Woodbine Mohawk Park: Highland Kismet may have a date with destiny in Goodtimes

In January, when trainer Mark Etsell took over the conditioning of the unraced Highland Kismet, he didn't have any major goals other than to see the son of Father Patrick hopefully make the races. A well-bred homebred from Mary Clark's Highland Thoroughbred Farm, Highland Kismet had reportedly trained down to 2:35 as a juvenile and no further. When Etsell got him, things did not appear that optimistic at the outset.

"He couldn't trot through the turns," said Etsell of what could best be described as a project horse. "We made a lot of changes, mostly with his shoeing."

While Clark had optimistically staked a colt she bred to major races, hoping to cash in on a maternal family that had seen generations under her ownership, Etsell was just trying to progress slowly and hopefully have a horse for the races sometime this spring.

"He trained on a half-mile track as a 2-year-old and we've got a five-eighths mile track. It took some time for him to trot through the turns," said Etsell, who eventually got the colt moving forward and improving his times enough to approach qualifying status.

It wasn't until late April that Etsell would discover what had been in Highland Kismet's bloodlines but had yet to emerge on the racetrack.

"I didn't have much of an idea until I took him to the track (Woodbine Mohawk Park) a week before the qualifier to train him and he went a mile in 2:00 with a last quarter in 28," said Etsell.

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Yet the training mile in and of itself paled in comparison to what would come next and what would follow.

On April 26 Highland Kismet came from 10 lengths off-the-pace through a slow first half to draw off in a 1:58 2/5 mile in a qualifier at Woodbine Mohawk Park, showing off with a final quarter of 26 3/5, something Etsell hadn't seen during training. Perhaps it was the big track that made a difference and the long stretch that allowed Highland Kismet to sprint home quickly, albeit while wearing trotting hopples. For Etsell the hopples were a safety net for a young horse that had been prone to making mistakes. Driver Bob McClure took the lines from Etsell when Highland Kismet debuted on May 2 with a 1:54 4/5 victory from off-the-pace and done quite effortlessly.

On May 23 Highland Kismet made only his second career start and the visual here was just mind-blowing. Despite getting away in eighth and 11 lengths off-the-pace in the opening quarter while starting from the rail position, Highland Kismet was able to get untangled from traffic and explode home to be within a half-length of the winner in a 1:54 3/5 mile. While the final time wasn't a major improvement, Highland Kismet's 26 2/5 final quarter caught the attention of much of the racing world.

"The rail is a tough place to start from at Woodbine (Mohawk Park)," said Etsell. "Bob was just trying to be careful with him leaving. He (McClure) thought he had no chance at the top of the stretch and said he would have moved him sooner if he knew he would get that response."

With a pair of starts, Highland Kismet was more aggressively handled by McClure on May 30, this time around getting the front past the quarter and winning in 1:53 1/5 while never being asked for speed in the late stages. The victory had McClure suggesting to the trainer that perhaps Highland Kismet would not need trotting hopples going forward. That suggestion will stay under wraps for now as Etsell is taking things a week at a time as Highland Kismet moves into stakes competition this Friday in one of two C$30,000 elimination races for the Goodtimes. He'll meet five others and only need to have a top-five finish to reach the final. Etsell, for his part, remains cautiously optimistic.

"I'm taking it one week at a time," Etsell said, while acknowledging that Highland Kismet was staked quite heavily by his owner-breeder. "This could be one of her last chances to have a horse like this, and I guess that's why he's been staked the way she has. I'm not sure if it was up to me that I would have gone in that direction," said Etsell.

Whatever direction may be, Friday is the first stop on the journey as the untested son of Father Patrick, out a Muscle Hill-sired mare, finds out first-hand where exactly he sits with the current sophomore crop. The Goodtimes field includes Winter Soldier (post three), a colt that finished third in last year's Valley Victory and won five times for trainer Tony Alagna. Ontario Sire Stakes winners at age two, Myretirementdreanm (post four) and Griff (post six) surround Highland Kismet at the gate. Griff has already won both of his starts this season against Ontario-sired competition. The Luc Blais-trained Private Access (post two) finished fourth in last year's Breeders Crown final.

Clearly Highland Kismet is taking a rather large jump in class and perhaps that has something to do with Etsell's position. From a pedigree standpoint Highland Kismet certainly fits very nicely with this field and epitomizes his breeder's expectations in the process. His dam Highland Top Hill finished second behind Ariana G in the first heat of the 2017 Kentucky Futurity Filly division at The Red Mile. She too was a homebred and the second foal from Highland Image. Highland Image's first foal was by Muscle Massive, and the move to Muscle Hill was a major investment, indicative of the breeder's confidence in the mare and expectations of a proven stallion. Mary Clark's farm had purchased Highland Image's dam S J's Image back in 2004 as a 9-year-old following the closing of Armstrong Bros., one of North America's finest nurseries. S J's Image was a half-sister to the $1.3 million-winning S Js Photo, but Clark would have little luck with her as a broodmare, with only two live foals following the purchase. Fortunately, one was Highland Image and 17 years since her arrival a colt may have arrived that meets Grand Circuit expectations.