Golden Gate Fields: Outside Nashville overpowers Golden Nugget rivals

Vassar Photography

Outside Nashville pulls away in the stretch of the Golden Nugget under jockey Dennis Carr.

ALBANY, Calif. – Outside Nashville coming off what was arguably the most impressive 2-year-old maiden win of the year in Northern California, wore down favored pacesetter Strong Wind and pulled away in the stretch to win the $55,100 Golden Nugget at Golden Gate Fields on Saturday.

Outside Nashville dueled head and head with Strong Wind, who won the $100,000 Graduation Stakes earlier this summer at Del Mar, through fractions of 22.64 and 45.48 seconds. The pair led Outside Nashville’s Jerry Hollendorfer-trained stablemate Zeewat by three lengths down the backstretch of the six-furlong race.

Outside Nashville, sitting outside Strong Wind, began to edge to the lead as the field turned for home. He was in front by a length at the eighth pole and won the race by 4 1/2 lengths in 1:09.54. Strong Win was three-quarters of a length in front of third-place finisher Zeewat.

"He broke good, and my job was to keep it honest up front,” said winning rider Dennis Carr. “When I hit him, I knew it was going to take something special to run him down because he really dug in and cut. He acts like he’ll be an honest horse.”

Outside Nashville, a son of Broken Vow, was a $115,000 purchase at the March Ocala 2-year-olds in training sale by Hollendorfer, John Carver, and Green Smith. He earned $31,200 for the victory, lifting his lifetime earnings to $56,750. He paid $6 to win.

Hollendorfer was in Los Angeles where he saddled Fury Kapcori, the runner-up in the Real Quiet Stakes that was run 15 minutes before the Golden Nugget.