Pinch Hit scores in Mari Hulman George Stakes

One race after her older half-brother Pitch Count won, Pinch Hit stepped up to the plate and won the $100,000 Mari Hulman George Stakes on Saturday evening at Indiana Grand.

Awestruck set a slow pace, going her opening quarter in a dawdling 25.12 and a half in 49.36 with Julien Leparoux and Pinch Hit spying her from second. Easy splits or not, Awestruck couldn’t open daylight on Pinch Hit on the far turn and was confronted by her pace-pressing rival at the quarter pole. The two ran in tandem past the eighth pole and to the sixteenth pole before Pinch Hit, running outside Awestruck, edged clear to win by about a neck. Dutch Parrot came late to nab third.

Pinch Hit, off six furlongs in 1:12.79 and a mile in 1:37.87, was timed in 1:43.92 for 1 1/16 miles over a fast track and paid $5.60 to win as the favorite over second-choice Awestruck.

“She stumbled a little out of the gate, but she regrouped nicely,” Leparoux said. “She fought all the way to the wire."

Brad Cox trains Pinch Hit for Klein Racing. The filly, a 4-year-old by Harlan’s Holiday out of Change Up, by Distorted Humor, is owned by Klein Racing and was bred by Bertram Klein and Reklein Stables, the same breeders as Pitch Count, who races for different connections now but was foaled a year before Pinch Hit by Change Up and won for a $25,000 claiming tag about a half-hour before his sister crossed the line.

Pinch Hit, who twice raced for a claiming tag during the spring of 2017, won her second stakes and ran her career mark to 5-3-0 from 13 starts. Owner Richard Klein said the filly would be pointed to the Groupie Doll Stakes at Ellis Park.