Search Results cruises to win in Molly Pitcher Stakes

OCEANPORT, N.J. – Search Results made short work of six rivals and cruised to an easy three-length win in the Grade 3, $400,000 Molly Pitcher Stakes on Saturday at Monmouth Park.

It was the third straight graded stakes win on the card for trainer Chad Brown and jockey Flavien Prat, who had already won the Monmouth Cup with Highly Motivated and the Matchmaker with Lemista, and the second for Seth Klarman’s Klaravich Stables, Highly Motivated’s owner.

Highly Motivated looks like a nice, solid older male dirt-route horse. Search Results looks very, very serious.

Second by a neck in the 2021 Kentucky Oaks, Search Results went on to win the Grade 1 Acorn five weeks later, but after a lesser third-place finish in the Test at Saratoga in August, Brown pulled the plug on her 2021 season. Search Results was a big disappointment in her 2022 debut, finishing a distant third in the Grade 3 Distaff, but she has come on like gangbusters. She won the Grade 2 Ruffian by two lengths and in the Grade 1 Ogden Phipps on June 11, Search Results went very, very fast in the early and middle stages, dueling champion Letruska into submission before succumbing to two of the best older fillies in training, Clairiere and Malathaat.

The Phipps was a one-turn 1 1/16-mile race and in the two-turn Molly Pitcher of the same distance, Search Results ran very, very fast again at Monmouth, but this time far more effectively. Breaking from post 3 and stalking the pace of Pennybaker and Beth’s Dream, who got the half-mile in a moderate 47.47, Search Results came with a three-wide burst around the turn to take total command of the Molly Pitcher before the homestretch. She did so by running her third quarter-mile, despite losing ground around the bend, in a wicked 22.94 seconds. Search Results cruised home clocking 1:40.47, less than a half-second off the track record.

Search Results was given a 97 Beyer Speed Figure.

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“Flavien executed things really well – just get out of there and get outside, try to extract her quick. I think she’s tons the best and I don’t want to take any chances. Just park her out on the center of the track and let her do it,” Brown said.

Search Results did it and did it easily. After showing a ton of speed in the Phipps, she melted into Prat’s hands awaiting his command.

“She seemed really push-button. She had some great speed out of the gate, but she can rate, as you can see today,” Prat said. “She seems really handy.”

Search Results, racing for the first time on Lasix, paid $3.20 as the overwhelming favorite. Leader of the Band ran a nice race to nab second by 1 3/4 lengths over Army Wife. Then came Bonny South, Shalimar Gardens, Pennybaker, and Beth’s Dream.

Bred by Machmer Hall, Search Results is a daughter of Flatter and Co Cola, by Candy Ride. She’s now 10-6-1-3 and while Brown said he had no immediate plan for the filly’s next start, she is aimed long term toward the Breeders’ Cup Distaff over 1 1/8 miles. Brown swerved the 1 1/8-mile Shuvee on Sunday at Saratoga in favor of this shorter, softer spot, but only because this race fit better into his long-range plan for the filly.

“She showed she can handle a mile and an eight effectively with a narrow defeat to Malathaat” in the Oaks, Brown said. “I’m not afraid of it.”

Not with a horse who has gotten scary good this summer.