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Drefong Colt Lands First Blow on Japan Road to the Derby

The first crop of foals sired by Eclipse Award-winning sprinter Drefong (Gio Ponti) have performed so well since 2-year-old racing in Japan began in early June that he has seen his covering fee bumped from ¥3 million (about $26,400) to ¥7 million (about $61,700) for the 2022 breeding season. Consigliere (Jpn) has done his part to help cement his sire's footing on the competitive Japanese breeding landscape and ran his record to two wins from as many starts with a neck defeat of Cafe Karma (Jpn) (Henny Hughes) in Saturday's Cattleya S. (allowance) at Tokyo Racecourse, the first of four races on the Japan Road to the Kentucky Derby.

Having graduated by 9 1/2 lengths going 1800 meters at Niigata in his lone previous appearance Aug. 22, the bay was favored at 7-10 and jumped fairly for Christophe Lemaire, then settled in a position slightly better than midfield as OBS March topper Clos de Mesnil (Practical Joke) speared through to make the running. Allowed to creep a bit closer on the turn, the Kazumi Yoshida colorbearer loomed up four wide at the top of the long Tokyo straight, was held together into the final furlong and a half and held sway late as 21-1 Cafe Karma dove at him to make a race of it (see below, SC 10). Geraldo Barows (Jpn) (Sinister Minister) was a further neck away in third, while second choice World Connector (Connect) was a meritorious fourth.

Consigliere, one of 22 first-crop winners for Drefong, is a half-brother to the Japanese SW & GSP Esmeraldina (Harlan's Holiday) and his dam Tasha's Star (Spanish Steps) is a half-sister to MGSW & GISP Tasha's Miracle (Harlan's Holiday). Tasha's Star did not produce a foal in 2020 and is the dam of a weanling filly by Shadai's two-time G1 Takamatsunomiya Kinen (1200mT) hero Kinshasa no Kiseki (Aus).

A total of 17 Kentucky Derby points (10-4-2-1) were awarded Saturday. The series continues in the Zen-Nippon Nisai Yushun at Kawasaki on the NAR circuit Dec. 15.

WATCH: Consigliere holds on in the Cattleya S.

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Unified Colt a Debut Winner at Fair Grounds

7th-Fair Grounds, $45,000, Msw, 11-26, 2yo, 6f, 1:10.57, ft, 3/4 length.

UNDERHILL'S TAB (c, 2, Unified–Mykindasaint {MSW, $171,228}, by Saint Ballado), looking to become the 15th winner for his freshman sire (by Candy Ride {Arg}), was half of the 4-5 favored entry. The dark bay colt tracked pacesetting entrymate Prather (Into Mischief) from third while racing along the rail through fractions of :22.41 and :45.99. He ranged up three wide at the top of the stretch and collared a determined Boss' Dialin In (Dialed In) late despite drifting out to win by 3/4 lengths. A half-brother to Malibu Saint (Malibu Moon), SW, $103,261, Underhill's Tab was a $10,000 KEENOV weanling and a $19,000 FTKOCT yearling before selling for $400,000 after working in :9 4/5 at this year's OBS March sale. Mykindasaint, who sold for $10,000 at last year's Fasig-Tipton February sale, produced a colt by Speightster last year and a filly by Preservationist this year before being bred back to Gift Box. Her Speightster colt sold for $25,000 at last month's Fasig-Tipton October sale. Click for the Equibase.com chart or VIDEO, sponsored by TVG. Lifetime Record: 1-1-0-0, $27,000.

O-Spendthrift Farm LLC; B-Jay Goodwin & Brian Foret (KY); T-Albert M. Stall, Jr.

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Maxfield Ends Career in Style in Clark

The connections of Maxfield (Street Sense) had been hoping the colt could add one more Grade I to his resume before retiring to stand the 2022 season at his owner's Jonabell Farm. The Godolphin homebred rewarded their faith at the 11th hour with a stylish score in his career finale in Friday's GI Clark H. at Churchill Downs, a track at which he is undefeated.

