Master Piece continues Dutrow success with Red Smith win

OZONE PARK, N.Y. — A week after carving a masterpiece at the Breeders’ Cup with White Abarrio, trainer Richard Dutrow Jr. created another one in the Grade 2, $300,000 Red Smith Stakes at Aqueduct.

Master Piece, a horse Dutrow received earlier this summer at the same time he was given White Abarrio, rallied from mid-pack under Jose Lezcano to win Saturday’s Red Smith by a neck over the perennial bridesmaid Soldier Rising. It was another half-length back to Verstappen in third.

Master Piece’s victory capped quite a week for Dutrow, who last Saturday won the $6 million Breeders’ Cup Classic at Santa Anita with White Abarrio and last Sunday’s $150,000 Nashua Stakes for 2-year-olds at Aqueduct with Where’s Chris.

“Unbelievable stuff,” said Dutrow, who watched the race via simulcast.

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Master Piece is owned in part by Mike Iavarone, for whom Dutrow, in 2008, campaigned Kentucky Derby and Preakness winner Big Brown.

“As soon as the horse hit the wire, Rick and I were on the phone,” Iavarone said by phone from Florida. “It’s like the guy hasn’t missed a beat. He comes back and is winning races everywhere. I can’t be happier for him and now happy for us.”

Iavarone added that he felt bad for Saffie Joseph Jr., who was the previous trainer of Master Piece and White Abarrio, but lost those two horses due to circumstances at Churchill Downs that led to him not being able to enter horses there or at NYRA tracks in late spring/early summer.

Iavarone added that Joseph was among the first to send him a congratulatory text after Master Piece won.

Master Piece missed the Grade 1 Manhattan in June and ran second in an allowance race at Belmont on July 4. Master Piece then ran 10th of 11 in the Grade 1 Arlington Million at Colonial Downs.

Dutrow and jockey Jose Lezcano felt the horse didn’t handle the heat.

“When we got him and started him in training he does not like the heat, it’s tough on him,” Dutrow said. “That might be a reason why he ran the way that he did in the race [at Arlington].”

Dutrow had him entered in the Grade 3 Knickerbocker at Aqueduct on Oct. 20 but scratched him from that spot when rained moved that race to the dirt.

In the Red Smith, Lezcano had Master Piece in midpack, about 9 1/2 lengths behind So High and Tide of the Sea who dueled through six furlongs in 1:13.00.

Lezcano had Master Piece on the move around the far turn and turning for home. Verstappen, who was sitting a beautiful trip under Declan Cannon, wrested the lead from So High above the eighth pole. Master Piece hit the front inside the sixteenth pole and was able to hold off the late-running Soldier Rising to get the victory.

Master Piece, a 7-year-old Chilean-bred ridgling by Mastercraftsman, covered the 1 3/8-miles over firm ground in 2:14.56 and returned $23.60 to win.

“I had plenty of horse on the turn, when I really asked him at the quarter pole and made him change leads, he took off like the good horse that he is,” Lezcano said.

Added Dutrow: “He gave him a great ride. He got a good trip, the horse obviously liked the grass course today, likes the cooler weather so he’s got more of a chance to be himself and these things added up to him running a big race.”

Iavarone bought the horse privately last year following an eighth-place finish in the Breeders’ Cup Turf. Master Piece ran seventh in the Pegasus World Cup Turf in January, a race that Iavarone, who owns Master Piece with his wife Jules and several partners, said is on the radar for next January. That $1 million race is scheduled for Jan. 27 at Gulfstream Park.

Meanwhile, Soldier Rising finished second for the fifth time in six tries this year in graded stakes company - including runner-up finishes in four Grade 1s run on this circuit this year. Overall, Solider Rising is 4-10-3 from 21 starts and is 0 for 14 in stakes.

“I like to win,” Christophe Clement, trainer of Soldier Rising. “With the way he’s been running and the way he’s so lazy the first part of the race I might try something different next year, put a pair of blinkers on him in the morning to see.”

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