Calder: Reporting Star rewards Pegasus gamble

MIAMI - Trainer Kathleen O’Connell knew going in that Reporting Star was a little overmatched going up against the likes of Verrazano and Itsmyluckyday last Sunday in Monmouth Park’s Grade 3 Pegasus. But with few others options at the time, she decided to make Reporting Star part of the five-horse field and was rewarded in the end when the son of Circular Quay finished second behind the odds-on Verrazano.

Reporting Star, who is owned by O’Connell’s principal client Gil Campbell, shipped to New Jersey following his third-place finish behind the rapidly improved Backseat Memories in the grassy Mambo Meister overnight stakes here on May 12. Reporting Star finished third earlier this winter, also on the turf, to the multiple graded stakes winner Rydilluc in Gulfstream’s Grade 3 Palm Beach.

“I still think he’s way better on turf than dirt, so I shipped him up north because staying in south Florida for the summer really isn’t the best idea with a grass horse,” said O’Connell. “The only reason I went into the Pegasus is because I saw it was coming up a short field, and when you have the opportunity to walk out of your barn over to the paddock to run in a Grade 3 stakes in a five-horse field, sometimes you have to take a shot.”