Around this time last year, I was sick in bed with the flu. It was a weekday and I was working for a horse owner who had a few 3yo fillies that I needed to make sure were nominated to the Kentucky Oaks.
I had submitted the paperwork, but I wasn’t sure it had been received, so I called my friend Ben Huffman, racing secretary for Churchill Downs and Keeneland. I got him on his cell, but he told me to hold on a sec – and then I heard him rooting a horse home from some television feed in the background. The horse won because Ben cheerfully came on the line and, while apologizing, explained that it was a big Allowance race at Gulfstream and he needed the winner – not just in his fantasy racing league, but for the Derby trail.
The horse was Dunkirk. And the little grey with the perfect pedigree would indeed go on to make the starting gate on the first Saturday in May.
We had a similar situation today: the 6th was a massively important Allowance race that could very well have Derby implications.
The winner: Drosselmeyer … a beautifully pedigree’d horse – mom was a multiple graded stakes winner and dad is graded stakes winner and leading sire – who has never been worse than third and broke his maiden at Churchill by 6. Today Drosselmeyer stalked the pace and then drew off to win by nearly 2 lengths as the even-money favorite.
While trainer Bill Mott has to be ecstatic (in his very subdued manner) that his charge continues to progress without seeming to peak this early in the game, the mood is probably a bit more quizzical in the Biancone barn this evening.
There were 2 big touts heading into today’s race and the one that wasn’t Drosselmeyer, was Pulsion. Trainer Patrick Biancone had shipped into south Florida to a) get away from the monster that is Lookin At Lucky, and b) to get the horse onto real dirt. However, the track veterinarian put the kabash on seeing if Biancone’s inclinations were correct, as the horse was a vet scratch this morning.
I was looking forward to seeing the 2 horses meet, as not only have they both shown massive amounts of talent, but they couldn’t be more opposite: Pulsion’s pedigree is an unraced dam and a young stallion with just one sibling who didn’t do much; while, as mentioned above, Drosselmeyer is blue-blood all the way around. They also have show talent in different ways on-track: Pulsion is Grade 1 placed, while Drosselmeyer had yet to step out of Maiden Special Weight company.
It might be a knee-jerk reaction, but for as important as the win was today for Drosselmeyer, the lack of Pulsion’s presence means I might be a bit more suspect of the weight of the win. I really do hope these two meet in the Fountain of Youth because then we’ll be able to get a real feel for what’s going on in south Florida – especially if either trounces Holy Bull winner Winslow Homer.
