Daily Racing Form National Digital Edition
First BC runners for Pharoah find success at Santa Anita
It didn’t take long for American Pharoah to get off and running as a Breeders’ Cup sire. The Triple Crown winner’s first race with Breeders’ Cup starters resulted in his first winner, as Four Wheel Drive won the Juvenile Turf Sprint. Another colt by American Pharoah, Another Miracle, finished third in the same race, and later in the day Sweet Melania finished third in the Juvenile Fillies Turf, putting all three of the stallion’s starters for the day on the board.
“Everybody’s got such high expectations for him,” Wesley Ward, the trainer of Four Wheel Drive, said of American Pharoah. “To get it done on the big stage like this in the Breeders’ Cup is just unbelievable.”
The strong Breeders’ Cup performance propelled American Pharoah, who stands for the international Coolmore group, clear of his rivals on the earnings list in an outstanding freshman sire class. Through Nov. 3, American Pharoah led the list with progeny earnings of $2,329,408, compared with $1,629,496 for WinStar Farm’s Constitution – whose son Independence Hall won the Grade 3 Nashua Stakes at Aqueduct on Sunday.
Four Wheel Drive is now unbeaten in three career starts, including a victory in the Grade 3 Futurity at Belmont. Ward says that the colt has inherited his sire’s famed easygoing nature, helping him to manage the busy atmosphere surrounding stakes action at various racetracks.
“American Pharoah, from what I saw, was a very docile horse,” Ward said. “He could go anywhere and took everything in and he was almost like a stable pony. And this guy’s the same way. [His owner] came over to the barn, and we brought him out, and you would have thought he was here for the last seven years. He came out, had his head down, and we were petting him, and he dropped his head, and he’s just a wonderful horse and a great demeanor. There’s no pre-race antics that you have to worry about with him.”
Third on the freshman sire list is Palace Malice, who also broke through with a first-crop Breeders’ Cup winner as Structor won the Juvenile Turf. The unbeaten Structor, who won the Grade 3 Pilgrim Stakes, has helped to push his sire’s progeny earnings to $1,396,681.
Belmont Stakes winner Palace Malice, who stands at Three Chimneys, emerged this year as a hidden turf sire, owing to the influence of versatile grandsire Smart Strike, with multiple stakes winners on the surface. However, trainer Chad Brown indicated that he started Structor on the turf in order to start the colt around two turns, and that he may move the colt to the dirt in the future.
“He’s a really true two-turn horse,” Brown said. “I would see in his work that hustling him off the bit early in some faster works in the morning, he wasn’t really effective. And up at Saratoga, looking to get him started, and if you’re running those short-distance dirt maiden races, they can really come up difficult and fast. So I didn’t want to just run him off his feet and blow him up early . . . I would like to try to get him on the dirt in the spring.
“I have been here before with other horses that have won these juvenile turf races, and I don’t think I’ve ever said I’m going to run one on the dirt,” Brown continued. “So this horse, he gives me the feeling like he’ll take to it, but we’ll see. But we’ll enjoy this.”
Gunthers cap another big year
It would be impossible to top the year the Glennwood Farm of father-daughter team John and Tanya Gunther had in 2018, earning an Eclipse Award after breeding and raising unbeaten Triple Crown winner Justify. But the 2019 Breeders’ Cup proved to be a fine exclamation point to another fine season for the Gunthers. Vino Rosso, whom the family bred, concluded an outstanding season by winning the Breeders’ Cup Classic, and earlier in the day, the farm’s homebred Without Parole finished a creditable third in the Mile.
Vino Rosso, by Curlin and out of the winning Street Cry mare Mythical Bride, was raised alongside Justify at Glennwood. The colt was a $410,000 Keeneland September yearling purchase by Repole Stable and St. Elias Stable. Last year, Vino Rosso won the Grade 2 Wood Memorial before finishing ninth behind Justify in the
Kentucky Derby and fourth in the Belmont Stakes as his former Glennwood stablemate swept the Triple Crown. This year, Vino Rosso has bloomed, with a pair of Grade 1 victories in the Gold Cup at Santa Anita and the Classic. He also crossed the line first in the Grade 1 Jockey Club Gold Cup but was disqualified to second behind Code of Honor.
“Well, John and Tanya Gunther, obviously, are great breeders,” said Mike Repole, who previously purchased multiple Grade 1 winner Stay Thirsty from Glennwood. “And just think, Justify and Vino Rosso, in the same crop, in the same pen, it’s pretty special – a Triple Crown winner and a Classic winner, side by side for the first couple years of their life. It’s pretty special.”
Without Parole, by Frankel and out of the unraced Lemon Drop Kid mare Without You Babe, scored a victory at the Royal Ascot meeting in the Gunthers’ silks last year, winning the Group 1 St. James’s Palace Stakes. Saturday’s Breeders’ Cup Mile marked his first start in more than five months, and first in the U.S. for trainer Chad Brown. The colt rallied from ninth in midstretch to finish third, beaten less than three lengths by victorious Uni.
“Tanya and I talked about it and felt that we should aim toward the Breeders’ Cup and take a shot, which is why we originally shipped him over from [John] Gosden to Chad Brown,” John Gunther said. “We were expecting to run in the Shadwell Mile at Keeneland as a prep, but Chad said he needed a couple more works. He has been working with Bricks and Mortar and has been really impressive. He wouldn’t let him get by in the breezes . . . Chad hopes to run him in the Pegasus [World Cup Turf] in January.”