Late-bloomer Walkathon brings winning streak into First Lady

LEXINGTON, Ky. – Walkathon was a fine runner earlier in her career, posting a Grade 3 victory in 2022. But this year, she has truly blossomed, with an uptick in her talent following physical development. Cutting a fine picture with dapples rippling over her muscles, Walkathon has won four stakes in 2024 as a 5-year-old, including three straight as she heads to the Grade 1, $750,000 First Lady Stakes for fillies and mares going a mile on the Keeneland turf Saturday.

“She’s definitely gotten stronger this year,” said Ian Wilkes, who has trained the Whitham Thoroughbreds homebred throughout her career. “She’s bigger, more mature – definitely at 5, she is more mature.”

Walkathon is seeking her first career Grade 1 win in the First Lady, and looking to best a mare who seemingly had her number earlier in the year. Chili Flag defeated Walkathon by a neck in the Grade 3 Honey Fox at Gulfstream Park, and then won the Grade 2 Distaff Turf Mile, with Walkathon leading into the lane before fading to fifth on a Churchill Downs course that was on the softer side of good.

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Chili Flag, who won the Grade 1 Just a Game in June at Saratoga, is one of four entrants for Chad Brown, who has won the First Lady a record seven times, including the last six years. The quartet, which this race seemingly goes through, also includes Whitebeam, second in the Just a Game before scoring a repeat win in the Grade 1 Diana, with Chili Flag a non-factor in ninth; defending First Lady winner Gina Romantica, a multiple Grade 1 winner at Keeneland who is winless this year; and multiple graded stakes winner Fluffy Socks.

Walkathon began the year with a win in the Grade 3 Endeavour at Tampa Bay Downs before the narrow loss in the Honey Fox, a fifth in the Grade 1 Jenny Wiley at Keeneland with trouble at the gate, and her fifth in the Distaff Mile. She righted the ship by winning the Anchorage Overnight at Churchill and the Kentucky Downs Preview Ladies Turf Mile at Ellis Park. Most recently, she cruised by three lengths in her preferred position on the lead in the Grade 3 Kentucky Downs Ladies Turf, pushing her earnings past $1.6 million.

“She’s like an Energizer bunny – very happy,” Wilkes said of the mare’s training since.

Walkathon’s non-factor effort when in the Jenny Wiley can be explained by a flat-footed break, which led to an evenly placed fifth-place finish. The winner, Beaute Cachee, was unchallenged on the front end.

“She wasn’t good in the gate that day,” Wilkes said. “She just didn’t break good, and there was no pace. It was a merry-go-round.”

Wilkes noted that Walkathon has caught a “pretty salty” field in the First Lady, which contains a good amount of speed, including two others coming off front-running stakes wins at Kentucky Downs – Ag Bullet and Safeen. Ag Bullet scored her third stakes win of the year in the Grade 2 Ladies Turf Sprint, a race at 6 1/2 furlongs. Safeen is coming off a win in the One Dreamer at a mile and 70 yards, in which she just held on by a head.

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Wilkes said that after breaking well, the key for Walkathon in this race will be for Brian Hernandez Jr., the mare’s regular rider since May, to read the pace scenario.

“That’s where you leave it to Brian,” he said. “You can’t get too caught up in a speed duel – or, if no one goes, we’re there. You’ve got to read it.”

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