Your Love earns first stakes win in Shine Again

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Trainer Chad Brown thought enough of Your Love to run her in the Grade 1 Test Stakes in the third start of the filly’s career.

While that didn’t work out, Brown was ultimately right that Your Love was stakes quality.

Wednesday, almost exactly a year since she finished sixth in the Test, Your Love won her first stakes, taking the $100,000 Shine Again by a length over Cairenn. It was another length back to Heavenly Score, the 2-1 favorite, in third.

Come Dancing, returning one week after she won an allowance race, finished fourth. Impasse, Wonderment, Yorkiepoo Princess and Aura Rose completed the order of finish.

Your Love, a 4-year-old daughter of Flatter owned by Paul Pompa Jr., is now 4-3-0 from eight starts. Wednesday, she was making the second start off a long layoff.

“We took a big swing at the plate and missed there, so we had to regroup for a while,” Brown said, referring to last year’s Test. “The owner, Paul Pompa, is a veteran, he’s had horses for a long time and he knows what to do. He’s patient as far as resting them and regrouping.”

Jockey Javier Castellano also did some regrouping after getting Your Love in trouble in an allowance race in June at Belmont, where she finished second as the favorite. That was the first time Castellano rode the filly.

Wednesday, breaking from the outside post in the eight-horse field, Castellano kept Your Love in the clear while Come Dancing set the pace, pursued by Heavenly Score. The first half went in a moderate 45.69 seconds.

Your Love came three wide in the lane, gradually caught and edged away from Heavenly Score, and held a wide-rallying Cairenn at bay.

Your Love covered the seven furlongs in 1:23.70 and returned $6.90 to win as the second choice.

“Last time was the first time I rode the horse, I didn’t know much, I tried to split horses, I did a couple of mistakes, I learned through the process,” Castellano said. “I’m glad I got it done today.”

The win likely earned Your Love a shot at another big prize, the Grade 1, $500,000 Ballerina on Aug. 25.

“It’s a much tougher race, we know that." Brown said. "Third race of her form cycle, if she continues to improve she could be right there."