America
History made by DeVaux in Kentucky Derby
By Steve Sherack, TDN
Friday evening wasn't the only 'Ladies Night' at Churchill Downs this weekend. Cherie DeVaux became the first female trainer to win the G1 Kentucky Derby, saddling Phipps Stable and St. Elias Stable homebred Golden Tempo (Curlin) to a last-to-first upset at odds of 23-1 in the 152nd renewal on an unseasonably chilly first Saturday in May.
The 'TDN Rising Star, presented by Hagyard' stormed home down the centre to narrowly outkick the unlucky Renegade (Into Mischief), slammed hard at the start from his rail draw, by a neck. The victory provided winning jockey Jose Ortiz with the Kentucky Derby/Oaks double after also guiding home Always A Runner (Gun Runner) first in primetime the day before. His brother Irad Ortiz, Jr. was aboard the 5-1 second-choice Renegade. It was another three quarters of a length back to the 70-1 maiden Ocelli (Connect) in third.
“Being a woman or my gender has never really crossed my mind in this journey of mine,” DeVaux said. “I have to say, the racetrack is a tough place. It's a tough place if you are a man. It's a tough place if you're a woman.
“Being a woman or my gender has never really crossed my mind in this journey of mine... I have to say, the racetrack is a tough place.” - Cherie DeVaux
“The thing that really has become apparent to me is that not everyone has the same constitution as I have mentally. It really is an honour to be able to be that person for other women or other little girls to look up to. You can dream big, and you can pivot. You can come from one place and make yourself a part of history.”
DeVaux added, “I started my career here 22 years ago as a bright-eyed, bushy-tailed exercise rider. And I would not believe that I would be sitting up here today. Never in my life did I think I would. And (late trainer) Chuck (Simon), he would be so proud. I am here because of him.”
There was a slight delay and reload with the gate scratch of Great White (Volatile) who reared and fell before loading but trotted away with a lead pony safely before the race began. Drawn widest of all in post 18, Golden Tempo was brilliantly steered to the inside by Ortiz to trail the scratched-down field, passing the Twin Spires and crowd of 150,415 for the first time.
As expected, it was G2 UAE Derby runner-up Six Speed (Not This Time) who was the fastest of all 18 3-year-olds through early fractions of 0:22.68 and 0:46.44 with Golden Tempo in last. Japan's unbeaten Danon Bourbon (Maxfield), sitting a fantastic tracking trip throughout, took charge on the far turn and kicked for home as the one to catch. He led by two lengths at the stretch call while hanging on his left lead, but the closers were storming in.
Golden Tempo and G1 Arkansas Derby winner Renegade closed in together, with Golden Tempo rolling over the top with Ortiz sporting the famed black-and-cherry Phipps colors to bring home the roses. The final time for 1 1/4 miles over the fast main track was 2:02.27.
See you back at the G1 Preakness Stakes in two weeks?
“We're going to let him decide that,” DeVaux said. “We're going to see how he looks tomorrow, and subsequently, the next couple weeks or, you know, the next couple days. But we're going to have to allow him to tell us, because the horse is first. We're not here for ourselves. We're not here for our egos. We're here for the horse.”
Co-owner Vincent Viola's St. Elias Stable also co-owned 2017 Kentucky Derby winner Always Dreaming. “It's very special, because a bunch of thought went into that breeding going back to it,” Viola said. “I got to give John Sparkman a huge acknowledgment here. He was very, very certain about Curlin with that mare. And it feels really special.”
The Phipps Family also co-owned 2013 Derby hero Orb. “This is everything to anybody in horse racing, really,” Daisy Phipps Pulito said. “This is what we breed to race. This is why you do it, to be on stages like this. And the way he ran and the way he was raised at Claiborne Farm.”
Pedigree: He finally did it. After finishing third in the 2007 Kentucky Derby, seeing sons Exaggerator (2016), Good Magic (2018), and Journalism (2025) finish second in the Classic, and witnessing two of his sons–Keen Ice (2022) and Good Magic (2023)–sire Derby winners, Curlin won the Kentucky Derby with his own runner.
One of the most influential and storied sires of modern day, Curlin has a knack for showing up on racing's biggest days. As a sire, he has nine North American champions, eight Breeders' Cups victories, and 26 Grade 1 winners. With two G1 Preakness Stakes winners, one G1 Belmont Stakes winner, and one G1 Kentucky Oaks winner, a Kentucky Derby win was the only thing still missing from his lofty list of accomplishments.
