BC Turf Sprint Gives Got Stormy a Second Chance

When it was announced that Got Stormy had been entered in The November Sale, it appeared her racing career would come to an end at the Breeders' Cup.

That may or may not be the case.

"Crazier things have happened," trainer Mark Casse said about the possibility of the 5-year-old mare racing after Fasig-Tipton's Nov. 8 select sale in Kentucky.

Yet regardless of what fate has in store in the aftermath of the World Championships at Keeneland, the Nov. 7 Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint (G1T) promises to be an emotional affair for the connections of Got Stormy as she seeks a victory that eluded her a year ago.

The 5 1/2-furlong Turf Sprint, where she figures to be one of the favorites in pursuit of a $1 million purse, will be the 26th start for the $1.99 million earner, with 24 of them coming for Casse and owner Gary Barber. Jockey Tyler Gaffalione is scheduled to be aboard for the 19th time. They have been together for three full years of racing on a journey that has taken them to an array of North America's top middle-distance turf stakes and will bring them to a fork in the road in the form of the Turf Sprint.

"It will be sad to see her go," Casse said, "but she's done so many great things for us."

Some of the highlights that stand out in Casse's mind are last year's track-record victory over males in the Fourstardave Handicap (G1T) at Saratoga Race Course and a runner-up finish a few months later in the TVG Breeders' Cup Mile (G1T).

"My favorite memory? The Fourstardave. So much was said about her coming back off just a week's rest and then her winning the way she did," Casse said. "That's an easy one, but hopefully that changes next week at the Breeders' Cup."

The Turf Sprint presents a chance to record the biggest win of Got Stormy's career and add even more glitter to Casse's decision to convert the daughter of Get Stormy  from a miler into a sprinter.

"You have to give credit to Gary Barber. Here's a horse who was second in the Mile, broke a track record for a mile at Saratoga, and I'm saying let's run her at 6 1/2 furlongs at Kentucky Downs. Not every owner would go for something like that, but Gary always thinks outside of the box," Casse said. "If you're not afraid of getting beat, you can do things like that, and we have been known to take shots. Unfortunately, your win percentage doesn't look great because of that, but that's OK."

The change took place two starts ago when Got Stormy won the 6 1/2-furlong Kentucky Downs Ladies Sprint Stakes (G3T) and then prevailed in the Buffalo Trace Franklin County Stakes (G3T) at Keeneland at 5 1/2 furlongs.

"All the credit goes to Mark," Gaffalione said. "He called me up one day and said we're going to cut her back in distance and run her at Kentucky Downs. It's a tricky course, but she ran one of the best races of her career that day and then she followed it up with a big race going 5 1/2 furlongs at Keeneland."

In the Sept. 12 Ladies Sprint, Got Stormy's first race at a distance less than 7 1/2 furlongs, the daughter of the Malabar Gold mare Super Phoebe rallied from fifth and pulled away in the stretch to win by 3 1/4 lengths. A month later, victory came at the expense of Casse's nerves as she was ninth in the early stages of the Oct. 9 stakes and sixth at the eighth pole, 3 1/4 lengths behind, before Gaffalione kicked her into top gear and she narrowly reached the wire first by a nose.

"Tyler loves her," Casse said, "and after his last ride, when she just got up, he said, 'Sorry, boss, I might have been a little overconfident.' I was like, oh yeah, I was talking to you midway through the race, saying, 'Oh, Tyler, when are you going to take off?' Her stride was amazing in that last sixteenth of a mile, but it was a lot more exciting to watch it the second time, knowing how it turned out."

Though the distance of the Turf Sprint would seem to favor speedsters, races like the Franklin County show how those races at Keeneland can be conducive to closers.

"If the Breeders' Cup was at Churchill Downs, I don't know if we'd be doing this," Casse said about running in the Turf Sprint. "I've been training turf horses in Kentucky for 40 years, and my thought is that there will be some give in the ground at Keeneland for the Breeders' Cup. They don't get a lot of sun, so the ground will be soft, and running 5 1/2 furlongs on that course will be like running six or 6 1/2 furlongs, which will be perfect for her."

