez won:

// The fourth race as the Kenny McPeek-trained Tiz the Bomb blew up to a 14 1/2-length romp in a 2-year-old maiden race.

// The sixth aboard the 4-year-old filly Teenage Kicks, winner by three-quarters of a length in an off-the-turf allowance race for trainer Bernie Flint and owner Naveed Chowhan.

// The seventh by 2 3/4 lengths on Joseph Murphy's 4-year-old colt My Man Flintstone for trainer Brendan Walsh in another allowance race.

// The eighth in the $30,000 maiden-claiming race that served as the nightcap and which Island Boy smoked to a 10 3/4-length score for Wilkes and owner-breeder Anita Ebert.

Gus Gus closed from last of seven but was no threat as 9-5 favorite Bueno Bueno rolled to a 7 1/4-length romp. Off at 6-1 odds, Gus Gus finished three lengths in front of the next-closest horse.

Hernandez's streak started the next race, in which Tiz the Bomb led all the way at 3-5 odds in a mile maiden race taken off the turf. In his only other start, Tiz the Bomb finished seventh in a five-eighths of a mile dirt race at Churchill Downs. Undaunted, before the Ellis meet began, trainer Kenny McPeek said he had a really nice horse for the track's $125,000 Runhappy Juvenile Aug. 15 in Tiz the Bomb. Nothing that happened change that.

“He ran big,” Hernandez said after the victory. “We always thought he was going to run like that. The first time was a little short for him. When he got to go the mile today, he showed how good he is. I don't know what Kenny's going to do with him now, but it looks like he'll go forward from here.”

Said McPeek: “He was just a little clumsy in his first race. Nothing went right. He got off a little awkward, and he couldn't run them down. He just needed more ground. He'll definitely go in (the Juvenile), and we'll go from there.”

Tiz the Bomb is a poster boy for McPeek's use of mile maiden races over the Ellis Park turf, the trainer wanting the distance more than the surface and unconcerned if soggy grass moves them to the main track. Tiz the Bomb would seem suited to both surfaces, being a son of 2015 Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf winner Hit It a Bomb, now part of Spendthrift Farm's stallion roster. His broodmare sire is two-time Breeders' Cup Classic winner Tiznow.

How Wilkes, Hernandez ended up in the breeding business
Here's how Hernandez found himself in the breeding business: “Ian called a few years ago and asked if we wanted to go in half on this mare with him,” he said. “We bred her to Fort Larned twice. We got the horse that ran today and we have a yearling over in Lexington.”

That mare, Social Amber, went 0 for 3 as a racehorse but is by the popular Claiborne Farm stallion War Front. Her owner at the time, Dennis Farkas, gave Social Amber to Wilkes, who as the trainer also has a free breeding right to Fort Larned.

“I gave half of the mare to Brian, and I had the breeding right,” Wilkes said. “So we got in at the right cost.”

Asked if their wives were “good pay” — racetrack parlance for owners who pay their training bills — Wilkes joked with a laugh, “Hmm, slow. They're tough. After the race, Trace wanted to know why Brian didn't move early enough.”

More seriously, he said, “He was very encouraging today to run second in his first start, because he's no five-furlong horse.”

Hernandez is now out of the breeding business. With Fort Larned moving from Kentucky to Ohio, Jamie Hernandez gave the mare to a friend in the Buckeye state.

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