Curlin victory marks Highest Honors as a 3-year-old to watch

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – On April 20, when most of the top 3-year-olds in training were putting in their most serious workouts for the Kentucky Derby, Highest Honors was just getting his career started with a troubled-trip second in a 6 1/2-furlong maiden race at Keeneland.

On Aug. 24, when the top 3-year-olds remaining from the spring gather for the $1.25 million Travers Stakes in Saratoga, Highest Honors figures to be right alongside of them in the starting gate.

Highest Honors earned a shot in the Grade 1 Travers with a professional 1 1/2-length victory in the $100,000 Curlin Stakes over a still-muddy Saratoga main track. Highest Honors, rallying four wide on the far turn under Jose Ortiz, outfinished Endorsed, who was five lengths clear of Looking At Bikinis, the even-money favorite who set the early pace.

Rowayton finished fourth followed by Intrepid Heart. Direct Order was eased. Cairo Cat reared in the paddock and fell on his side and was scratched. Grumps Little Tots and Mo Gotcha were early scratches.

Highest Honors won for the second time in three starts for owner William S. Farish and trainer Chad Brown. His other win came in a one-mile maiden race on June 1 at Belmont.

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Highest Honors gives Farish a second horse in the Travers to go alongside Code of Honor, who won the Dwyer Stakes after getting put up from third to second in the Kentucky Derby.

As Farish tries to do with all his colts, he put Highest Honors through the auction ring at the Fasig-Tipton Saratoga yearling auction in the summer of 2017. The bidding stopped at $750,000, which was below the reserve set for him.

Highest Honors spent the summer of 2018 working at Saratoga, including a bullet work from the gate on Sept. 1. But he needed time thereafter and didn’t show up on the work tab again until February.

“He’s a big, scopey colt, he needed time,” Will Farish Jr. said. “He got there and then had to back off – little baby things. He’s come along nicely.”

Saratoga’s main track was still muddy from the rains that forced the cancellation of the final seven races on Thursday’s card. As Friday’s card wore on, it seemed like the outside was the better part of the track.

Breaking from the outside post in the six-horse field, Ortiz guided Highest Honors into the three path entering the first turn. He was last of six, but only six lengths off the pace after a quarter in 24.23 seconds.

Down the backside, Ortiz kept Highest Honors in the four path, right behind Endorsed, who was third behind pacesetter Looking At Bikinis and Rowayton, who was stalking from second, through a half-mile in 49.36 seconds.

Around the far turn, Rowayton tackled Looking At Bikinis while Endorsed was rallying three wide and Highest Honors was advancing four wide.

Endorsed, under Joe Bravo, had a short lead in upper stretch, but Highest Honors, widest of all in the lane, moved to the lead at the eighth pole and outfinished Endorsed to get the victory.

Highest Honors, a son of Tapit, covered the 1 1/8 miles in 1:52.27 over the muddy track and returned $10.20 as the third choice.

“The track is good outside, I got three horses lined up in front of me, let me make the one move and hopefully it works out and it did,” Ortiz said. “He was very professional, took dirt.”

Regarding the tussle with Endorsed, Ortiz said, “I think mine wanted the distance, which was probably the difference today.”

Brown said the Travers was in his thoughts for Highest Honors for awhile and was happy to see the colt earn his way there with this performance.

“I know he lacks some experience and some seasoning – he doesn’t have a big body of work underneath him – but I always thought he was talented enough to get here and thankfully Mr. Farish and the team was patient and gave the horse back to me after having a few problems as a 2-year-old,” Brown said. “He just needed some time. The horse is perfect now.”

Brown was a little disappointed that Looking At Bikinis couldn’t finish off the race after setting modest fractions on the lead. He may have been compromised by being on the inside part of the track under Javier Castellano.

“It looked like he was trying to come back there towards the end and he showed a lot of courage to be third,” Brown said. “I’m not going to totally eliminate him from consideration for a race like the Travers if I see something in the morning on a dry track that gives me a strong feeling that he was really compromised in this race somehow.”

Trainer Kiaran McLaughlin was pleased with Endorsed’s performance and said he would consider either the Travers or the H. Allen Jerkens, a seven-furlong race, on the same Aug. 24 card.