Happily Unbridled

Tomorrow’s the day that Big Brown will return to Monmouth Park in New Jersey. His last trip there was to win the Haskell and this time the purpose is to prepare him for a run in the Breeders’ Cup Classic (gr I) at Santa Anita in October.

Big Brown will be racing on the turf for only the second time in his career. He won his maiden race over the turf by running away from the field and cruising to the win by over 11 lengths.  We don’t expect him to do that again tomorrow and in fact, he doesn’t even have to win at all for his connections to be happy with him. They just want to see a good effort over the turf which may translate into a good effort over the synthetic track at Santa Anita.

Ten other horses are running in the Monmouth Stakes:

PP. Horse, Weight, Jockey
1. Nightscape (MD), 119, Emilio Flores
2. Hotstufanthensome (KY), 119, Jose Lezcano
3. Shakis (IRE), 121, Joe Bravo
4. Big Brown (KY), 120, Kent J. Desormeaux
5. Kiss the Kid (KY), 119, Elvis Trujillo
6. Proudinsky (GER), 119, Ramon Dominguez
7. Drum Major (KY), 119, Kendrick Carmouche
8. Get Serious (NY), 119, Pablo Fragoso
9. Fagedaboudit Sal (NJ), 121, Pedro L. Cotto, Jr.
10. Ballonenostrikes (FL), 119, Daniel Centeno
11. Silver Tree (FL), 121, Eddie Castro

We wish them all well and may the best horse win!

Big Brown breezed on the Aqueduct turf on September 9 and gave trainer Rick Dutrow Jr just what he was looking for … an easy basic work with a fluid stride, looking happy and comfortable.

Big Brown’s next start will be in the $500,000 Monmouth Stakes on September 13. That will be his last prep race before what may be his final race … the Breeders’ Cup Classic (gr I) at Santa Anita in October. The Momouth Stakes will be run on the turf, a surface on which Big Brown has not run since his very first race … which he won by over 11 lengths. The connections of Big Brown wanted a turf race before the Classic since the Santa Anita surface is a synthetic surface and often a good turf horse translates into a good synthetic track horse.

The Monmouth Stakes was created just to lure Big Brown to the Jersey Shore track and it will be an exciting day for horse racing fans. When Big Brown is at the top of his game, there’s no horse today that is more fun to watch. He has amazing acceleration as well as an equally amazing presence and we hope to see both of those qualities this weekend.

Go Big Brown Go!