Dispatched at even-money along with hard-knocking GSW & MGISP Midnight Bourbon (Tiznow), Maxfield was away in good order from the outside post in this eight-horse affair and cruised up to press his chief market rival through a :23.83 opening quarter. Glued to Midnight Bourbon's outside hip through a half in :48 flat, the dark bay turned up the heat with three-eighths left to run, drawing even with his foe. Floated out three wide by Midnight Bourbon turning for home, Maxfield gained a narrow advantage over that stubborn rival in the lane, but had a new shooter coming in hot on his outside in Happy Saver (Super Saver). Midnight Bourbon gave way in the final sixteenth, but Happy Saver was still coming on strong. Maxfield dug deep with a little encouragement from Jose Ortiz, holding off Happy Saver by a half-length. Midnight Bourbon hung on for third.

“I feel just delighted he got the job done like that today,” trainer Brendan Walsh said. “It's a very prestigious race and it's very nice he could win it and go into his stud career like that.”

“He put me in the race today when he broke from the gate,” Ortiz said. “I could tell Happy Saver would be coming around the far turn and Maxfield felt him come alongside as well. He was able to dig down and really fight hard today. Hats off to Brendan and his team who have done an amazing job with him throughout his career. I'm very happy he gets to go out this way.”

Winner of the GI Claiborne Breeders' Futurity S. in 2019, Maxfield missed that year's GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile with a foot bruise and subsequently underwent surgery for an ankle chip. He returned a winner in the 2020 GIII Matt Winn S. in May and was knocked out of the delayed GI Kentucky Derby with an ankle fracture. Back in time for one more start as a sophomore, the dark bay captured the Tenacious S. at Fair Grounds that December and opened 2021 with a win in the GIII Mineshaft S. there Feb. 13.

Third in his first attempt at 10 furlongs in the GI Santa Anita H. Mar. 6, Maxfield rebounded with a win in the GII Alysheba S. Apr. 30 and followed suit with a facile score in the GII Stephen Foster S. June 26, taking his record beneath the Twin Spires to four-for-four. The homebred checked in second to GI Breeders' Cup Classic winner and likely Horse of the Year Knicks Go (Paynter) in Saratoga's GI Whitney S. Aug. 7 and completed the exacta in Belmont's GI Woodward S. Oct. 2, earning 105 Beyer Speed Figures for both of those efforts.

Pedigree Notes:

Maxfield is one of 11 Grade I winners, 35 graded scorers and 81 black-type victors by his sire Street Sense, who he will be standing alongside at Darley's Jonabell Farm for an introductory fee of $40,000. He is also one of 12 top-level scorers, 32 graded winners and 57 black-type victors out of a daughter of red-hot broodmare sire Bernardini, who stood at Jonabell until his death earlier this year. Maxfield is the third Grade I winner of this year alone produced by a daughter of Bernardini, following dual Grade I-winning turfer Colonel Liam (Liam's Map) and GI Cotillion S. victress Clairiere (Curlin). He is also the broodmare sire of GI Breeders' Cup Distaff runner-up Dunbar Road (Quality Road).

Sheikh Mohammed's operation acquired Maxfield's second dam MGSW Caress (Storm Cat) for $3.1 million in foal to Coronado's Quest at the 2000 KEENOV sale. That was the same year she produced future Grade I winner and sire Sky Mesa (Pulpit). Caress is also the dam of MGSW & GISP Golden Velvet (Seeking the Gold), who is the dam of GSWs Lucullan (Hard Spun) and Innovative Idea (Bernardini). This is also the family of MGSW sire Bernstein (Storm Cat); MGSW & GISP Good Samaritan (Harlan's Holiday) and Della Francesca (Danzig); and GSW & GISP Country Cat (Storm Cat).

Maxfield's dam Velvety has also produced the 3-year-old colt Dubai Vision (Medaglia d'Oro), who was unplaced in one start in Europe, and an unraced juvenile filly named Loved (Medaglia d'Oro). Her 2020 Street Sense colt passed away and she had an Uncle Mo colt Mar. 20 of this year. The 11-year-old mare was bred back to Uncle Mo.

