Schultz says Travers or Pennsylvania Derby likely next for Baby Vino
:quality(75))
Lindsay Schultz and the 3-year-old colt Baby Vino spent three months singularly focused on getting ready for the Grade 1 Haskell Stakes at Monmouth Park, a journey that ended in shocking triumph when the 28-1 longshot gutted it out to win the $1 million race on Saturday. Now, the trainer is posed with a different challenge: Options.
“We had [the Haskell] planned for a while, but his owners have been asking me about every possible race he could run in all along,” Schultz said. “Look, it's good to have options. It's even better to have a horse that fits at this level. It's just pretty special to have a 3-year-old this good.”
There is a difference between achieving a difficult goal and choosing the next, and it is unlikely that Baby Vino ever catches a field quite so unprepared again. When he and jockey Jorge Vargas Jr. shot up the rail to challenge the Preakness winner Napoleon Solo on Saturday, not even Schultz was sure he would have the courage to finish the job. In his only other start against winners in June, he won the $125,000 Pegasus at Monmouth by 10 3/4 lengths, a victory that did not require much fortitude.
“We questioned it, but [in maiden races at Oaklawn Park], he showed that he had courage running, so had we some confidence,” Schultz said.
Napoleon Solo and Paco Lopez tried everything to get the longshot to cower on the rail, but Vargas’s gamble on the inside paid off. Baby Vino showed great courage and edged clear by a half-length, earning a 100 Beyer Speed Figure. The colt, trainer, and jockey all earned their first Grade 1 at once, and conventional wisdom would suggest Baby Vino will be in similar company again soon.
On Sunday afternoon, Schultz said her colt came out of the race in good order, eating in full and recovering well in his stall. She confirmed that the Grade 1 Travers at Saratoga was in consideration next month, as well as the Grade 1 Pennsylvania Derby at Parx Racing in September.
“I'm not sure which one,” Schultz said. “We just have to see how he comes out of it and how much time and what's going to be the best fit for him. But he just ran against very good horses and obviously fit in that company.”
The Haskell also grants Baby Vino an automatic berth in the $7 million Breeders’ Cup Classic at Keeneland in October.
Schultz responded to the proposition with a small laugh.
“We’ll see,” the trainer said.
Trainer Chad Summers came away with plenty of positives for runner-up Napoleon Solo, who took the early lead and fought on well for a clear second. Despite coming up just short of his third Grade 1 victory, the Preakness winner seemed to improve at Monmouth. With two strong efforts in a row, he has firmly put an earlier pair of fifths in the Grade 2 Wood Memorial and Grade 2 Fountain of Youth well behind him.
“We’ve brought ourselves up on consistency,” Summers said. “The fact that the horse ran the way he did as a 2-year-old, winning the [Grade 1 Champagne], won the Preakness, now coming back second in the Haskell, I would hope that people would at least look at him as one of the best horses of the crop right now.”
Summers said Napoleon Solo was on the road back to Saratoga at 8:00 a.m. Sunday, and he intends to nominate for the Travers next month while keeping the Pennsylvania Derby open as another option in September. The colt is a notoriously sharp worker in the morning and went to the Haskell on two months’ rest after winning the Preakness.
Iron Honor, the Preakness runner-up who made a belated rally for third in the Haskell, has now come up just short in back-to-back Grade 1 tries for Chad Brown. Though his colt failed to capitalize on what could have been a prime opportunity, the trainer said he is on a firmer path to Parx than some of his Haskell rivals.
“That was the time to win a race like the Haskell and he couldn’t get it done,” Brown said. “Whether it was the track or not, I'm wondering whatever I do with him going forward — which is likely the Pennsylvania Derby — I might put the blinkers back on him. I'll see how he trains.”
Further Ado, the even-money favorite who stalked well off the rail on the sloppy track before fading to fifth, has not managed to string together back-to-back wins as a 3-year-old. The Brad Cox trainee will “regroup” in Kentucky, where he has earned all four of his career victories.
“It just didn’t look like he was traveling quite as well as he needed to be, and just ran a flat, flat effort to be beaten five or six lengths,” Cox said. “I guess it’s time to regroup. He shipped back home to Churchill today. It’s one of those races, as long as he comes out of it well, I’ll draw a line through it and that’s what I’m hopeful we’ll be doing over the next few days and get him back to the track.
Ocelli, the 10-race maiden who finished third in the Kentucky Derby, seemed to immediately reject the sloppy track at Monmouth and gave way early, finishing last in a 31 3/4-length defeat.
Trainer Whit Beckman can only take away the silver lining that he better understands his colt, who will ship to Saratoga. It is distinctly possible that Ocelli has more options for a next start than any horse in the country, and would be as sensibly entered in a maiden race as he would be in one of the premier 3-year-old stakes.
“We’ve never shied away from [high-level stakes],” Beckman said. “He’s been putting himself in a position that gives us the confidence to keep him running in graded stakes company, rather than in maidens and conditions. We’ll keep everything in play as we move forward, but with this ownership group, if the horse is good, we’re not just going to tuck tail and run.”
Trainer Lou Linder Jr. said the 76-1 longshot Star Sweeper might have been most impacted by the 1 1/8-mile distance, though jockey Luis Rivera Jr. noted that the sloppy track didn’t help.
He may cut back to a mile down the line, but the current plan is to target the $200,000, 1 1/16-mile Smarty Jones at Parx on Aug. 18. That race serves as the local prep for the Pennsylvania Derby, where he could take another swing at high-caliber rivals.
− additional reporting by David Grening
:: Want to learn more about handicapping and wagering? Check out DRF's Handicapping 101 and Wagering 101 pages.