Forty Niner and Seeking the Gold race for different stables but seem to have gone through their careers as an entry. Sons of the same stallion, Mr. Prospector, they were born in the same barn at Claiborne Farm in Paris, Ky., grew up together in the fields there, went to New York as 2-year-olds and spent last winter in Florida.
But they were never closer together than they were through the stretch today at Monmouth Park.
Forty Niner, under Laffit Pincay Jr., on the inside and Seeking the Gold, ridden by Pat Day, on the outside, ran head and head for the last half mile of the $500,000 Haskell Invitational Handicap. At the wire, Forty Niner thrust his head out just a bit farther to win the Haskell by a nose, reassert himself as the top 3-year-old in training, and set up a compelling rematch with Seeking the Gold in the Travers Stakes at Saratoga on August 20.
Forty Niner, last year's champion 2-year-old and the runner-up by just a neck to Winning Colors in the Kentucky Derby this spring, ran the mile and an eighth in 1:47 3/5 seconds over a very fast track and paid $3.60 to win as the favorite to his backers in a crowd of 23,027. Seeking the Gold, whom Day chose as his Haskell mount over Forty Niner, was sparkling in defeat as he and the winner ran the final furlong in the very quick time of 12 1/5 seconds. Primal was four lengths behind the top two and half a length in front of Private Terms. Teddy Drone was the distant trailer in a field of five.
Forty Niner and Private Terms each carried 126 pounds, one more than Seeking the Gold.
It was Forty Niner's ninth victory in 15 career starts and his first stakes triumph since April. The son of Mr. Prospector and the Tom Rolfe mare File, bred and owned by Claiborne and trained by Woody Stephens, earned $300,000 today to run his earnings to $1,339,880.
The victory was particularly sweet for Seth Hancock, the president of Claiborne, who was miffed that Day abandoned Forty Niner. Hancock had replaced Eddie Maple with Day earlier this spring, but Day stuck with Seeking the Gold for the Haskell because he rides several other top horses for that colt's connections, the owner Ogden Phipps and the trainer Claude (Shug) McGaughey.
www.nytimes.com...
24 сен 2012
