Walsh wins four consecutive races at Ellis
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A gratifying Friday morning breeze followed an extremely successful Thursday afternoon in the Brendan Walsh stable.
Walsh sent out the winner of the fifth race Thursday at Ellis Park, Irish Law. He also won the sixth race with first-time starting 2-year-old Talleyrand, and made it a rare natural hat trick when Icona captured the seventh.
Walsh was not done. Twirling Aces looked like the nuts in race 8, a first-level dirt-sprint allowance, and won easily at 11-10 to make it four in a row.
Walsh’s stable thinks they won four on a Churchill Downs card at some point in 2022, but there’s no record of it. Walsh did have a three-win day on Sept. 18 at Churchill that year.
“It was a good day, regardless. You think you’re live and you might have no winners,” Walsh said.
While 3-year-old filly Twirling Aces ran the best race of Walsh’s winners Thursday, her second impressive victory in as many starts, Talleyrand could be a horse to watch this summer.
By Into Mischief, the colt is out of Pretty City Dancer, dam of Kentucky Oaks winner Pretty Mischievous and two-time Grade 2 winner Bella Ballerina. After making a midstretch lead Thursday, Talleyrand stuck his feet in the ground and started looking around, paying attention to everything except racing. He won anyway, and though the margin of victory was a mere head, Talleyrand quickly galloped out far in front.
“He’s been like that at home, too. He’s got bags of talent. Hopefully, the race will really benefit him,” Walsh said.
Friday morning at Turfway Park, the 4-year-old filly Lush Lips worked an easy three furlongs, her first breeze since April 4. Lush Lips looked like the horse to beat in the Grade 1 Jenny Wiley at Keeneland in April but had to be scratched with an undisclosed issue and just now is ramping back up toward a late-summer and autumn campaign.
Lush Lips has won three in a row, 4 of 5, and is 6-3-0 from her last nine starts. She captured the Grade 1 Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup in October, won the Mrs. Revere in November at Churchill, and on Feb. 24 landed the Grade 3 Honey Fox at Gulfstream Park by 1 3/4 lengths. Second-place Classic Q has since won the Grade 2 Distaff Turf Mile and the Grade 1 Just a Game.
Wednesday at Churchill, Walsh sent East Avenue out to work a half-mile toward the Philip Iselin Stakes on Aug. 15 at Monmouth Park, where in his last start he beat high-class Bishops Bay in the Salvator Mile, earning a career-best 104 Beyer Speed Figure.
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