Former Claimer Lady's Island Wires Sugar Swirl Field
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Photo: Coglianese Photos/Lauren King
Lady's Island wins the Sugar Swirl Stakes at Gulfstream Park
A claimer last year, Lady's Island now can be called something else—a graded stakes winner—after leading throughout in the $100,000 Sugar Swirl Stakes (G3) at Gulfstream Park Dec. 14.
Matched against what seemed to be a quick group in the six-furlong sprint, Lady's Island somehow made her opponents look slow. She busted out of the gate under Emisael Jaramillo, showing only her tail to eight foes. Two lengths in front after an opening quarter-mile in :22.15, she began to distance herself from her rivals with a half-mile in :44.69, opening up five lengths on pace-chasing Heavenhasmynikki.
Then the question was not whether she would win but by how much.
"Jaramillo keeps her to her task, but the task has been complete. It's a gate-to-wire destruction of today's Sugar Swirl field," Gulfstream announcer Pete Aiello remarked in the final sixteenth of a mile.
The official margin was 6 3/4 lengths over stakes-winning Meadow Dance, who rallied from fifth to grab second, 1 1/2 lengths ahead of late-running 73-1 longshot Pretty Greeley in third.
The winner, a 5-year-old daughter of Greatness trained by Georgina Baxter, finished in 1:10.75 on a fast track and paid $8.60 as the second choice in the betting.
Left in her wake—both early and late—was favored A Bit of Both, a normally speedy filly who failed to keep pace and ran fifth.
"She's just a super-fast filly," Baxter said of Lady's Island. "I knew there was a lot of speed, but I didn't think they were going to be as fast as her. They always say they have got one faster, but they have to be really fast to beat her out of the gate."
Lady's Island, 13-for-26 overall, is 9-for-11 since being claimed by her current owners, Averill Racing and Matties Racing Stable, from a $16,000 optional claiming race at Gulfstream in June 2018, a race in which she showed speed before fading to third. Three of those victories have come in stakes this year at Gulfstream, including the Nicole's Dream Stakes and the Bob Umphrey Turf Sprint Stakes, races that were taken off the grass and run on sloppy tracks.
"They do such a great job of claiming these horses and even better at placing them," Baxter said of the mare's owners. "They let us give the horses time. It doesn't happen overnight.
"Basically, she always had like a Ferrari engine but on a push bicycle. But, you know, we let her grow and develop, and she's put on a lot of weight and muscle. We're reaping the benefits now."
Bred in Florida by Bailey Bolen, Lady's Island is one of five winners from six starters from her dam, the Broad Brush mare Broadway Martha.
Broadway Martha was purchased for $1,000 by Arboritanza Racing at the Ocala Breeders' Sales Winter Mixed Sale from Lisa McGreevy's Abbie Road Farm consignment in January 2018. She produced a yearling full brother to Lady's Island named Imtakinittothebank.