During Thursday's sixth race for maiden 2-year-old fillies at Tampa Bay Downs, trainer Barbara Minshall got a workout watching Diamond Ore battle two equally determined rivals down the stretch of the mile-and-40-yard event.
“I was riding her from the quarter-mile pole home,” Minshall said jokingly after Diamond Ore's half-length victory from Purtiz. Forbidden Dream was another neck back in third in the seven-horse field.
Diamond Ore is by one of the world's leading sires, Tapit, and she is out of the Distorted Humor mare Bubbler, making her a half-sister to Arrogate. That Bob Baffert-trained runner won the 2016 Travers and Breeders' Cup Classic and the 2017 Pegasus World Cup Invitational and Dubai World Cup Sponsored By Emirates Airline, en route to becoming North American Thoroughbred racing's all-time money-earner with $17,422,600.
Samy Camacho rode the winner, who completed the distance in 1:42.25.
Minshall, who trains the regally bred winner for owner Bernard Cleary's Clearview Stable, was especially pleased with Diamond Ore's effort in light of it being her first start on a dirt track. Her three previous tries, including a second-place finish Nov. 14 racing a mile-and-a-sixteenth, were on the all-weather surface at Woodbine in Toronto.
“She is really a nice filly who wants to go longer, and I wanted to give her a little experience,” Minshall said. “Hopefully she learned something from that. The first time she had even worked on dirt was last week (5 furlongs in 1:01 4/5 at Sequel @ Winding Oaks Farms in Ocala), and she worked really well that day.
“Samy rode her perfectly. We've had a lot of luck with him,” Minshall said.
Camacho said he was able to track pace-setter Purtiz and Forbidden Dream comfortably from mid-pack before launching his winning bid at the 3/8-mile pole. But there was no quit in those two, and he had to work hard to secure the victory.
“I was sweating at the top of the stretch, but my filly kept fighting and did the job,” Camacho said.
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