Very sad to report more tragic news that’s come our way this year. John Attfield, who’s been our very able Assistant Trainer for the last two years alongside Axelle, sadly had a very sudden heart attack and died last month.
John had been plagued by ill health throughout his life. He’d undergone some pretty severe cancer treatments and been declared in remission a number of times. He really despised cancer treatment, so I suppose if there’s a small blessing to be taken from this, it’s that John didn’t have to go through another tremendous battle he hated ever again.
He was a stalwart member of the Fair Grounds and Saratoga team as well as being a vital cog in the Belmont wheel. The day before John died, he was on the golf cart with me watching breezes, cooling horses out, and sending them over to the races. He died doing what he loved, surrounded by the people he loved. His absence is felt deeply in our barn and we will all miss him dearly. Rest easy, my friend.
These last few blogs have been difficult with all we’ve experienced, but as this is our final blog of the year, I’d like to end it by highlighting some of the successes we’ve had over the last three weeks.
Past Tense has taken her winning form from Aqueduct to the Fair Grounds. She’s a filly we claimed out of a Maiden Forty back in September during the Belmont At The Big A meet. In October, she won first off the claim and then joined our string at the Fair Grounds, where she ran tremendous, winning by a fast diminishing half-length under an excellent ride from Mitchell Murrill. She has two race targets coming up: one is either on December 22nd, which is a second-level Allowance, or we may opt to wait for the Pago Hop, which is a straight three-year-old filly Stakes going two turns on the grass on December 28th.
December 12th was a busy day for the Aqueduct division with Spring Magic winning first off the claim for Zilla Racing and Van Vranken Racing. Great to get this filly in the winner’s circle as she has a bit of a tendency to finish second in a lot of her starts.
That same day, Carol Said No finally broke through and broke her Maiden, and actually showed a lot of tenacity. This is a filly who’d had three starts prior. I ran her on the turf for her debut, which turned out to be the wrong surface for her. But then she ran an excellent second on dirt at Monmouth in her next start. Third time out at Aqueduct, she hit her head in the gate as it was opening and cut her lip, which caused her to break very slowly, so that was a race to draw a line through. It was great for Pat and Joe Veazey, and Tom and Carol Hopkins to see this filly finally get her photograph taken on December 12th.
The two-year-olds have run very well recently. Griffin’s Wharf put his bad break behind him on November 29th, running a very good third in what was a very strong maiden field on paper. Pleased for owners Rainbow’s End Racing, Titletown Racing, and West Paces Racing.
A Bourbon for Toby has had two very difficult trips. I was extremely pleased with his run on November 9th from the rail in a sprint where he finished third, but then moving on to December 7th, he had a tremendous amount of tough luck in the middle of the race. Having broken a half stride slow, he found himself in the pocket trip on the rail, surrounded by horses. So, when Dylan needed space to get out on this colt, he simply had nowhere to go.
Tough for the horse, tough for the jockey, tough for Paul Farr, who’s a wonderfully understanding owner, but this horse will have an opportunity to redeem himself in the next few weeks. He’s a colt with an enormous amount of promise, and I’m looking forward to watching him progress.
On December 1st, Creed’s Vision headed down to Laurel to run in a Maiden Special Weight, finishing second. It’s good to see a lot of these two-year-olds beginning to hit the board and run really well.
It was exciting to head back to California and to Del Mar for the Gr. 1 Hollywood Derby with Donegal Momentum at the end of November. He has really led the way amongst our three-year-olds this year—especially after the sad demise of The Big Torpedo—and continued on his upward trajectory. This is a horse who broke his maiden first time out sprinting on the dirt and has gone on to prove a good bit of his pedigree is coming through, being out of state, performing well in a two-turn turf stakes, and moving like a beautiful grass horse.
He won the Gio Ponti at Aqueduct and then backed that up by going to California and nearly winning the Hollywood Derby. The question mark for me was always going to be the distance of nine furlongs. And at the end of the day, that’s probably what caught him out in the last five strides of the race. Still, he ran extremely well, setting sensible fractions the whole way around the Del Mar turf but just getting run down late. We did have the option of running in the Hill Prince at Aqueduct, but opted to go to California instead as we thought he had more chance of getting the trip on firmer ground out there. Personally, I think he acquitted himself very well.
Donegal Momentum will now concentrate on mile races going forward. He’s currently gone to Barry Berkelhammer’s Abracadabra Farm in Ocala for a vacation. Afterwards, we’re expecting him to join our string at Fair Grounds—where he trained beautifully last winter—in the middle of January to prepare for his season. The Keeneland Mile, The Poker, and The Four Star Dave would be logical spots for this horse to point to. And we’d like to try to get him running at the Fair Grounds before he leaves New Orleans.
I hope you’ve all had a marginally better 2024 than the Morley family. It’s been a tough year to say the very least, but I’m wishing you all the very happiest of Christmases and looking forward to 2025 being a successful and smiley year.
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