Golden Tempo is a sixth-generation Phipps-bred, tracing all the way back to the 1969 Ogden Phipps private purchase of Lady Pitt (Sword Dancer). The champion 3-year-old filly of 1966, Lady Pitt's best foal for the Phipps was Blitey (Riva Ridge), who produced Grade 1 winners Dancing Spree (Nijinsky II), Fantastic Find (Mr. Prospector), and Furlough (Easy Goer) in addition to serving as ancestress of a tremendous amount of top horses. Golden Tempo traces through her unraced daughter Oh What a Dance (Nijinsky II), whose runners included champion Heavenly Prize (Seeking the Gold) and Grade 1 winner Oh What a Windfall (Seeking the Gold).
Phipps Stable has raced most of the family as homebreds, but bred two of Carrumba (Bernardini)'s five foals–Golden Tempo and the mare's current 2-year-old, a colt by Nyquist–in partnership with St. Elias Stables. The mare's yearling Liam's Map filly was bred solely by Phipps Stable. Carrumba, winner of the 2016 G3 Top Flight Invitational Handicap and placed in seven other Graded events including the G1 Ogden Phipps Stakes, was barren for 2026 to Good Magic.
Europe
2000 Guineas belongs to Bow Echo
By Tom Frary, TDN Europe
A wide-open G1 Betfred 2000 Guineas on paper turned into a two-horse race approaching the final furlong and then a singular domination from Bow Echo (Night Of Thunder) as George Boughey's TDN Rising Star dismissed his only threat Gstaad (Starspangledbanner) with a mighty display on Newmarket's Rowley Mile.
Delivering poignancy as well as class carrying the colours of the late Sheikh Mohammed Obaid, the 9-2 shot brushed aside the 3-1 joint-favourite Gstaad heading to the closing stages and powered to an emphatic 2.75 length victory in a fast 1:35.59. There was an astonishing eight-length margin back to Distant Storm (Night Of Thunder) in third.
There is already abundant evidence that after the retirement of Frankie Dettori we have a wunderkind who looks destined for the heights and, soon after turning 20, Billy “the Kid” Loughnane was steering his first Classic winner.
“I can't put it into words–I planned the race out in a million different directions, but it went perfectly today,” the elated rider said. “I'm very fortunate to ride him–he's an absolute superstar and a dream to ride, what a feeling! He'd had a perfect preparation into the race and George is a genius–he's done everything right with this horse and just shows what he can do if he gets the stock.”
“I can't put it into words – I planned the race out in a million different directions, but it went perfectly today.” - Billy “the Kid” Loughnane
Boughey had made no secret in recent weeks of what he believed the winner was capable of and was able to reflect on an eerily flawless run-up and run through the race. “I felt like I had almost gone a bit overboard on what we thought of him before, but that is what he was showing me,” he said of the unbeaten homebred from the family of Dubawi, who had long been the ante-post favourite before the plunges on Gstaad and Distant Storm.
The real tale of this renewal was the finishing sectionals of Bow Echo, who was held up early and ran entirely to par throughout under a perfectly-executed ride, and Gstaad. The winner's uphill finale was a fast 12.24, the more prominently-ridden Gstaad managed a top-class 12.57 and the next fastest was Distant Storm's 13.41. The front pair were just a class apart.
“We thought he was a good one, so that wasn't a huge surprise–I thought he might do that,” Boughey added in the aftermath of a second Classic for the yard after the initial success of Cachet in the 1000 Guineas four years ago. “He's as good as we thought he was. He and Billy are two stars and it's so special to do it at home–to win both Guineas as a Newmarket trainer is amazing.”
“Sheikh Mohammed Obaid was in some ways a mentor to me and a phenomenal breeder of horses. He had an amazing brain and he knew this horse would be a better 3-year-old,” Boughey explained. “He was insistent he didn't run in the Dewhurst–I wanted to run him in that or a Breeders' Cup but Sheikh Mohammed Obaid was watching today and he'll be telling me 'I was right' and he was. If he'd won the Dewhurst, he'd have been 6-4 for this but he's matured–he was a child against men last year and now he's the top of the pile.”
“He's as good as we thought he was. He and Billy are two stars and it's so special to do it at home–to win both Guineas as a Newmarket trainer is amazing.” - George Boughey
In a rarity when it comes to bringing a fancied colt to this race, Boughey's winter and spring travails with Bow Echo passed without a single hitch. “He has made the job very easy if truth be told,” he said. “The guys at home have done a fantastic job and Jordan McMurray, who rides him every day, would tell you he has the most extraordinary brain, this horse. He is so unassuming and you wouldn't know he is there.”
