Go Noni Go proving a versatile investment

Go Noni Go is among racing’s newest graded stakes winners, taking last Saturday’s Grade 3 DRF Bets Bourbonette Oaks on Turfway’s Polytrack in decisive fashion. She has come a long way from when she was cataloged for last summer’s Fasig-Tipton Kentucky summer horses of racing age sale. Then only sporting two unplaced efforts in maiden special weights on the dirt, she made few shortlists.

But the day before the sale, Go Noni Go set a competitive hoof on turf for the first time, as owner Kathy Wallace and trainer Michael Sullivan sent the Get Stormy filly out for a maiden special weight at Ellis Park. The result was a 4 1/2-length victory, which caught the eye of Kirk Wycoff, who manages his family’s Three Diamonds Farm. He went to $100,000 to purchase the filly from the Foundations Farm consignment.

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Three Diamonds sent Go Noni Go to Mike Maker, who also trains Grade 1 United Nations winner Bigger Picture for the operation.

Maker admits that though the new addition trained well, the diminutive filly didn’t immediately strike him as a standout when she joined his string in Saratoga last summer.

“Training-wise, she made a great impression; physically, she didn’t make that much of an impression,” Maker said. “She’s a slight filly, she struggles with her weight, but she’s very easy to train and has good energy.”

Go Noni Go began to repay Three Diamonds’s investment by finishing on the board on 3 of her 4 remaining starts as a juvenile, with a win in an allowance-optional event at Gulfstream and a third-place effort in the Kentucky Downs Juvenile Fillies. She finished fifth in the Grade 3 Sweetest Chant Stakes in her 3-year-old debut before proving she could handle Polytrack, too.