King's Plate 2024: Conrads sending two stakes winners
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ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Manfred and Penny Conrad are no strangers to racing success, having won the 2018 Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint with longshot Shamrock Rose about five years after diving into the sport with Mark Casse as their trainer.
The Conrads own two prime contenders for the $1 million King’s Plate on Aug. 17 at Woodbine, Essex Serpent and Midnight Mascot. The duo ran first and third in the Grade 3 Marine on June 29, with Essex Serpent prevailing with a big 89 Beyer Speed Figure in just his third career start and first race around two turns.
Midnight Mascot won the Woodstock Stakes in his season opener before ending up third behind stablemate My Boy Prince in the King Corrie Stakes. He had a fast pace to close behind while taking the overland route in the 1 1/16-mile Marine, in which Essex Serpent rode a speed bias to a one-length score over shipper Cameo Performance, who returned to win the $250,000 Kentucky Downs Preview Nashville Derby at Ellis Park.
Essex Serpent and Midnight Mascot breezed five-eighths in 1:01 together last Sunday, with Essex Serpent, an Honor Code gelding, going slightly best under Patrick Husbands, who won last year’s King’s Plate on Paramount Prince. Kazushi Kimura has the King’s Plate mount on Midnight Mascot, a son of Army Mule.
The handsome bay Essex Serpent is a homebred, and Midnight Mascot, who is out of a full sister to 2013 Plate winner Midnight Aria, was a $200,000 Keeneland September yearling buy. Penny Conrad said she won’t be rooting for one over the other in the King’s Plate.
“We’re very excited to have two in the race,” she said. “It’s quite something. I have no preference. It’s just an honor to have two in the race. It’s exciting.”
The Conrads live about an hour west of Toronto near Waterloo, Ontario. Originally from Germany, Manfred came to Canada in 1963 and built a prominent property development business called The Cora Group. Penny emmigrated from England in the 1960s.
Known for their philanthropy, the Conrads have donated millions in support of various institutions and initiatives. Manfred was inducted into the Waterloo Region Entrepreneur Hall of Fame in 2015.
Shamrock Rose, the 2018 Eclipse Award-winning champion female sprinter, was sold by the Conrads for $2.5 million at the 2019 Fasig-Tipton Kentucky fall mixed sale. They also have raced stakes winners Aubrieta, Jennifer Lynnette, Listenlindalisten, Muskoka Gold, Muskoka Wonder, and Theogony. In 2017, they campaigned Florida Derby runner-up State of Honor, who finished 19th in the Kentucky Derby and eighth in the Queen’s Plate.
Casse loaded for King’s Plate
Casse sends out probable King’s Plate favorite My Boy Prince for Gary Barber, who won his first Sovereign Award as Canada’s outstanding owner last year. Casse and Barber have combined to win the Plate three times – with Lexie Lou in 2014, Wonder Gadot in 2018, and with Paramount Prince last year with Michael Langlois as co-owner.
My Boy Prince will try to become the first Canadian champion 2-year-old to win the Plate since Edenwold in 2006. The $115,000 sale topper at the 2022 Canadian Premier yearling sale, the son of Cairo Prince had one of the most impressive juvenile campaigns ever by a Woodbine-based runner.
My Boy Prince aired by 14 lengths in the restricted Simcoe Stakes on Tapeta with a 94 Beyer, and was second on turf in the Grade 1 Summer after undergoing a shoe repair in the paddock. He romped in the restricted Cup and Saucer Stakes on turf and was a prominent third in the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf at Del Mar.
My Boy Prince won two seven-furlong stakes with authority in the spring before a workmanlike victory after a tardy start in the nine-furlong Plate Trial, a stakes that was run in a slightly faster clocking than the Woodbine Oaks on the same card.
Attard has another Plate filly
Kevin Attard-trained fillies have fared well in the Plate, and he has Caitlinhergrtness this year. She will try to become the 39th filly to win North America’s oldest annually run race.
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Caitlinhergrtness just missed winning the July 20 Woodbine Oaks, a mere two weeks after landing an allowance on turf in her local debut and first start for Attard. There are four weeks between the Oaks and King’s Plate, which might enable her to run another peak race and not regress.
Fillies receive a five-pound weight break in the King’s Plate from males, who carry 126 pounds. Attard won the 2022 Plate with that year’s Canadian Horse of the Year Moira and saddled Munnyfor Ro to a fourth-place finish in the 2021 Plate. Both were exiting a victory in the Oaks.
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