Month: February 2021

Monomoy Girl Wins!

Monomoy Girl returns to the winner’s circle in her 2021 debut in style, taking the Grade 3 Bayakoa Stakes at Oaklawn Park today. The 6-year-old daughter of Tapizar broke well and was four wide going into the first turn and laid third off of the leader, Our Super Freak, until jockey Florent Geroux asked her to pick up the pace around the far turn. Once she made her move, it was her race for the taking and she won by two lengths. Her time in the 1 1/16-mile dirt race was 1:45.92.

Trainer Brad Cox reported Monomoy Girl will ship back to her homebase at the Fair Grounds where she will be prepared for the $1 million, Grade 1 Apple Blossom Handicap at Oaklawn on April 17.

Click here for the link to purchase winner’s circle photos. Use code: MyRacehorse for a 15% discount good for the next 24 hours only.

Enjoy these race day photos courtesy of Coady Photography, the official track photographer at Oaklawn Park.

2-Year-Olds Work at de Meric

Athenian Beauty ‘19 (inside) with Speightstown Belle ’19 took the exciting next step of working for the first time Thursday at de Meric Training Center in Ocala, Fl.

Athenian Beauty ‘19, a son of Connect, and Speightstown Belle ‘19, a son of Kantharos, each went about their new assignment professionally and with eagerness during this quarter-mile breeze. The riders are not asking their mounts for speed, but rather letting these 2-year-olds go about their business at their own pace.

The atmosphere at de Meric offers these 2-year-olds the opportunity to become gradually acquainted with the sights and sounds they will encounter once they arrive at the racetrack. The advantage of being at a training center at this time in a young horse’s development is that the activity level is a notch below what they will encounter at the racetrack, thus giving them the opportunity to focus on the task at hand without too many distractions as they continue to learn the ropes.

Trainer Tristan de Meric can be heard on the video after the work, giving praise to both these colts.

2-Year-Old Update

Latte Da ’19 (outside) and Classofsixtythree ’19 trained together yesterday morning over the King’s Equine dirt track. The duo galloped twice around before jogging home. You can see from the video they have both really started to pick up the pace during their gallops.

Lady Valentine Update

The team at Payton Training Center reports that Lady Valentine will begin to pick up the pace in her gallops in about seven days’ time.

This practice is called “two-minute licking,” which is basically 14 seconds per furlong. The filly will do this twice a week. Around the third week in March, provided all goes well with the stronger gallops, she will have a three-furlong breeze or two. Pending the work(s) go well and she comes out of them in good order, Lady Valentine will head back to trainer Todd Pletcher’s barn the first part of April.

The Payton training team shared that Lady Valentine has done extremely well during her time at the training center and said the 3-year-old has shown an increase in muscle tone, notably in her neck, over her back, and hindquarters.

From a personality standpoint, people who work around Lady Valentine at Payton report she is an easy-going filly and is very fond of her food!

Here’s a video of Lady Valentine galloping at Payton on Friday.

Mo Mischief Arrives at Payton!

The team at Payton Training Center reported that Mo Mischief arrived in Ocala, Fl. in good order from Kentucky at 5 a.m. local time today.

The plan for Mo Mischief while he is at Payton Training Center, which is owned by trainer Todd Pletcher’s father, J.J. Pletcher, is for him to build his stamina through track work. With the fabulous conditioning he received from the water treadmill therapy at the Kentucky Equine Sports Medicine and Rehabilitation Center, Mo Mischief will now commence with 30 days of jogging over the Payton training track, followed by 30 days of galloping. At that point, pending all has gone well with his training, Mo Mischief would have a three-furlong breeze or two before rejoining Todd’s barn in May.

We will keep you updated with news of Mo during his time at Payton.

Quick Conversation Work Video

Team Clement shared with us this video of Quick Conversation (inside) working with stablemate Entwine yesterday at Payson Park.

It was Quick Conversation’s second five-furlong breeze. The 3-year-old daughter of Frosted covered the distance in 1:02.80, a full second faster than her last breeze of five furlongs on Feb. 6.

The time was the fastest of 10 works at the distance on the turf yesterday at Payson Park.

Quick Conversation was visually more impressive than her workmate — a winner last year at 2 in England — who was being mildly urged to keep up. You can see the rider on Quick Conversation was quiet with his hands and was letting the filly do the work on her own.

Christophe Clement said, “It was a nice work for the filly and she came back in good order.”

The MyRacehorse Team will check in this week with Christophe to discuss plans for the filly going forward.

Got Stormy

In a thrilling victory, Got Stormy won the Grade 3 Honey Fox Stakes at Gulfstream Park yesterday in her seasonal debut. The 6-year-old daughter of Get Stormy triumphed over seven rivals, completing the one-mile turf race in a final time 1:35.52. Under jockey Tyler Gaffalione, Got Stormy broke well and stalked the pace in second position. Gaffalione made his move in the stretch and Got Stormy surged to the lead approaching the sixteenth pole and then was able to hold off the fast-closing Zoffelle to win by a nose.

Due to Gulfstream Park losing internet yesterday, the winner’s circle photo is not available yet. Once the track photographer completes the composition photo and has uploaded it we will provide the link.

Enjoy these race day photos provided by Adam Coglianese, Gulfstream Park Track Photographer.

Todd Talks Storm Shooter

Our featured guest on Friday’s edition of MRH Live was trainer Todd Pletcher, who walked us though his thoughts on Storm Shooter, including his recent race, his trouble with lead changes in his races, and what he foresees for the 3-year-old son of Twirling Candy going forward while discussing trying the New York-bred on the turf.