Brown completes Grade 1 sweep with Bricks and Mortar in Arlington Million

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill.– Arlington always will be the racetrack that chairman emeritus Dick Duchossois built, but on Saturday this was Chad’s house.

Bricks and Mortar raised the roof on an epic day for trainer Chad Brown, cementing his candidacy for Horse of the Year and giving Brown a clean sweep of the trio of Grade 1 races here with a three-quarter-length Arlington Million win.

Bricks and Mortar’s Million followed Valid Point’s impressive score in the Grade 1 Secretariat and Sistercharlie’s dominant performance in the Grade 1 Beverly D. No trainer has swept the three races and only Brown, who won the Million and Beverly D. last year and finished second in the Secretariat, has come close. Brown, adding a luxury weathervane to his edifice, followed the Million by winning the Grade 3 Pucker Up with Cafe Americano.

The Arlington Brown-out didn’t just descend this year. Brown has won the Beverly D. five times in a row now and the Million three years in a row – remarkable.

“I’ve been saying it all week and all day, and I’ll say it again – I love Arlington,” Brown said.

Sistercharlie swung a heavy wrecking ball in her three-length Beverly D. tally, but Bricks and Mortar doesn’t put a lot of real estate between himself and his beaten rivals – but beat them he does.

But for two close third-place finishes during his 3-year-old season – and with better luck he might have won each – Bricks and Mortar would be undefeated in 12 starts. The Million marked his sixth straight win since the horse returned from a year-plus layoff necessitated by a hind-end problem that nearly ended his career, and Bricks and Mortar already has brought home four seven-figure stakes this year. The Million followed victories in the $7 million Pegasus Turf, the $1 million Turf Classic, and the $1 million Manhattan. The Million winner’s share pushed him less than $100,000 away from $5 million in career earnings.

“He’s an exceptional animal, an amazing horse,” said Seth Klarman, whose Klaravich Stable owned Bricks and Mortar with William Lawrence – for now. A deal to send the 5-year-old off to stud in Japan next year was finalized earlier this week. Klaravich and Lawrence will campaign the horse the remainder of this season.

:: Get PPs, Clocker Reports, picks, and more from DRF's Saratoga/Del Mar One-Stop Shop

Bricks and Mortar let nobody down Saturday. Brown said Bricks and Mortar can get hot in the paddock but before the Million he was “cool as a cucumber,” giving Brown added confidence on the walk through the tunnel out onto the racetrack. It was more of the same after the gates opened, Bandua breaking fast and crossing over from his outside post to set the pace.

Irad Ortiz Jr. has ridden Bricks and Mortar his last seven starts and said he has been regularly riding the horse in training the last few months. It was only starting with the Manhattan, Ortiz said, that Bricks and Mortar began fully settling during the early and middle stages of his races. Saturday, he only faintly nodded his head as the field passed the stands the first time before leveling into a comfortable rhythm racing from sixth along the fence. Bandua set a steady tempo, going 24.45, 48.65, and 1:12.94 while chased by Hunting Horn and Catcho en Die, but other than the leader, the ones moving best into the far turn were Magic Wand and Bricks and Mortar.

Ortiz came off the fence past the three-furlong pole around the far turn and toyed with the idea of making a relatively early outside move. When he saw Wayne Lordan on Magic Wand traveling better than anything to the outside, Ortiz pointed Bricks and Mortar toward her tail, came through the opening created when Magic Wand set off after Bandua, and tipped three paths deep after straightening for home.

Bricks and Mortar races low to the ground, a picture of efficiency. He’s like a machine, always firing, and once in the clear it looked inevitable he’d run down the pair in front of him.

“I told the owner I just concentrate on my horse and ride him,” Ortiz said. “He’s so good. Whenever I ask him, he’s there for me every time.”

Magic Wand proved no match for the winner but finished well to get second over a brave Bandua in third. Then came Robert Bruce, Pivoine, Intellogent, Captivating Moon, Hunting Horn, and Catcho En Die. The Great Day was scratched. Winning time for the 1 1/4 miles on a fast-playing firm turf was 1:59.44. Bricks and Mortar paid $3 to win.

It’s unclear what Brown possibly could do for an encore after his Saturday at Arlington. Also murky is what the rest of the year holds for Bricks and Mortar. To date, his sweet spot has been 1 1/8 miles to 1 1/4 miles but there are no North American races worth his participation in that range the rest of the year. Connections surely want to go to the Breeders’ Cup, but the questions are what to do between now and then and whether to aim at the 1 1/2-mile Turf or the Mile.

“It’s a tricky decision with this distance,” Brown said. “I’m going to have think about that, talk to the owner and really observe that horse. I know its protocol to say that after a race, but I don’t think it could ever apply more than with a situation like this. He’s undefeated this year and I don’t want to make a mistake. I don’t want to the one that causes him to lose by picking the wrong race.”

That’s for the future. For now, Brown can contemplate the scope of the turf empire he’s built and a day at Arlington like no one ever has had before.