Unsurprisingly, there will be no Guineas-Derby double attempted with the winner. “He wasn't entered in the Derby, he's a Night Of Thunder from a fast family and his work was suggesting to us he could win a Group 1 over six,” Boughey concluded. “He's always shown me so much pace, but he relaxes and probably could get further as he's a good horse but his is a miling family and at the moment that's where we'll be looking.”
“He is a horse that has always shown a huge turn of foot and I want to make him a champion miler if we can,” he stated. “The Irish Guineas is there, he is obviously in at Royal Ascot and then he has to take on the older horses. I would say we would be looking to make him a dual Guineas winner, but he will tell us as he is a very expressive horse.”
Pedigree: Bow Echo, who becomes the 10th Group 1 winner and second European Classic winner for his 2000 Guineas-winning sire, is the second foal out of Aristocratic Lady (Invincible Spirit) who was a smart sprint handicapper for the Crisfords. Her dam is the Listed Sandringham Handicap runner-up Dubai Queen (Kingmambo), a half-sister to Dubawi whose three Stakes performers were the G3 Brigadier Gerard Stakes winner and Champion Stakes-placed Royal Rhyme (Lope De Vega) and Frankel's Listed Height of Fashion Stakes winner Victoria Harbour and G2 May Hill Stakes runner-up Zabeel Queen.
America
Rhetorical stretches to win G1 Turf Classic
By Alan Carasso, TDN
Gary Barber, Cheyenne Stable and Wachtel Stable's Rhetorical (Not This Time) was trying nine furlongs for the first time in his career in Saturday's G1 Old Forester Bourbon Turf Classic at Churchill Downs, but the distance proved no hindrance whatsoever, as the New York-bred wrested command not long after the break over a course that had been playing kind to front-running types over the weekend and proved not for catching.
The 5-year-old gelding is the second consecutive winner of the Turf Classic bred in New York, joining Spirit of St Louis (Medaglia d'Oro) last May.
Still traveling supremely well on the run around the second turn, Rhetorical–carrying the Wachtel colours–opened up on his rivals entering the final furlong and was never in danger from there, scoring in stakes-record time. Make Me King (Fr) (Dark Angel {Ire}), a latest fourth to the all-world Ombudsman (Ire) (Night of Thunder {Ire}) in the G1 Dubai Turf on March 28, was given an outstanding inside-out ride by Derby-winning jockey Jose Ortiz, but just couldn't bridge the gap and settled for second. Corruption (Medaglia d'Oro) closed with interest for third.
“The key for this horse was getting him in front,” said winning trainer Will Walden. “He's a real Alpha male; he wants to dominate every group of horses. When he got out front today, I saw everything change. His demeanour, his body language, he liked it out there. We had him down at Palm Meadows this winter and did a lot of basic things with him. It was real good for him.”
“He's (Rhetorical) a real Alpha male; he wants to dominate every group of horses. When he got out front today, I saw everything change.” - Will Walden
Pedigree: Rhetorical is easily the best of three winners from his dam, Sheet Humor (Distorted Humor), a daughter of Grade 3 winner Sheets, who was acquired by Mallory Mort for US$14,000 (AU$19,400) in foal to Midnight Lute at Keeneland November in 2015. Sheet Humor was purchased by Korean interest for US$3,000 (AU$4170) at the 2021 Fasig-Tipton Fall Sale in Saratoga. Sheet Humor produced a colt by New York stalwart Central Banker in 2023 and was most recently covered by the expatriated Preservationist.
Tough Japanese-trained T O Elvis wins G1 Churchill Downs
By Alan Carasso, TDN
With a smashing five-length victory in the G3 Capella Stakes at Nakayama in December, Tomoya Ozasa's T O Elvis (Volatile) earned a place in the field for the G2 Riyadh Dirt Sprint in February. Connections elected to take a pass on that 1200-metre test–won by Imagination (Good Magic)–to give the colt more time to prepare for the G1 Dubai Golden Shaheen at the back end of March. But owing to the ongoing hostilities in the region, T O Elvis's trip to Meydan was called off at the 11th hour and he was rerouted for the G1 Churchill Downs Stakes.
In addition to an arduous trip from Japan, which included a layover in Alaska, a 42-hour stay in quarantine at Chicago's O'Hare Airport and an hours-long van ride down to Louisville, the task facing the relatively unexposed colt was far from straight-forward, given the strength of the competition signed on.