The decision to try sprint races came during a frustrating 5-year-old campaign. After Got Stormy closed her 2019 season with a victory in the Matriarch Stakes (G1T), she started 2020 in a sluggish manner. She was a shocking fourth in the Feb. 8 Lambholm South Endeavour Stakes (G3T) at Tampa Bay Downs at 1-5 odds and lost her next four starts, including a second in the Aug. 22 Fourstardave.

The string of five straight losses, with three fourth-place finishes, sparked doubts about her ability to beat top-caliber rivals, but Casse knew better.

"She had always run against the best horses out there. She's faced boys all over, from New York to California, and she always runs her race," Gaffalione said. "But she wasn't finishing off her runs early this year and she got beat a couple of times late. She was coming up a little short, and I was thinking maybe she didn't want to do this anymore, but Mark had faith in her."

What resonated with Casse was that Got Stormy kept encountering courses that were listed as firm but had some give in them.

"I was getting tired of hearing from everybody that Got Stormy was washed up, she was finished," Casse said. "The only thing that happened to Got Stormy was that she couldn't get lucky with weather. We had her at Saratoga for the Fourstardave and there was no rain in the forecast, yet a cloud came and it poured. At Tampa, the ground was soft."

Casse said the mare's problem with softer turf is that fatigue sets in and saps the strong closing kick she has on a rock-hard surface. In his mind, running her at a shorter distance accounts for that and allows her to handle any type of turf.

"It's not that she can't handle a soft turf," he said. "She actually loves soft turf. Her distance limitation is about 7 1/2 furlongs, so she coasts the last sixteenth of a mile at a mile. But when she gets in bog, it looks like she's coasting uphill, so it's impossible for her to go that far on that kind of surface. That's the only reason she didn't run better."

With a record of 10 wins from 25 starts, Got Stormy has proven to be an astute purchase for Barber, who bought her early in 2018 from Alan Quartucci and trainer Lisa Lewis after she finished third and fourth in her first two starts. Four starts later, she captured the Penn Oaks for the first of her eight stakes wins with Casse, who had previously trained the outstanding turf miler Tepin, the champion turf female in 2015-16.

"From the beginning, she's been great to me," Gaffalione said. "I rode her in her first start for Mark and she won easily. She was entered in a stakes next (the Sanibel Island Stakes) and lost, but she kept moving forward and progressing. She has some turn of foot. It's unlike anything I've ever felt in my life. I have so much confidence when I ride her."

She won the Ontario Colleen Stakes (G3T) at 3 and then blossomed at 4, especially after she won the Aug. 3 Fasig-Tipton De La Rose Stakes and Barber convinced Casse to run her back a week later in the Aug. 10 Fourstardave. They were rewarded with a 2 1/2-length score in a blistering 1:32.

"At 4, she came back a different horse," Gaffalione said. "She kept climbing the ladder and putting up big numbers. In April, when she was third in the (1 1/16 mile) Jenny Wiley (G1T), it was a little bit out of the distance range she wants to run, but she put in her best effort and challenged Rushing Fall and gave her all she could handle. I knew then she'd be a serious horse the rest of the year."

Though Got Stormy is scheduled to be sold a day after the Turf Sprint, Casse said a winning effort at the Breeders' Cup might not be her swan song. It could be the incentive Barber or a new owner needs to keep her in training for one more year.

"I think if she runs well, it will depend on what somebody wants to pay for her at the sale. I'm sure Gary has a price in mind. Knock on wood, she looks good, she's sound, and she could run another year. Somebody might buy her and run her another year. It's a possibility," Casse said. "Now that she has showed that she can sprint, it opens up a lot of avenues in other countries. If she stays around another year, it would be fun to take her to Royal Ascot to see how she fares. It's all been discussed, and we'll see what happens."

Until then, Casse's attention will be focused on a much more pressing matter for the multiple grade 1 winner, namely trying to add a Breeders' Cup victory to a sales page that's already quite stellar.