After a wet and cool Spring in upstate New York, June is heating up on and off the track.
With our (Woodford Racing) horses running from coast to coast, June got started with an impressive win by Hot Springs on June 3rd at Churchill Downs. In his second lifetime start, Hot Springs tracked the early leaders going a mile and a sixteenth on the turf and drew off impressively to win by more than four lengths! Hot Springs is a three year old colt by the exceptional sire Uncle Mo. You can see a video of the race here.
The win by Hot Springs was followed by Engage coming second in the $400,000 Woody Stephens Stakes at Belmont Park on June 9th. The Woody Stephens Stakes was part of the impressive series of stakes races the New York Racing Association assembled on Belmont Day. While Justify winning the Triple Crown on Belmont Day was certainly the highlight, Engage was equally impressive. He raced mid pack while the early leaders set blistering fractions for a seven furlong (7/8th’s of a mile) race. At the top of the stretch jockey Jose Ortiz swung Engage off the rail to go after the leaders. Engage took the lead with a sixteenth of a mile to go but was outfinished by the winner. It was Engage’s first race going seven furlongs and he proved he is one of the top 3 year old sprinters in the country. You can see a video of the race here.
On June 17th Catapult ran second at Santa Anita Park in California going a mile on the turf. It was Catapult’s first race in nine months and he looked very good off the layoff. That race can be seen here. The winner of the race was a multiple graded stakes winner and we look forward to facing him again this Summer as California racing shifts to Del Mar in San Diego.