Gun Runner's second crop takes flight with three weekend maiden winners

Horse of the Year Gun Runner will get a chance to continue to build on the smashing success of his first crop as his Preakness Stakes winner Early Voting and multiple Grade 1 winner Cyberknife face off in the Grade 1, $1.25 million Travers Stakes on Saturday at Saratoga. His second crop also is beginning to light up the board.

Gun Runner recorded three maiden special weight winners from his crop of 2-year-olds over the weekend.

Chief among the trio was Echo Again, who lived up to high billing with a 6 3/4-length debut victory Saturday at Saratoga. The colt earned a Beyer Speed Figure of 94, the third-highest by a juvenile this season.

“We thought he was good, but I’m not sure any of us were expecting the performance he put in,” said David Fiske, racing and bloodstock adviser to owner-breeder Ron Winchell’s Winchell Thoroughbreds. Winchell co-campaigned Gun Runner with Three Chimneys Farm, which stands him in Kentucky.

“That was eye-popping,” Fiske added. “I talked to Ron about three times yesterday, and I told him, ‘I don’t know what you want me to tell you, because I’m speechless.’ ”

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Gun Runner was represented by Saratoga maiden winner Grand Love the following day. Also on Sunday, Counterspy won a maiden at Ellis Park.

Typically, young stallions are strongly supported in their first season, as their farms and supporters look to give them the best start at stud possible. But they may struggle to attract strong support in their second, third, and fourth seasons as farms look to support their next incoming stallions and breeders wait on the results of the first foals on the racetrack.

But that has not been the case with Gun Runner, with Winchell and Three Chimneys supporting him strongly, leading to success with current 2-year-olds. Echo Again and Counterspy were both bred by Winchell, with Echo Again out of a mare by the family’s other outstanding stallion, Tapit, a cross that has already proven highly successful. Grand Love races as a homebred for Three Chimneys.

There have already been signs that Gun Runner’s upcoming crops will be strong, as well. A colt from his third crop, out of Grade 1 winner Heavenly Love, topped the Fasig-Tipton Saratoga selected yearling sale at $2.3 million when sold to the Coolmore group.

“He’s an exceptional sire,” Coolmore’s M.V. Magnier said. “He is going very, very well.”

Gun Runner is the runaway leader on the North American second-crop sire list, with progeny earnings of $7,897,882. Calumet Farm resident Keen Ice is next at $4,257,288.

In addition to Arkansas Derby and Haskell Invitational winner Cyberknife – the first 3-year-old colt this year to win multiple Grade 1 events – and Preakness winner Early Voting, Gun Runner’s first crop includes Eclipse Award champion 2-year-old filly Echo Zulu, who helped her sire smash the North American freshman earnings record last season; Grade 1 winners Gunite and Taiba; and graded stakes winners Pappacap and Wicked Halo.

Echo Again will search for a fall path to the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile. Meanwhile, Disarm, another impressive Saratoga maiden winner from Gun Runner’s second crop – and out of a Tapit mare – is expected to carry the Winchell colors in the Grade 3 Iroquois Stakes on Sept. 17 at Churchill Downs.

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“They just don’t stop. The mantra from Steve last year when talking to jockeys was, ‘Just don’t give up on them, keep going,’ ” Fiske said. “You kind of see that in some of Gunite’s performances, and the two we’ve run up there this year. They run through the wire and look like they want to go further. They’re an impressive bunch.”

Ghostzapper wins third Plate

Horse of the Year Ghostzapper sired his third winner of the Queen’s Plate, the first leg of the Canadian Triple Crown, on Sunday, as his daughter Moira rolled by seven lengths to remain unbeaten on the season. The filly, who races for X-Men Racing, Madaket Stables, and SF Racing, was bred by Frank Stronach’s Adena Springs, which stands Ghostzapper at Hill ‘n’ Dale in Kentucky in partnership with that operation.

Ghostzapper, who won the 2004 Breeders’ Cup Classic among six graded stakes, raced as a homebred for Stronach, who also bred and campaigned his sire, Awesome Again, winner of the 1997 Queen’s Plate and 1998 Breeders’ Cup Classic.

Ghostzapper is the sire of four Canadian champions to date, led by 2015 Queen’s Plate winner Shaman Ghost, who went on to win the Grade 1 Woodward Stakes in 2016 and Grade 1 Santa Anita Handicap in 2017 and retired with more than $3.8 million in earnings.

Ghostzapper also is the sire of Canadian champion Holy Helena, winner of the 2017 Woodbine Oaks and Queen’s Plate. Moira has now also accomplished that double, winning the two classics by a combined 17 3/4 lengths.