Gimme a Nother on target with neck win in Beverly D. Stakes
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As Gimme a Nother ramped up her training this spring toward a 2026 campaign, her trainer, Graham Motion, already had a major summer target in mind, and on Saturday at Colonial Downs Gimme a Nother hit dead center, winning the Grade 2, $500,000 Beverly D.
It did not come easy. Achieve, making her stakes debut, made an easy lead and did not go down without a fight, holding grimly to the end as Gimme a Nother surged outside a very live Somethinabouther and got up by a neck.
Gimme a Nother went 7-7 in South Africa before coming to Motion in America and is now 10-14 because the mare has a nose for the wire. Achieve kicked hard at the head of the homestretch and, with a furlong and a half remaining, Gimme a Nother still had several lengths to find under John Velazquez, but you could literally see her spark to life when the task of running down the leader was set before her – she and Velazquez had it timed to the second.
“Johnny asked me afterward if I was nervous, and yes, I was,” Motion said. “I didn’t think she was going to get there.”
Achieve had a neck on Somethinabouther, who ran well in defeat but lost just a touch of momentum in the final strides while getting home two lengths clear of fourth-place Stellify, the 5-2 second choice. Gimme a Nother ran 1 3/16 miles over firm turf in 1:54.28 and paid $5.20 as the favorite. Venencia, Daisy Flyer, and Storm Miami were scratched.
Achieve, coming off three straight wins and making her stakes debut, popped straight to the lead under Sonny Leon and dictated a slow tempo, going 24.47 and 49.34 while under no pressure. Achieved rolled around the far turn still clear, and no one had come within a length of her as she turned for home, switching leads on cue and accelerating to open up two lengths again. The fourth quarter-mile, 23.62, was easily the race’s quickest and, with Achieve showing no sign of coming back, Gimme a Nother had to go get her, which she finally did, five strides before the wire.
Gimme a Nother now has won three in a row after losing four straight (her only poor performance coming in June 2025 over a soft Saratoga course), ending her 2025 season with a victory in the John Mabee and starting this year with a smart score in the Eatontown at Monmouth Park.
“It takes a little while to adjust when they come over here. I thought at the end of last year she was really coming to herself,” said Motion, who trains Gimme a Nother for Newstead Stables.
Gimme a Nother would have wound up in the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Turf last fall had a splint bone injury not taken her out of training, and now that race, on Oct. 31 at Keeneland, becomes Motion’s autumn goal.
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