Belmont Park

First Captain's 3-year-old season ends due to ankle issue

David Grening|Sep 19, 2021

First Captain trains at Saratoga Race Course on July 28

Barbara D. Livingston First Captain, shown training on Thursday morning, won the Grade 3 Dwyer at a mile. The Curlin is for horses who have not won a graded stakes at over a mile.

ELMONT, N.Y. - First Captain, a winner of three of four starts including the Grade 3 Dwyer Stakes, will miss the remainder of his 3-year-old season due to an ankle issue, trainer Shug McGaughey said Sunday.

First Captain was being pointed to Saturday’s Grade 1, $1 million Pennsylvania Derby Stakes at Parx Racing.

McGaughey said that First Captain has “just a little bit of pressure in an ankle. Nothing that even really showed, but I was afraid if I did something with him that maybe it would show.”

First Captain, a son of Curlin owned by a group that includes West Point Thoroughbreds, Bobby Flay, Siena Farm, and Woodford Racing, won his first three starts - all at the Belmont spring/summer meeting - before he finished third in the Curlin Stakes at Saratoga on July 30.

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That result made his connections decide to skip the Travers and focus on the Pennsylvania Derby. McGaughey said First Captain will be sent to a farm in Kentucky for a break.

Meanwhile, entries for the Pennsylvania Derby were to be taken Monday and post positions will be drawn at 2 p.m. Parx plans to livestream the draw on its Facebook page.

The field is expected to include Kentucky Derby 1st- and 3rd-place finishers Medina Spirit and Hot Rod Charlie, as well as Travers runner-up Midnight Bourbon, Keepmeinmind, Americanrevolution, Bourbonic, Fulsome, I Am Redeemed, Speaker’s Corner, and Weyburn.

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