Dunbar Road wins her prep race for Mother Goose with authority

ELMONT, N.Y. – Dunbar Road set herself up for the Grade 2 Mother Goose Stakes on June 29 with a useful, 5 1/2-length allowance win Thursday at Belmont Park.

The heavy favorite at 1-5, Dunbar Road, under Jose Ortiz, was within a length of the pacesetting duo of Private Beach and No Hayne No Gayne, was kept wide to avoid kickback, and took over at the head of the lane before drawing off to win convincingly. Dunbar Road, a daughter of Quality Road owned by Peter Brant and trained by Chad Brown, covered 1 1/16 miles in 1:43.57 and earned a 90 Beyer Speed Figure. She returned $2.70. The Brown-trained South of the Shore got up for second.

Dunbar Road was making her first start since she finished second in the Grade 2 Gulfstream Park Oaks nearly nine weeks ago. She had been entered in the Kentucky Oaks at Churchill Downs but was left on the also-eligible list and ultimately scratched. After briefly considering running in the Black-Eyed Susan, that plan was scrapped in favor of the Mother Goose, preceded by this allowance race. The Mother Goose, like this race, is run at 1 1/16 miles around one turn.

“It’s the conservative way. Didn’t have to ship her. It’s only her third start. If she’s that good, she’ll have time to prove it,” Brant said. “Chad wanted to run her in the Oaks, and she didn’t get in; it was a rough day there with the weather, so we might have been fortunate.”

About Thursday’s performance, Brant said, “She won pretty easy; she did everything right.”

Brant said he doesn’t see any distance limitations for Dunbar Road and hopes that after the Mother Goose, races like the Coaching Club American Oaks and/or the Alabama – two Grade 1 races for 3-year-old fillies at Saratoga this summer – could be in her future.

“It’d be nice,” Brant said.