Turfway Park Synthetic Championships Lure Deep Lineups

Back in 1994, Turfway Park introduced the Kentucky Cup Day of Champions, a multi-stakes card that complemented its existing spring stakes program. Classic winners such as Tabasco Cat and Silver Charm highlighted some early runnings before the races eventually fell out of favor when overshadowed by richer stakes around the country.

Thirty years later, Turfway, flush with purse funds from gaming, is launching another lucrative day of racing—this time focused on stakes over its synthetic Tapeta surface. Four $250,000 stakes are part of the Dec. 14 nighttime card—the Turfway Park Synthetic Championships. Three of the four stakes at the Northern Kentucky track drew overflow fields—the Holiday Cheer, Prairie Bayou, and Holiday Inaugural—and the other, the My Charmer, landed a deep field of 11.

The races were previously contested for $125,000 apiece and spread over multiple weekends. 

Gary Palmisano, vice president of racing for Churchill Downs Inc., which owns and operates Turfway, said he is impressed by the quality on Saturday besides the field size.

"A couple of these races are close to becoming grade 3s, so we were really focused on recruiting quality horses," he said.

He believes the card should benefit from its placement during a relatively quiet time of year within the sports calendar, noting there was only one college football game Saturday due to the usual break between conference championships and bowl season.

Saturday's only domestic graded stakes race is the Los Alamitos Futurity (G2) at Los Alamitos Race Course.

"So we really wanted to put a flag in the ground on this particular weekend, thinking we have the undivided attention of the public," Palmisano said. "And we feel like this could really lead to a successful event both this weekend and for many years to come."

C R K Stable's 2023 Shoemaker Mile (G1T) winner, Exaulted , and Steve Moger's 2023 Santa Anita Handicap (G1) winner, Stilleto Boy , both unplaced in four starts apiece in 2024, race in the Prairie Bayou at 1 1/16 miles. Gold Square's Howard Wolowitz , who defeated a soft field for the top stakes level in the Franklin-Simpson Stakes (G1T) at Kentucky Downs, competes in the Holiday Cheer at six furlongs. He was most recently ninth in the Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint (G1T).

Some jockeys who do not regularly ride at Turfway during the winter, such as Luis Saez, Emisael Jaramillo, Florent Geroux, and Sofia Vives, are in action Saturday at Turfway.

Trainers sending horses to Kentucky for the card include Christophe Clement, Kevin Attard, and Robert Tiller.

Vives rides Frank Di Giulio Jr.'s reigning Canadian champion sprinter Patches O'Houlihan , who starts outside Woodbine for the first time in the Holiday Cheer after going 11-for-14 in Canada for Tiller.

Woodbine, like Turfway, has a Tapeta surface, and with Woodbine's season nearing a conclusion, about a half dozen who raced there are headed to Turfway.

The My Charmer and Holiday Inaugural, two races for fillies and mares, offer the top 1-2-3 finishers credits toward future stallion fees at Claiborne Farm through a "Make Your Mare" partnership. 

Tommy Town Thoroughbreds' Ghostly Gal , who edged Resolute Racing's Dana's Beauty  in last month's Claiming Crown Tiara at Churchill Downs, faces her again in the 1 1/16-mile My Charmer.

Moyglare Stud Farm's Love Appeals  and OXO Equine's Upper Case  are the likely favorites in the Holiday Inaugural.