Gold Phoenix working toward Del Mar Handicap
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When Gold Phoenix won the Grade 3 San Juan Capistrano Stakes at about 1 3/4 miles on turf by five lengths at 2-5 odds at Santa Anita on Sunday, he ran in his longest race, won by his widest margin, and was sent off at the shortest price in his 33rd start.
The victory was the 10th stakes win of a career that began with his lone appearance in Ireland, a win in a maiden race on the all-weather surface at Dundalk Racecourse in Ireland in February 2021. Since a second-place finish in his debut in the United States, in an allowance race on the hillside turf course at Santa Anita in January 2022, Gold Phoenix has been a fixture in trainer Phil D’Amato’s California stable.
The San Juan Capistrano was Gold Phoenix’s second stakes win in four starts this year, preceded by a win in the Grade 3 San Luis Rey Stakes at 1 1/2 miles on turf at Santa Anita in March. Gold Phoenix’s race schedule in the second half of the year will have several familiar stops.
D’Amato said on Wednesday that Gold Phoenix will be considered for the Grade 2 Eddie Read Stakes at 1 1/8 miles on turf at Del Mar on July 26. Gold Phoenix, an 8-year-old Irish-bred, won the 2023 Eddie Read Stakes in 2023 and was seventh the following year.
The Grade 2 Del Mar Handicap at 1 3/8 miles on turf on Aug. 29, a race Gold Phoenix has won a record four times from 2022 to 2025, is the primary objective of the summer.
“He’ll come back and run in the Eddie Read and then the Del Mar Handicap, or we’ll just wait for the Del Mar Handicap,” D’Amato said. “Our main goal is the Del Mar Handicap and that’s his ideal distance. Do I have to run him in the Eddie Read? No.”
Gold Phoenix is scheduled to resume jogging at Santa Anita on Thursday. The gelding’s training and behavior in the coming weeks will largely determine his race schedule.
The same situation occurred after Gold Phoenix finished a troubled seventh in the Grade 1 Old Forester Bourbon Turf Classic at Churchill Downs on May 2. After that race, D’Amato said the Eddie Read would be Gold Phoenix’s next start, but the San Juan Capistrano was on Gold Phoenix’s schedule by the end of May.
“He was kicking up his heels the last couple of weeks,” D’Amato said. “I don’t think I could have kept his feet on the ground until Del Mar.”
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D’Amato said Gold Phoenix displays a strong “energy level” when he is ready to race.
“You can tell when he’s sitting on a big one or ready to run his ‘A’ race,” D’Amato said. “It’s great to know and a good gauge on which race to run him in.”
In the San Juan Capistrano, Gold Phoenix closed from eighth of nine under jockey Hector Berrios to take the lead in early stretch. He led by 1 1/2 lengths with a furlong remaining, an advantage that widened easily in the final sixteenth.
Gold Phoenix has won 12 races and earned $2,437,087. He has started in 26 graded stakes, with all the stakes wins in California.
Courtesy of his victories in the Del Mar Handicap, Gold Phoenix has started in the last four runnings of the Breeders' Cup Turf, finishing 10th of 13 at Keeneland in 2022, fourth at Santa Anita in 2023, fourth at Del Mar in 2024, and fifth at Del Mar last year. In the last two years, Gold Phoenix has been the best-placed American-based runner in the race.
A win in the $300,000 Del Mar Handicap in August would give Gold Phoenix a fees-paid berth to this year’s BC Turf at Keeneland on Oct. 31.
Gold Phoenix has one win in eight starts in Grade 1 races – the 2023 Frank Kilroe Mile on turf at Santa Anita.
The San Juan Capistrano was a Grade 1 as recently as 2003, when the race had a purse of $400,000. In the last decade, the purse has ranged from $100,000 to $125,000. D’Amato has won four of those runnings.
In 2020, the D’Amato-trained Red King won his first stakes in the San Juan Capistrano for a partnership that included Little Red Feather Racing. Gold Phoenix is co-owned by Little Red Feather Racing, Agave Racing, Sterling Stables, and Marsha Naify.
“This race means a lot,” said Billy Koch, a founder and managing partner of Little Red Feather Racing and a lifelong racing fan in California.
Koch is old enough to remember when the San Juan Capistrano drew some of the sport’s leading turf runners and was dominated by Hall of Fame trainer Charles Whittingham, who won the race 14 times, including 12 times from 1970 to 1989.
“I watched the San Juan for all those years with Charlie Whittingham,” he said. “It’s not as big as stature as it was back then, but we still appreciate the history.”
Gold Phoenix could easily add to his total of stakes wins at Del Mar this summer. Another Grade 1 win would be a finer achievement.
“How about the Breeders’ Cup at Keeneland?” Koch said.
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