Gourmet Dinner, Awesome Feather stay unbeaten

Gourmet Dinner and Awesome Feather kept their records unblemished and hopes alive of sweeping their respective divisions of the Florida Stallion Stakes after registering victories on Saturday in the $100,000 Affirmed and Susan’s Girl stakes at Calder.

The Affirmed and Susan’s Girl were two of six stakes decided on the 13 race Juvenile Showcase program consisting exclusively of 2-year-old races.

Gourmet Dinner won for the third time in as many starts by rallying to a 2 1/2-length decision over the pacesetting Rough’n Royal in the seven-furlong Affirmed. Vee’s Accolade finished third in a field of only five 2-year-old colts and geldings.

Gourmet Dinner, a son of Trippi, is trained by Peter Guylas for owner William Terrill’s Our Sugar Bear Stable. He covered the distance in 1:25.69 over a fast track and paid $3.60 under regular rider Sebastian Madrid.

“It looked like he had a lot to do when he was last down the backstretch, but he’s a good horse and got there,” said Terrill, who also bred Gourmet Dinner along with Ocala Stud. “We’ll stay here for the In Reality, but it’s seven weeks in between races. so we’ll probably nominate him in a race in between and run him if we think he needs to.”

Awesome Feather made it a perfect 4 for 4 in her young career after using similar tactics to wear down and run away from pace setter Cristal Jak en route to an easy four-length tally in the seven furlong Susan’s Girl. Silverest was a distant third in another five horse field.

Awesome Feather ($2.20) is owned by her breeder, Fred Brei’s Jacks or Better Farm, trained by Stanley Gold and was ridden to victory by Jeffrey Sanchez. The same combination swept the open division of the Stallion series a year ago with Jackson Bend. His final time of 1:24.57 was more than a full second faster than Gourmet Dinner ran seven furlongs winning the Affirmed.

“She just does what she has to,” said Brei. “We’ll just train her up to the big one” – the $375,000 My Dear Girl on Oct. 16 – “and then hopefully go on to the Breeders’ Cup.

Other stakes winners on the card included longshot Machisa ($97.60) in the $100,000 Fasig-Tipton Turf Dash, Too Experience ($8.20) in the $100,000 Seacliff, Ayoumilove ($8.60) in the $100,000 Catcharisingstar on turf, and the odds-on Blue Eyed Sweetie ($4.60) in the $100,000 Lindsay Frolic.