EquiSport Photos
Gina Romantica Among Chad Brown Quartet For Del Mar's Matriarch
You can generally rely on trainer Chad Brown bringing a small string of quality horses to Del Mar for the annual Fall Turf Festival.
Since 2016, when Brown won his first stakes at Del Mar, the New York-based trainer has won 19 stakes and all but one (the 2019 Del Mar Oaks) came this time of year. Three were Breeders’ Cup victories. The rest were during the Turf Festival.
In 2020, Brown won four of the seven stakes races that make up the Turf Festival. Every year since he’s won two races, last year the ollywood Derby (G1) with Program Trading and the Matriarch (G1) with Surge Capacity.
Brown has owned the Matriarch in recent years. He’s won six of the last seven runnings and comes with a full arsenal of horses this year.
Brown has four entered in Del Mar’s final stakes race of the year led by Gina Romantica, a 5-year-old daughter of Into Mischief who has over $1.7 million in earnings. She is a multiple Grade 1 winner, taking the last two runnings of the First Lady (G1) and the 2022 Queen Elizabeth II Cup (G1), both at Keeneland.
“It’s her last career race,” Brown gives for the reasons he’s bringing her to the West Coast, “It’s a Grade 1. It’s a mile and she’s proven at the distance. I’ve had a lot of success in the race and it all just made sense.”
Gina Romantica came west one other time for the 2023 Breeders’ Cup at Santa Anita where she ran fourth against males in the Mile (G1). She missed the Breeders’ Cup this year with a quarter crack.
Three of her stablemates will be joining her in the Matriarch. Child of the Moon and Prerequisite were shoulder to shoulder at the end of their last race, Child of the Moon running down Prerequisite to win the Athenia at the Belmont at the Big A meet in October. A neck separated the two.
“They both ran terrific,” Brown said. “This is a big step up in a Grade 1 competition. Child of the Moon has never seen Grade 1s before. Prerequisite has and has run well. With both horses, cutting back to a mile is the real question mark. It’s a little short for both of them to be their very best but I think if they get the right trip it could work out for them.”
The fourth Brown horse is Klaravich Stables’ Tax Implications, a 4-year-old British-bred who will be ridden by Joel Rosario.
Stepping up to take on the Brown contingent is Ag Bullet, a speed-ball out of the Richard Baltas barn, who set a record for 6½ furlongs at Kentucky Downs this summer winning the Ladies Turf Sprint (G2). The daughter of Twirling Candy finished a close third in her last race, the Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint (G1) at Del Mar.
“I was surprised she ran as good as she did against the boys,” Baltas stated. “She just tries so hard every time. She has a lot of talent. I thought five-eighths might have been a little short for her but he (Umberto Rispoli) rode her good. She came off the pace and gave us a thrill there. She got beat by a neck but I thought she was going to win it there for a second.”
While Ag Bullet does some of her best running in sprints she’s not exactly stretching out in the one mile Matriarch.
“She’s won twice going a mile,” Baltas said, “but she doesn’t beat these kinds of horses going a mile. But I don’t think it’s going to matter. As long as she gets a good trip. She drew well. There’s some speed in the race. If she runs her race she’ll be right there.”
Mouffy is doing something she’s only done twice before in her 15-race career: run back-to-back races at the same track. She finished fourth in the Goldikova (G3) on the Breeders’ Cup undercard at Del Mar last out. She’s run at six different racetracks this year, her most recent win coming at Woodbine in the Dance Smartly (G2) in October.
“She ran super,” trainer Jonathan Thomas said of the race in Canada. “She’s always hinted that kind of ability.”
Recommended for You
The 44th running of the G1 Matriarch is Race 7 on Sunday’s nine-race card. Probable post time is 3:30 p.m. (PT)
Following is the field from the rail out with jockeys and morning-line odds: Sacred Wish (John Velazquez, 12-1); Tirupati (Kazushi Kimura, 30-1); Ag Bullet (Umberto Rispoli, 3-1); Child of the Moon (Manuel Franco, 10-1); Aussie Girl (Irad Ortiz, Jr., 20-1); Mouffy (Vincent Cheminaud, 15-1); Tax Implications (12-1); Kehoe Beach (SCRATCHED); Prerequisite (Flavien Prat, 6-1); Aspen Grove (Juan Hernandez, 20-1); Gina Romantica (Jose Ortiz, 8/5), and Nadette (Hector I. Berrios, 15-1).
