Burnham Square runs away with Louisville Stakes
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Late last summer, after Burnham Square, winner of the Grade 1 Blue Grass in April, missed by a head in the $2.6 million Nashville Derby, his turf debut, trainer Ian Wilkes immediately said that Burnham Square would race no more as a 3-year-old. His future, Wilkes said, lay on turf. Burnham Square is a gelding, and that future, Wilkes hoped, could extend many years forward. Wilkes even invoked a name – John Henry, one of racing’s great geldings, a Grade-1 winner at age 9.
In April, after Burnham Square had won the 1 1/2-mile Elkhorn at Keeneland by 9 3/4 lengths, stretching out to the distance Wilkes thinks best suits him following a 1 1/16-mile comeback race, Wilkes roughly outlined a 2026 campaign that would culminate in the $2 million Kentucky Cup Turf and the $5 million Breeders’ Cup Turf.
The Australian-born Wilkes trains racehorses – full stop. Used to ride them, for years was the right-hand man for trainer Carl Nafzger. If ever Wilkes engaged in self-promotion or self-regard, if ever he has uttered even a brash word, it has happened out of the public eye – and, most probably, it never has happened at all. So, to hear Wilkes make the John Henry reference, to announce such a demanding race schedule, told you something about Burnham Square.
And Saturday night at Churchill Downs, Burnham Square validated both his Elkhorn and his trainer’s high regard by winning the Grade 3, $200,000 Louisville Stakes by 4 3/4 lengths.
Say what you want about the Louisville competition: Burnham Square went off at odds of 1-5 for a reason. But to watch the horse travel through the three-turn, 1 1/2-mile Louisville under his regular rider Brian Hernandez was to see a horse gaining confidence by the race, utterly professional, his stride sweetened by the move last year from dirt to turf. He responded to every cue Hernandez gave: To march forward from fifth after turning onto the backstretch off the second turn, to go after the two leaders past the three-furlong marker and into the homestretch, and, finally, to blow past that pair at the three-sixteenths marker in upper stretch.
Hernandez never came close to wielding his crop. Twice he threw the reins at Burnham Square, and by the furlong grounds the gelding had opened five lengths. That was it. Hernandez put his hands down and Burnham Square coasted home, his last half-mile in 46.19, his final quarter in 22.84.
“He was well within himself the entire time and traveling well,” Hernandez said. “With a horse like him, you really don’t worry about the time the leaders are going; you just want to get him in a good rhythm. He did just that and responded when I asked him to go.”
Over a course rated “good,” Burnham Square clocked 2:26.80 while paying $2.46 to win. His Beyer Speed Figure came back at 100, down from the lofty 107 he earned in the Elkhorn. Dancin in Da’nile came from fifth of six to finish second, a neck in front of 6-1 second choice Echo Lane.
Wilkes trains Burnham Square for his breeder, Whitham Thoroughbreds. Burnham Square is a son of Liam’s Map and the Scat Daddy mare, Linda, whom Wilkes also trained.
These two Grade 3s in April and May, Wilkes hopes, serve mainly to propel Burnham Square into the heart of his season, focused on 1 1/2-mile races but also including the 1 1/4-mile Arlington Million at Colonial Downs in August.
“Distance is his forte,” Wilkes said. “We’ll work backwards from the Breeders’ Cup Turf and go to Kentucky Downs as well as the Arlington Million.”
It’s an ambitious schedule, for sure. Wilkes has the horse to do it.
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