Hawthorne notes: Last Gunfighter earns his rest

STICKNEY, Ill. – This time, Last Gunfighter really is getting a break. And after the 13-month run the 4-year-old has put together, a winter rest has been well earned.

Last Gunfighter originally was scheduled to go to owner-breeder John Gunther’s Glennwood Farm in Versailles, Ky., after finishing a rallying fifth in the Breeders’ Cup Classic. But trainer Chad Brown, well pleased with Last Gunfighter’s condition coming out of the BC Classic, advised one final run in the Hawthorne Gold Cup, and Last Gunfighter came through early Saturday evening at Hawthorne, winning the Gold Cup by a length. The win was Last Gunfighter’s eighth in his past 11 starts and pushed his career bankroll over $1 million, to $1,025,405.

“We were going to give him a break, but Chad’s very good at assessing horses,” said Tanya Gunther. “He wouldn’t have run him if he didn’t think the horse was up to it.”

Tanya Gunther is John Gunther’s daughter and is actively involved in the family horse business. So active, in fact, that she broke Last Gunfighter herself as a yearling at Glennwood in 2010.

“I’ve been breaking and riding them the last several years,” she said. “I love it, even though I get turfed once in awhile. In fact, I did come off [Last Gunfighter] once in the field. He tripped and almost went down. It wasn’t his fault.”

Last Gunfighter hasn’t made many missteps since he moved into Brown’s barn in the second half of 2012 following an extended layoff. A son of First Samurai – whom Gunther bred, owned, and eventually sold – Last Gunfighter raced four times as an early-season 3-year-old, failing to win but displaying talent his connections had seen from the start. Racing for Brown starting in October 2012, Last Gunfighter won six races in a row, moving from maiden to stakes horse in a matter of starts, his win streak coming to an end with a second-place finish behind Flat Out in the Suburban in July at Belmont.

Rallying from mid-pack behind Alpha’s slow Gold Cup pace Saturday, Last Gunfighter showed off the qualities that have produced his excellent run the last year: a long, sustained run, the ability to see out a true distance of ground, and tenacity when challenged in the stretch. He clocked just 2:06.11 for 1 1/4 miles on a fast track, but the Hawthorne surface was slow-playing Saturday, and the raw time produced a Beyer Speed Figure of 100.

“He doesn’t have a super-quick turn of foot, but he always tries down the stretch, and most of the time he’s got there, except in the Grade 1’s,” said Gunther.

With Last Gunfighter still relatively lightly raced and just about to turn 5, there could easily be a Grade 1 with his name on it somewhere in 2014. Gunther said there’s no established timetable for returning Last Gunfighter to the track.

“We’ll see how the weather goes,” she said. “I know Chad would like to have him down at Palm Meadows as soon as possible.”

Geier heads to Fair Grounds

Trainer Greg Geier’s two Gold Cup starters, third-place Street Spice and sixth-place Fordubai, both came out of the race in good condition, Geier said Monday. Geier will head to his winter quarters at Fair Grounds on Wednesday, and three of his eight-horse string are talented older dirt-route horses.

Afford, a high-end allowance race winner here last week, will target the Dec. 21 Tenacious Handicap in New Orleans, while some combination of Street Spice and Fordubai will be pointed to the Louisiana Handicap on Jan. 18. All three horses are owned and were bred by Jim Tafel.