McKulick Stands Out in Four-Horse Flower Bowl

Normally in a graded turf stakes in New York for fillies and mares, the numbers favor trainer Chad Brown.

Yet in the Sept. 2 Flower Bowl Stakes (G2T), it is trainer Christophe Clement who has quantity on his side. Clement will send out half the field for the $500,000 distaff turf stakes at Saratoga Race Course. Of course, with a field of only four in the 1 3/8-mile Flower Bowl, quantity takes on a different meaning than in most instances.

Meanwhile, Brown has proven quality on his side with his lone starter, McKulick . Owned by Klaravich Stables, the 4-year-old daughter of Frankel  is a grade 1, 2, and 3 winner who has placed in six additional graded stakes. On Saturday she will face a field in which only one of the other three starters has registered a group or graded stakes win on turf.

"She looks good," Brown said. "I've been really happy with her training and we penciled this in right after (she won the Aug. 3 Glens Falls Stakes, G2T, at Saratoga). She seems to run well at Saratoga."

McKulick, named for Brown's late bookkeeper, Mary McKulick, will be the four-time Eclipse Award winner's hope for a record-extending eighth victory in the Flower Bowl. She can also wrap up a guaranteed, fees-paid spot in the Breeders' Cup Filly and Mare Turf (G1T) through a victory in the Breeders' Cup Challenge Series: "Win and You're In" stakes.

She enters Saturday's race off a neck victory in the Glens Falls over multiple grade 1-winning War Like Goddess . It was her second win in three starts at Saratoga, adding to a maiden win and a second in last year's Saratoga Oaks Invitational Stakes (G3T).

"She's come around and was a little slow to come into form this year, but now I think she's doing better than ever," said Brown, whose filly captured the Belmont Oaks Invitational Stakes (G1T) last year and closed 2022 with a second in the Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup Stakes (G1T) at Keeneland. "She needed a little more fitness and such, and this time of year, she's at her best physically. She's carrying the most weight I've seen her carry and she's really loving the summer. I think it's leading to her success."

War Like Goddess, who won the 2021 Flower Bowl when it was a grade 1 affair and was second to Brown's Virginia Joy  in last year's race, missed some training time due to a fever after the Glens Falls and trainer Bill Mott did not enter the $2 million earner in Saturday's edition. 

Mott was uncertain of future plans for the 6-year-old mare but listed two 1 1/2-mile stakes races against males as possibilities: the $1.7 million Kentucky Downs Turf Cup (G2T) Sept. 9 or a bid for back-to-back wins in the $500,000 Joe Hirsch Turf Classic Stakes (G1T) Sept. 30 at Aqueduct Racetrack.

As for the Flower Bowl, Clement's duo is topped by Moyglare Stud Farm's Amazing Grace . A 5-year-old Protectionist  mare, she was third in the Glens Falls, 2 1/2 lengths behind McKulick.

A group 2 winner in Germany, in her April 1 United States debut she captured the Orchid Stakes (G3T), a 1 1/2-mile turf test at Gulfstream Park.

Clement also will send out West Point Thoroughbreds and Dream With Me Stable's Parnac , a Zarak  filly who was third in the July 1 Robert G. Dick Memorial Stakes (G3T) at Delaware Park.

Andrew Rosen and Linda Shanahan's Tamarama , making her first U.S. start in the Flower Bowl for trainer Jack Sisterson, completes the field.