Secret Love upsets Franklin Square for first stakes win
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Secret Love improves to 2-for-3 with upset victory in Franklin Square. Chelsea Durand/NYRA Photo.
By Melissa Bauer-Herzog
Nedlaw Stable’s and Tobey Morton’s Secret Love took her record to two wins in three starts Saturday with an easy upset win in the $100,000 Franklin Square Stakes at Aqueduct.
Secret Love, a $270,000 OBS July 2-year-old sale graduate, led home a 1-3 finish for her sire Not This Time and punished bettors who disregarded her as the longest shot on the board in the 6 1/2-furlong stakes for New York-bred 3-year-old fillies. Pablo Morales rode the 13-1 upsetter in the field of five for trainer John Kimmel, but it wasn’t a cakewalk to get to this target.
Secret Love stormed home to win on debut by 6 1/4 lengths late September at Belmont Park but a setback forced her to sit out all the fall races. Returning in an allowance-optional claimer race in late December at Aqueduct, she finished second to Rossa Veloce in a defeat she would avenge in the Franklin Square.
“The filly broke her maiden very impressively but she lost a shoe and grabbed her quarter and that’s why she missed the next 90 days,” Kimmel said. “We came back and ran her in an ‘a-other-than’ off a long layoff and she needed that race. She had a couple breezes after that race and was breezing extremely well and outworking [stakes-placed] Frost Me.”
Secret Love looked ready to run in the Franklin Square and applied pressure on her rival Rossa Veloce quickly after they broke from the gate. Morales looked comfortable on his mount throughout as she galloped through early fractions of :22.76 and :46.68. The middle of the race looked very familiar to all who watched the December allowance with Secret Love shadowing Rossa Veloce just as she’d done before.
Drawing even with the leader as they left the turn, Morales asked her to go by and she obliged with a little more than a furlong to run. Secret Love pulled away to win by 1 1/2 lengths in a time of 1:19.86 with 3-5 favorite Laobanonaprayer and 8-5 second choice Vacay passing the pacesetter late to finish second and third.
“She came to run,” Morales said. “They gave me a lot of confidence in her. They told me to have her forwardly placed because they thought she was going to run big. I pretty much followed instructions and came out of there running. Once [Rossa Veloce] made the lead, I just sat second the whole way around there. She gave me a nice kick down the lane and I thought it was good enough to win and she sure did.”
With a stakes win under her belt, Secret Love is set to take on stablemate Frost Me in more than just a breeze. Kimmel indicated that the Maddie May Feb. 20 is a likely target for both fillies.
Secret Love was co-bred by Sequel Stallions NY and Stonestreet Thoroughbred Holdings and is a granddaughter of three-time Group 1 winner Exotic Wood. The filly’s A.P. Indy dam was purchased by Sequel New York for $17,000 at the 2018 Keeneland January horses of all ages while carrying Secret Love.
A 15-year-old mare, Exotic Design has produced four winners from six to run and is a full sister to stakes winner and Grade 3-placed Key To Power. This has proved to be a productive family with Exotic Wood’s daughters and granddaughters producing six stakes performers.
Exotic Design’s New York-bred 2-year-old colt is by Sequel Stallions NY and Stonestreet Thoroughbreds’ Union Jackson with her yearling colt by that same stallion. The mating has proven popular for the partnership with Exotic Design back to foal to Union Jackson for her 2021 foal.
Endnotes:- [Image]: https://www.nytbreeders.org/news/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/SecretLove-NYTB.jpg
Source URL: https://www.nytbreeders.org/news/2021/01/16/secret-love-upsets-franklin-square-for-first-stakes-win/
Tiz the Law among Eclipse Award finalists
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Tiz the Law, finalist for champion 3-year-old male honors, rolls to victory in the 2020 Belmont Stakes. NYRA/Elsa Lorieul Photo.
By Tom Law
Sackatoga Stable’s Tiz the Law earned an Eclipse Award nod in the 3-year-old male category after a 2020 season highlighted by his Belmont Stakes victory and two other Grade 1 triumphs.
Breeders’ Cup Classic and Kentucky Derby winner Authentic and Arkansas Derby winner Nadal join Tiz the Law in the 3-year-old male division.
The Eclipse Awards are determined by a vote of the National Turf Writers And Broadcasters, National Thoroughbred Racing Association and Daily Racing Form. Of the 249 eligible voters, 238 took part in the voting. Finalists are determined in each category by voters’ top three selections, using a 10-5-1 point system. The Eclipse Award winners are determined solely by first-place votes.
The winners in the 17 equine and human categories will be announced during a virtual ceremony of the 50th Eclipse Awards, presented by Spendthrift Farm, on TVG and other outlets at 8 p.m. ET Thursday, Jan. 28.
After a 2-year-old campaign that included a victory in the Grade 1 Champagne, Tiz the Law won four of six starts in 2020 with a second in the Kentucky Derby. He started the season with a win in the Grade 3 Holy Bull Stakes before a victory in the Grade 1 Florida Derby in late March, both at Gulfstream Park.
The coronavirus pandemic altered the Triple Crown and Tiz the Law opened the series with a victory in the Belmont Stakes June 20 at Belmont Park. Tiz the Law’s victory completed a career sweep of the spring classics for Sackatoga Stable and trainer Barclay Tagg, who teamed to win the Derby and Preakness Stakes in 2003 with Eclipse Award winner Funny Cide.
