D'Amato will rest a few, bring back a few

ARCADIA, Calif. - This is a time of year when leading runners trained by Phil D’Amato are departing the stable for wintertime breaks while others are returning from recent rests.

Since Santa Anita’s winter-spring meeting began on Thursday, D’Amato has won Grade 2 stakes with King of Gosford in Thursday’s Mathis Mile and with Motorious in Saturday’s Joe Hernandez Stakes.

They are bound for 30-day rests soon, while the 2024 stakes winner Iron Man Cal returned to the stable on Sunday after a late autumn vacation, D’Amato said.

Motorious, second in the Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint at Del Mar on Nov. 2, won the fourth stakes of his career in the Hernandez, run at about 6 1/2 furlongs on the hillside turf course. Motorious finished a head in front of Sumter after a stretch duel.

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The Hernandez Stakes was his fifth start of 2024. He will not race again for many months, D’Amato said.

“We’ll turn him out and bring him back for a nice second half of the year campaign, maybe a little before that,” D’Amato said.

The main goal is the BC Turf Sprint at Del Mar on Nov. 1.

Motorious, who races for Anthony Fanticola, has won stakes ranging in distances from five furlongs in the Grade 3 Green Flash Handicap at Del Mar in 2023 and 2024 and twice at about 6 1/2 furlongs on the hillside turf course.

D’Amato said winning at the two distances can be tricky, even though they are both turf sprints.

“It’s a big difference in terms of race shape,” D’Amato said on Sunday. “It takes a good horse to do both and he’s a really good horse.

“You train them a little differently. At 6 1/2 furlongs, you have to have more foundation for the last furlong and a half.

“He was a little closer to the pace yesterday. The class kicked in and he got the job done.”

Iron Man Cal was second by a neck at 29-1 in the BC Juvenile Turf at Del Mar on Nov. 1 in his last start. D’Amato said Iron Man Cal is likely to return in the spring, with the now-Grade 1 American Turf Stakes at Churchill Downs on May 3 as a goal. The race had a purse of $600,000 in 2024.

The outstanding filly Thought Process, a 3-year-old in 2025, has another month remaining to her vacation. Thought Process won two stakes at a mile on turf at Del Mar and Santa Anita in the late summer and early fall before finishing ninth in the BC Juvenile Fillies Turf at Del Mar on Nov. 1.

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