Fortissimo, Superwolf rematched in Tall Stack
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Belterra Park will run the first stakes race of its slightly delayed meet this Friday, when six Ohio-bred 3-year-olds line up to sprint 6 1/2 furlongs in the $75,000 Daryl E. Parker Memorial Tall Stack Stakes. The race features a rematch between Fortissimo, the champion Ohio-bred 2-year-old male of last season, and Superwolf, the only horse to beat him.
Fortissimo, who races for the partnership of Ohio trainer and breeder Tim Hamm’s Blazing Meadows Farm and Kentucky-based WinStar Farm, won his first four starts last year, including sprint victories in the Hoover Stakes and Cleveland Kindergarten. Boots Malone, second in the Hoover and third in the Kindergarten behind Fortissimo and Superwolf, also returns in the Tall Stack.
Fortissimo’s only loss came in the Best of Ohio Juvenile at 1 1/16 miles last October when he made an early bid to go by pacesetting Superwolf before winding up third behind that foe and Ed’s Reward, another Tall Stack entrant.
Fortissimo, who was gelded in March, cuts back to one turn for his season debut. He has worked sharply, with three consecutive bullet works, including one from the gate.
Best of Ohio Juvenile winner Superwolf has a recency edge in the rematch for Robert and Marion Gorham. He finished second to Boots Malone, who was much the best, when the pair took on older horses in an allowance race in March. Superwolf then turned the tables on Boots Malone for a victory in the Howard B. Noonan Stakes, at six furlongs, on April 3 at Mahoning Valley, suggesting that distance wasn’t the only thing he needed to beat Fortissimo.
Belterra conducted its first day of racing last Saturday – two days later than originally scheduled, with massive cleanup efforts resulting in the delay. Historic rains in Kentucky and Ohio in early April resulted in severe flooding of the Ohio River, immediately adjacent to the track. When the floodwaters receded, images shared by horsemen showed a good deal of debris on the track. In addition to those cleanup and maintenance efforts for safe training and racing, the opening of the stable area was delayed several weeks, as the barns needed to be disinfected post-flood.
Belterra’s meet, which generally hosts racing on a Wednesday-through-Saturday basis, runs through the fall. The Tall Stack is the first of 15 stakes on the schedule, all for Ohio-breds. That track will host the first of three Best of Ohio cards that take place across the state’s three Thoroughbred tracks. Belterra is the only one of the tracks to card its showcase races on both dirt and turf.
The program consists of five $100,000 statebred stakes – the Babst/Palacios Memorial for sprinters, the Diana for female sprinters, the Norm Barron Queen City Oaks for 3-year-old fillies on dirt, the Sydney Gendelman for older horses on turf, and the Green Carpet for 3-year-olds on turf.
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