Tiz the Law added another Grade 1 victory and improved to 4-for-4 less than two months later in Saratoga’s Travers Stakes. He finished the season with a second in the Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs and a sixth in the Breeders’ Cup Classic at Keeneland.
Bred by Twin Creeks Farm and out of the Tiznow mare Tizfiz, Tiz the Law sold for $110,000 to Sackatoga Stables’ Jack Knowlton at the 2018 Fasig-Tipton Saratoga New York-bred yearling sale. He won six of nine and $2,735,300 before being retired in January.
Tiz the Law, who earned New York-bred Horse of the Year and champion 2-year-old male titles in 2019, will stand his first season for $40,000 at Coolmore America’s Ashford Stud in Versailles, Ky.
The 2020 Eclipse Awards finalists (in alphabetical order) are:
Horse of the Year: Authentic, Improbable, Monomoy Girl
Two-Year-Old Male: Essential Quality, Fire At Will, Jackie’s Warrior
Two-Year-Old Filly: Aunt Pearl (IRE), Dayoutoftheoffice, Vequist
Three-Year-Old Male: Authentic, Nadal, Tiz the Law
Three-Year-Old Filly: Gamine, Shedaresthedevil, Swiss Skydiver
Older Dirt Male: Improbable, Maximum Security, Vekoma
Older Dirt Female: Midnight Bisou, Monomoy Girl, Serengeti Empress
Male Sprinter: Vekoma, Volatile, Whitmore
Female Sprinter: Gamine, Glass Slippers (GB), Serengeti Empress
Male Turf Horse: Channel Maker, Order of Australia (IRE), Zulu Alpha
Female Turf Horse: Audarya (FR), Rushing Fall, Tarnawa (IRE)
Steeplechase Horse: Moscato (GB), Rashaan (IRE), Snap Decision
Owner: Godolphin LLC; Klaravich Stables Inc.; Spendthrift Farm LLC, MyRaceHorse Stable, Madaket Stables LLC, and Starlight Racing
Breeder: Peter E. Blum Thoroughbreds LLC, Calumet Farm, WinStar Farm LLC
Trainer: Steve Asmussen, Bob Baffert, Brad Cox
Jockey: Irad Ortiz, Jr., Joel Rosario, John Velazquez
Apprentice Jockey: Luis Cardenas, Yarmarie Correa, Alexander Crispin
Endnotes:- [Image]: https://www.nytbreeders.org/news/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/tiz-the-law-the-belmont-stakes-credit-elsa-lorieul.jpg
Source URL: https://www.nytbreeders.org/news/2021/01/16/tiz-the-law-among-eclipse-award-finalists/
Killybegs Captain retired to Mill Creek Farm
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Killybegs Captain wins the 2019 Frank J. DeFrancis Memorial Dash at Laurel. Jim McCue/Maryland Jockey Club Photo.
Graded stakes winner Killybegs Captain was retired this month and will enter stud in 2021 at Anne Morgan’s and Tim Little’s Mill Creek Farm in Stillwater. The 7-year-old son of Mizzen Mast out of the Holy Bull mare Al Maha will stand his initial season for $2,500 live foal/stands and nurses.
Campaigned by Curragh Racing and trained by John Terranova, Killybegs Captain won seven of 27 starts with five seconds and three thirds for $572,453 in earnings. A $75,000 purchase at the 2016 OBS April 2-year-olds in training sale, Killybegs Captain was a winner at 3, 4, 5 and 6 and rose from the allowance ranks to become a stakes winner in his last two seasons.
Killybegs Captain scored his biggest victory in the Grade 3 Frank J. De Francis Memorial Dash at Laurel Park in 2019, defeating a field that included He Hate Me and New York Central in 1:08.10 for 6 furlongs.
Third in the Grade 2 John A. Nerud Stakes at Belmont Park and Grade 1 Forego Stakes at Saratoga Race Course in 2019, Killybegs Captain also won back-to-back editions of the Pelican Stakes at Tampa Bay Downs in 2019 and 2020. He defeated multiple Grade 1 winner Imperial Hint in the 2019 edition of the Pelican, winning the 6-furlong stakes in 1:09.66.
Bred by H. Allen Poindexter, Killybegs Captain is the sixth foal out of Al Maha, a half sister to stakes winner Find the Treasure and the dam of multiple graded stakes winner Pontchatrain from the family of Grade 1 winner Past Forgetting and Grade 2 winner and sire Concerto.
Killybegs Captain is one of six winners out of Al Maha, who is also the dam of a now 2-year-old unnamed filly by Cross Traffic purchased for $50,000 by Tonja Terranova, agent for Curragh Racing at last year’s Keeneland September yearling sale.
“He was a beautiful horse – sound horse – he retired sound,” Tonja Terranova, assistant to her husband, told Daily Racing Form. “He beat Imperial Hint, he was third to Mitole. He was just a solid racehorse; ran short, ran long.”
Endnotes:- [Image]: https://www.nytbreeders.org/news/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/Killybegs-Captain-NYTB.jpg
Source URL: https://www.nytbreeders.org/news/2021/01/16/killybegs-captain-retired-to-mill-creek-farm/