Friday, Churchill Downs
CLARK S. PRESENTED BY NORTON HEALTHCARE-GI, $749,334, Churchill Downs, 11-26, 3yo/up, 1 1/8m, 1:49.06, ft.
1–MAXFIELD, 123, c, 4, by Street Sense
                1st Dam: Velvety, by Bernardini
                2nd Dam: Caress, by Storm Cat
                3rd Dam: La Affirmed, by Affirmed
O/B-Godolphin (KY); T-Brendan P. Walsh; J-Jose L. Ortiz.
$450,910. Lifetime Record: 11-8-2-1, $2,001,812.
Werk Nick Rating: A+++ *Triple Plus*.
Click for the eNicks report & 5-cross pedigree.
2–Happy Saver, 121, c, 4, Super Saver–Happy Week, by
Distorted Humor. O/B-Wertheimer Et Frere (KY); T-Todd A.
Pletcher. $146,100.
3–Midnight Bourbon, 118, c, 3, Tiznow–Catch the Moon, by
Malibu Moon. ($525,000 Ylg '19 KEESEP). O-Winchell
Thoroughbreds LLC; B-Stonestreet Thoroughbred Holdings LLC
(KY); T-Steven M. Asmussen. $73,050.
Margins: HF, 3, 1 1/4. Odds: 1.20, 12.10, 1.20.
Also Ran: Militarist, King Fury, Night Ops, Dr Post, Chess Chief.
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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Veteran Racing Secretary Creel Dies From Cardiac Complications

Tom Creel, a well-respected East Coast-based racing secretary and official whose career spanned parts of five decades, died on Thanksgiving Eve from cardiac complications at Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester, New York. He was 64.

Sam Elliott, a longtime friend and coworker, confirmed Creel's death to TDN Friday. He said Creel had suffered a heart attack several weeks ago. On Nov. 22 Creel underwent an eight-hour surgery to implant an artificial heart pump, but developed complications from that procedure and was unable to recover, Elliott said.

Creel had taken over this past spring as the racing secretary at Finger Lakes. But he is perhaps best remembered for his decades of working his way up through the ranks in various racing offices at New England tracks. He was the Suffolk Downs racing secretary from 2008 through the track's closure in 2019, and he later was the assistant racing secretary at Parx and the racing secretary at Delaware Park.

Creel had also worked racing official jobs at Penn National and Tampa Bay Downs, and at times was a jockey agent. Creel also was the racing secretary for the final two stops on the New England county fairs circuit-Brockton Fair and Northampton Fair-before the half-milers went defunct in 2004.

“Tommy was really good at his job, and he enjoyed it,” Elliott said. “As a racing secretary, just putting the races together, there wasn't anybody better. I think that's just that experience of being at the fairs.”

Elliott was alluding to the improvised, deadline-driven nature of the job at the seasonal bullring tracks. At the New England fairs, where horses often ran on the same day that entries for the next race date would be drawn, it was not uncommon for the racing office to forego using a condition book and instead just ask whoever wanted to run to enter their horses. In those instances, it was up to a racing secretary to build races based what limited stock was available, and Creel had a knack for putting together competitive races that didn't slight trainers or overmatch their horses.

“When he was the racing secretary, if you entered your horse, he'd find a place for you to run-that's just the way it was,” Elliott said.

“We met each other at Rockingham in April of 1986, and it was love at first sight,” Elliott explained. “We were pals right away. Tommy was just a very, very funny guy. He took the racing seriously and knew what he needed to do for his job. But he liked to have fun, and he was really good to all the little people at the track. He'd know all the grooms by name. He was the quintessential racetracker. He lived and breathed it, and on his days off you could often find him visiting some other racetrack just for fun. ”

Creel's services had not been finalized as of Friday afternoon, nor had a complete list of survivors.

Elliott told TDN that Creel had two children and a grandchild: One daughter, Amanda, and one son, Christopher. During Creel's tenure at Suffolk Downs, Christopher started shadowing his father on the backstretch and in the racing office at a very early age. He later became a jockey agent while still in high school, and has since worked as a racing official, assistant trainer, and bloodstock agent.

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