Santa Anita: Tonito M arrives from Puerto Rico with sights set on Preakness

ARCADIA, Calif. – Can the top 3-year-old from Puerto Rico become a top 3-year-old in the United States? Mickey Gonzalez believes the answer is yes.

Tonito M won six of seven starts in Puerto Rico before Gonzalez purchased him last month. The Rock Hard Ten colt arrived at Santa Anita on Friday to prepare for a U.S. campaign. He jogged twice over the weekend and was scheduled to begin galloping Tuesday for his new trainer, Jerry Hollendorfer.

“Mickey bought him because he thinks he was the best horse in Puerto Rico, and his record would indicate that,” Hollendorfer said. “We’re going to look at him, start breezing him, and see if we can find a race for him.”

Bred in Kentucky and sold as a yearling at Keeneland for $12,000 in September 2012, Tonito M began his racing career last July at Camarero in Puerto Rico. He quickly made a splash for trainer Ramon Morales and Abar Racing.

Tonito M won his debut by seven lengths, followed by Grade 3 and Grade 2 wins, before losing an allowance. His next three starts were wins in a Grade 1, an allowance, and a Grade 3 that he won by more than 11 lengths Feb. 16. All seven starts were against small fields at Camarero, and his last four races were routes.

Gonzalez, an insurance entrepreneur whose stable is called M Racing, purchased Tonito M after his most recent win.

“He reminded me of Mister Frisky and Bold Forbes,” Gonzalez said this week by phone. Bold Forbes won the 1976 Kentucky Derby, and Mister Frisky won the 1990 Santa Anita Derby. Both horses began their careers in Puerto Rico.

The Kentucky Derby is a reach for Tonito M, but the second jewel of the Triple Crown is in play.

“I know we are a little bit late,” Gonzalez said. “My idea was the Arkansas Derby [on April 12], but the decision will be in Jerry’s hands. If that did not happen, we plan to race him in the Illinois Derby [on April 19 at Hawthorne], then the Preakness.”

Tonito M was not an original nominee to the Triple Crown; the $6,000 late-nomination deadline is Saturday.

Gonzalez declined to say how much he paid for Tonito M, though the figure is believed to be in the middle six figures. The best horse previously owned by Gonzalez is Who’s Up, winner of the Grade 3 Generous Stakes in 2009 at Hollywood Park.

Tonito M is a long-bodied bay with a forehead strip. Hollendorfer, whose 2013 champion juvenile, Shared Belief, is off the Derby trail, described Tonito M: “He has a nice, big frame. We would like to put just a little more weight on him.”