Moreno well despite running with throat abscess in Travers;
Orb pleases McGaughey
Moreno was bright and doing well after his gallant nose second
to Will Take Charge on Saturday in the Grade 1, $1 million Travers at Saratoga.
Trainer Eric Guillot revealed Sunday morning that the
gelded son of Ghostzapper raced with a large abscess near his throat.
“That’s an abscess that started Monday,” explained Guillot,
while a stable hand jogged Moreno in a straight line outside the barn for the
trainer’s inspection. “I think the worst day was yesterday. We started
compressing it. We’re good to go now, but I thought I was going to have to
scratch on Monday.
“We don’t know what caused it — I think an ingrown hair, maybe, or he jerked
back on the chain. It got infected and went the wrong way. You don’t want to
pack it and work on it too hard and too fast. Yesterday, we iced it. I gave him
a lot of anti-inflammatories.”
While Guillot said the abscess had no impact on Moreno’s
performance, the strap from his blinkers wrapped around the abscess. He is
treating the wound with silver sulfadiazine, a topical antibacterial.
Travers Day was an emotional one for the colorful Guillot,
who told anyone who would listen that the horse named after owner Michael Moreno
was one of the best in the three-year-old division.
“Everyone thought I was talking trash,” Guillot said. “He just beat the Derby
winner, the Haskell winner and the Belmont winner, right?”
Guillot had predicted the key to Moreno’s success would be
internal fractions, and Moreno got away on the lead with an opening quarter-mile
in :24 2/5 and a second quarter in :24 2/5, which put him up by two lengths.
On the turn for home, Moreno was in full flight and had
plenty left to turn back a bold challenge by Kentucky Derby winner Orb, only to
get caught at the wire by Will Take Charge.
“That’s what we wanted,” Guillot said of the manageable
fractions. “That’s why he got beat a whisker.
“It was a tough loss. It left me
all emotional. I walked down to the track by myself. I wished everybody, 50,000
people, just evaporated. I wanted to be by myself for a few minutes. Then I
realized, ‘I just got beat a whisker at 30-1 against the best of the best.’ It’s
horse racing. If his name was Guillot, he would have won by 20.
“I tried to not get all emotional and teared up, but I had to. I couldn’t do
it. I didn’t see (owner) Michael (Moreno); he was up in the box. I was in there
10 minutes later, and we were both crying.”
Guillot said he plans to leave Moreno at Saratoga to train
up to the Grade 2, $1 million Pennsylvania Derby on September 21 at Parx Racing and then,
if all goes well, he will run in the Breeders’ Cup Classic at Santa
Anita.
“We’d run him right out of his stall,” Guillot said,
referring to his home base. “It’s my back yard. I’ve got to take that on.”
While Moreno is headed to the Penn Derby, Orb likely will make his next start
in the Grade 1, $1 million Jockey Club Gold Cup on September 28 at Belmont Park,
according to Hall of Fame trainer Shug McGaughey. The horseman on Sunday expressed
satisfaction with his colt’s third-place finish in the Travers.
In the Travers, Orb saved ground while stalking the pace
and loomed at the top of the stretch but was unable to match strides with winner
Will Take Charge or overtake runner-up Moreno. Orb was ridden by Jose Lezcano,
who replaced injured jockey Joel Rosario.
“I thought he ran a great race,” said McGaughey, who trains
the Kentucky Derby winner for Stuart S. Janney III and Phipps Stable. “He came
to the paddock the way I wanted him to, and I thought he had running on his
mind. I thought Jose rode him great. He was down on the inside the other two
horses, and he couldn’t get by Moreno, really, after that slow pace.
“I’m disappointed we didn’t win, but I’m not disappointed in his effort one
bit. I thought they did a terrific job with him.”
If Orb competes in the Jockey Club Gold Cup, he will be
making his first start against older horses. The Travers was his first start
since his third in the Belmont Stakes in June.
“Now we’ve got a good, solid race under his belt, we’ve got
all last winter and spring’s stuff behind us,” McGaughey remarked. “I think we
can really move forward now. I’m going to look at the Gold Cup. That’s not to
say the Pennsylvania Derby or the (Grade 2, $500,000) Indiana Derby (on October
5 at Indiana Downs) or something is completely out of the picture, but I think
we want to go to the Gold Cup.”
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