2025 has been a real rollercoaster year. And when I say rollercoaster, that’s not always what I’m looking for, to be perfectly honest. I feel like we’ve been a little spottier in our results than I would’ve liked, but delighted to say that the last month has been exceptional in terms of horses that have run very well, finally getting their heads in front and getting their wins for the year.
I think we are sitting in a position where we’ve got some extremely promising two-turning-three-year-olds in the barn. None more so than Attfield who has had three starts this year beating stakes winner Schwarzenegger in his debut at Saratoga. He’s then returned to run third in the Futurity going six furlongs.
I always felt Attfield had the ability to go further though, and we decided that instead of sprinting again at the end of his two-year-old year, we’d stretch him out around two turns. Unfortunately, with Dylan Davis getting hurt, it was necessitated that Ricardo Santana would take over and he did an absolutely fabulous job with Attfield winning the Central Park on November 7.
Attfield has always worked well on the dirt as well, so while there weren’t too many targets for him in the immediate future, we gave him a brief break and he returned to our barn at Belmont last weekend. It’s great to see A Bourbon for Toby finally make the eleventh time the charm. This horse has been extremely frustrating while proving to be extremely resilient and talented this year.
The patience and belief of his owner Paul Farr has been exceptional. He’s always maintained that I have said that this is a good horse and that the good horse in him would eventually come through. A thirteenth and a marginal cutback in trip on ground that he quite clearly relished enormously, and a super ride from John Velazquez meant that A Bourbon for Toby broke his maiden at the back end of his three-year-old year with an 88 Beyer and a nine-plus on the Ragozin Sheets.
Cerro Rico had a very unfortunate introduction to racing in Saratoga, and it took me a long time to put the pieces of the puzzle back together, both mentally and physically. Steven Rocco and all involved at Adelphi Racing Club have been enormously patient allowing me to put the building blocks back together with this horse. It was therefore incredibly exciting to see him break his maiden on November 14, again under a massive ride from John Velazquez.
A couple of other horses who have done really well for us, For the Ladies has been an incredible project since her purchase from the two-year-old sale. The filly quite clearly has a very decent level of ability, but she was a virtual runoff in her training in the middle of the summer and I have to give a lot of props to Leah Gyarmati for the work that she has done with this filly getting her to relax in her day-to-day training, also to Wilver Solares for his work with her, and again to Ricardo Santana who has come in and breezed her on a regular basis. While we were in England at Tattersalls in October, this filly was incredibly unlucky to just get beaten on the line. But it was great to see her come back and fulfill that promise with an incredibly eye-catching win breaking her maiden by seven lengths, which is very difficult to do in a two-year-old sprint race.
Diliello is another juvenile to look forward to next year. This enormous son of Gift Box has been banging on the door repeatedly in turf sprints. So it was great to see him get his head in front under Ricardo Santana before he headed off for his winter vacation. Metatron is a horse of Zilla Racing Stables who has clearly had his issues in the past, but seems to be doing well at the moment. Huge kudos to Carlos David, who sent this horse into us in tremendous order. It was a case of simply making sure that we got him over there in one piece. He broke his maiden on November 16.
The juveniles have really stepped up this month, and another one to break his maiden was Liamster for Donegal Racing. This son of Liam’s Map is a New York-bred, a smaller individual but a tenacious type. He was very game to break his maiden going six and a half furlongs on the main track as well.
A couple of other horses of note who have run in the past month: A filly of Titletown Racing, Interstatelovesong was very impressive separating a pair of Chad Brown maidens first time out. She did really well considering the race was seven furlongs, which is a very tricky distance to debut at. She’s a filly with a bright future that I’m looking forward to campaigning.
Fantastic to see One Nine Hundred come back with such a big effort. With no suitable target for him in New York, we shipped him to Churchill Downs, where he encountered not only a new racetrack, but a new racing surface as it rained earlier in the afternoon. He was very game to run third, beaten a couple of lengths off a layoff, having not run since July. Another horse with a really bright future.
It’s great to see horses like One Nine Hundred and Paula’s a Star coming back in at the end of their three-year-old career and going on to hopefully achieve stakes-horse status in their four-year-old campaigns.
Away from the racetrack, the winter does afford for us to take a little bit of a deep breath and as we are not going to England for Christmas, we actually took the girls to England to stay with my brother for Thanksgiving. Nine cousins under the age of nine in the house was not the most peaceful, but it was an incredibly enjoyable week. A big thank you to Billy and Natasha for hosting a tremendous Thanksgiving. The girls got to do a lot of ragging around with their cousins, and we had a wonderful time with granny and my two brothers and all their children. It was the first time that Grace and Willow got to meet the twins, and a great time was had by all.
It is unlikely we will do another blog before the end of the year. So, just reflecting on 2025, statistically, this is the second time we’ve had our horses average above $10,000 per start, and we have once again surpassed our prize money earned. All in all, it’s great to see a level of quality and quantity in the barn where hopefully we can push on and have a really big 2026.
Hope you all have a wonderful Christmas and New Year, and I will blog back in January.
