Gun Runner following in footsteps of Saint Liam

Gun Runner was an honest and consistent 3-year-old. The winner of the Louisiana Derby and Risen Star, both Grade 2 events, he finished a creditable third behind Nyquist and Exaggerator in the Kentucky Derby, then bounced right back to win the Grade 3 Matt Winn Stakes.

He spent the summer and fall finishing third behind eventual division champion Arrogate in the Travers, a close second to eventual Grade 1 winner Connect in the Grade 2 Pennsylvania Derby, and second in the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile. He then nabbed his elusive Grade 1 win in the Clark Handicap, defeating a field of elders that included Canadian champion Shaman Ghost, now among the top older horses in the country.

As productive as Gun Runner was, though, trainer Steve Asmussen was looking forward to more in his 4-year-old season.

“He’s out of a half-sister to Saint Liam,” Asmussen said. “Saint Liam was [eligible for] other-than at the end of his 3-year-old year and wound up Horse of the Year. He was much better at 4.”

Indeed, Gun Runner has now won two of three starts through the first half of his 4-year-old campaign after his sevenlength romp in the Grade 1 Stephen Foster Handicap under the lights Saturday at Churchill Downs. He also won the Grade 3 Razorback Handicap by 6 3/4 lengths. His only loss this year is a runner-up effort to Arrogate, rated the world’s best dirt horse, in the Dubai World Cup.

Gun Runner is one of five horses to win the Clark and the Stephen Foster, Churchill’s two signature dirt races for older horses. Fittingly, the group also includes Saint Liam (2004-05); Blame (2009-10) was the most recent to pull off the feat. Both were Eclipse Award champions.

“We’re seeing the physical growth in the horse – he’s put on some weight, he’s a little thicker, a little bigger, and just keeps coming the right way,” Asmussen said.

Gun Runner, by Candy Ride, is the first foal out of Quiet Giant, a Grade 2 winner at age 4. She is a half-sister to three graded winners led by Saint Liam, who at the end of his 3-year-old campaign was an allowance winner and had finished a well-beaten second in the Iowa Derby. He announced himself as a 4-year-old with a hard-fought second to champion Ghostzapper in the Woodward before scoring his first Grade 1 in the Clark. He went on to win the 2005 Breeders’ Cup Classic and Horse of the Year honors. In total, his record for his 4- and 5-year-old seasons was 11-6-3-1.

Gun Runner races for the partnership of two prominent industry players: Winchell Thoroughbreds, which campaigned and holds an interest in leading sire Tapit, and Three Chimneys Farm, under the leadership of the Brazilian Borges-Torrealba family, which acquired a controlling interest from farm founder Robert Clay in 2013. The colt races in the Winchell colors and eventually will stand at Three Chimneys. First, however, he has big targets for the rest of the season.

“It’s very sportsmanlike of Mr. Torrealba to run a horse like this as a 4-year-old,” Asmussen said.

Blame gets classic winner

Eclipse Award champion Blame, standing at historic Claiborne Farm in Kentucky, has flirted with progeny victories in major Grade 1 events, as one might expect. Blameitonthelaw was third behind champion Nyquist in the 2015 Del Mar Futurity, and Going for Broke was second to champion Songbird in the 2016 Alabama Stakes. But Blame’s first Grade/Group 1 winner came in a classic on turf in France, as Senga scored in the Prix de Diane, or French Oaks, over the weekend.

Blame, a Grade 2 winner on Polytrack who never raced on turf, has 11 stakes winners, seven on turf. Senga is joined by Grade 3 winner Onus, a multiple course record setter, as well as stakes winners Exaggerated, Firsthand Report, Nobody’s Fault, Queen Caroline, and Sweet Victory. The stallion’s dirt runners are led by graded winners Far From Over and March.

Blame has lived up to a versatile sire line. Arch is best known for his dirt runners, with champion Blame joined by Grade 1 winners Archarcharch, Hymn Book, and Pine Island. But his standouts also included Canadian Horse of the Year Arravale, a multiple Grade 1 winner on turf, as well as turf Grade/ Group 1 winners Grand Arch, Les Arcs, and Prince Arch.

Arch was one of several maintrack Grade 1 winners for Kris S., a group led by Eclipse Award winners Action This Day and Hollywood Wildcat. But the Roberto stallion’s best runner was two-time Japanese Horse of the Year Symboli Kris S. He also sired Eclipse Award champion turf mare Soaring Softly, Breeders’ Cup Turf winner Prized, Epsom Derby winner Kris Kin, and Grade/Group 1 winners Dr Fong, Kicken Kris, and Whitmore’s Conn.

A first for Shanghai Bobby

Spirit of Shanghai became the first winner for juvenile champion Shanghai Bobby, a well-regarded member of a strong group of freshman sires, when she won a maiden-claiming race Sunday at Santa Anita.

Shanghai Bobby, standing at Coolmore’s Ashford Stud in Kentucky, put together a stellar juvenile campaign in 2012, going unbeaten at distances from 4 1/2 furlongs to 1 1/16 miles and winning three graded stakes – capped by the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile – to earn a divisional Eclipse Award.

He was received extremely well with his first crop of yearlings to come to the sales ring in 2016. All six of his yearlings through the ring at last summer’s select Fasig-Tipton Saratoga sale fetched six-figure prices, led by a $380,000 filly selected by prominent bloodstock agents Alex Solis II and Jason Litt.

Shanghai Bobby then recorded an average price of $113,105 from 38 yearlings sold at the bellwether Keeneland September yearling sale, including a $575,000 colt sold to Mayberry Farm and a $400,000 colt sold to Breeze Easy LLC.

Shanghai Bobby is by the late Harlan’s Holiday, a productive sire of sires. His standout sons include Into Mischief, last year’s leading juvenile sire, and Majesticperfection, the sire of Kentucky Oaks winner Lovely Maria.