T O Elvis, with Forever Young (Jpn) rider Ryusei Sakai adding to the appeal, broke away perhaps a beat slowly from the eight hole, but the opening stages of the race were not all that demanding from a pace perspective.
Imagination soon drew alongside and perhaps stuck a nose in front, but by this time, Sakai had gone for T O Elvis in earnest, and it was a case of 'how great thou art' from there, as he whistled home to score impressively under hands-and-heels steering. Disruptor (Gun Runner), who scratched out of Friday's G2 Alysheba Stakes in favour of this, came from midpack to be second best, while Crazy Mason (Coal Front) rallied from a detached last and won the photo for third over Imagination.
The final time was 0.01 faster than Alannan (Conquistador Cielo) recorded in the 2001 Churchill Downs–then a handicap–and was just 0.05 off the seven-furlong track record held by Groupie Doll (Bowman'sBand).
“It's so special to get a win like this at Churchill Downs. It's been such a great experience.” - Ryusei Sakai
“It's so special to get a win like this at Churchill Downs. It's been such a great experience,” said Sakai, who finished third aboard Forever Young in the 2024 Derby. Trainer Daisuke Takayanagi added, “This is a first winner for Japan here. It was a very challenging race but we were able to get it done.”
Pedigree: T O Elvis becomes the first top-level winner for the Three Chimneys-based Volatile, whose three other graded winners include G3 Indiana Derby winner and 'TDN Rising Star' presented by Hagyard Tip Top Thomas; G3 Southwest Stakes victor Speed King; and Fast Market, winner of the grassy G3 Pebbles Stakes. T O Elvis is the second Grade 1 winner out of a mare by Curlin, the other being Arkansas Derby scorer and Derby runner-up Renegade.
A nine-time stakes winner from 10 appearances at Emerald Downs, Stopshoppingdebbie (Curlin) was acquired by Town and Country Horse Farms and Pollock Farms for US$410,000 (AU$570,000) in foal to Medaglia d'Oro at Keeneland November in 2015, but she failed to produce a winner from three foals and was sold privately to the Prunziks, who operate Stone Bridge Farm in Lexington.
The now 16-year-old mare, a half-sister to fellow Pacific Northwest star Shampoo (Gulch) and to the once-beaten Smarty Deb (Smart Strike), is also responsible for stakes winner and Grade 1-placed Generous Tipper.
Stark Contrast wins G1 American Turf Stakes
By Jill Williams, TDN
Connections of Stark Contrast (Caravaggio), second in the G3 Jeff Ruby Steaks on March 21 behind scratched G1 Kentucky Derby contender Fulleffort (Liam's Map), could have entertained a Derby bid with the 50 points he earned at Turfway, but opted instead for the 35th running of the G1 American Turf Stakes Saturday on the Derby undercard at Churchill Downs. And boy, did it pay off for the Michael McCarthy-trained Amerman homebred, who took home his first Grade 1 score.
“I can't tell you how highly I thought about this horse (Stark Contrast).” - Michael McCarthy
“I can't tell you how highly I thought about this horse,” added trainer Michael McCarthy. “He got a little sick on us over the winter. We were able to reroute and go to the Jeff Ruby Steaks. Flavien (Prat) speaks for himself and he gave him a great trip. Mr. and Mrs. Amerman are not here today, but I really wish they were.”
Pedigree: Stark Contrast is one of 13 Graded winners for Caravaggio, the leading European first-crop sire of 2021, who was relocated to Japan's Shizunai Stallion Station for the 2023 season. The son of Scat Daddy has also sired 28 black-type winners, including multiple Group 1 winners Porta Fortuna (Ire) and Tenebrism, and additional multiple American Grade I winner Whitebeam (GB).
The Amermans bought Stark Contrast's granddam, Turns My Head (Ire) (Montjeu {Ire}), for US$310,000 (AU$430,000) at the 2008 Keeneland September sale. Her dam, an unraced US$3.8 million (AU$5.3 million) Demi O'Byrne purchase at Keeneland September in 2005, produced 2014 American Turf winner Global View (Galileo {Ire}) and is also the granddam of 2024 GI Churchill Downs Stakes winner Gun Pilot (Gun Runner). Turns My Head was a winner for the Amerman program and produced Stark Contrast's dam–2020 G2 John C. Mabee Stakes third Catch the Eye (Quality Road)–before she was sold for US$75,000 (AU$104,000) to Checkmate Thoroughbreds/Sir Prancealot in the 2021 Keeneland November sale.
