Lady Sabelia Captures Willa On the Move

Mrs. Frank P. Wright's grade II winner Lady Sabelia defended her title in the $100,000 Willa On the Move at Laurel Park Dec. 5 with a 1 3/4-length score over Disco Chick while covering six furlongs in 1:10.17.

It was Lady Sabelia's 10th career victory and seventh at Laurel, including the 2014 edition of the Willa On the Move, which she took by 7 3/4 lengths. The 5-year-old mare, by Majestic Warrior, has now earned $665,465 for Wright. Trained by Robin Graham and ridden by Horacio Karamanos, Lady Sabelia raced third behind a :22.62 opening quarter set by longshot Dallas Cowgirl before moving to the lead with a three-wide move around the turn in the event for fillies and mares 3-years-old and upward.

"Around the turn she wanted to go and I didn't want to stop her," Karamanos said.

Lady Sabelia won the Barbara Fritchie (gr. II) in February before finishing off the board at Keeneland in the Madison (gr. I) in April. The mare came back from a six-month layoff Nov. 1 to win the Pumpkin Pie at Belmont Park by 7 1/2 lengths.

"She's a pleasure to train. She's wonderful," Graham said. "She seems to be coming back great, wonderful."

Also on the card, Matthew Schera's Vorticity, purchased for $220,000 at the Fasig-Tipton Midlantic Sale in May, ran down Tale of E Dubai above the eighth pole and then held off Never Gone South to win the $100,000 Marylander Stakes by three-quarters of a length.

Vorticity, a son of Distorted Humor   trained by James Lawrence and ridden by Victor Carrasco, covered the seven furlongs in 1:24.63. Favored Never Gone South held second and Runningfromthefeds third.

Breaking from post two, Vorticity raced second inside Tale of E Dubai past an opening quarter in :23.15 and a half in :46.44. Carrasco took back off the leader entering the turn and then came around Tale of E Dubai to take the advantage. Vorticity then held off Never Gone South, who came into the Marylander off a second-place finish in the James F Lewis.

The Marylander was Vorticity's third career start. The colt finished third in his racing debut Oct. 10 at Laurel before breaking his maiden at Aqueduct Racetrack Nov. 8.

"First time out we were using the race as an education," Lawrence said. "I told (Schera) not to expect to win. He's good enough to win, but we wanted to see a good effort first time out. Then after that pretty sharp maiden race we started looking at a campaign."

Another impressive winner at Laurel Dec. 5 was Cash is King's Cathryn Sophia, a 12 3/4-length winner in her debut at Parx Racing Oct. 30, who make it look even easier when she effortlessly drew away down the stretch to a 16 1/4-length victory in the $100,000 The Gin Talking Stakes for 2-year-old fillies.

A daughter of Street Boss   ridden by Roberto Rosado and trained by John Servis, Cathryn Sophia, who went off the 1-9 favorite, covered the seven furlongs in 1:2317. Prognosis was second and Thundering Sky was third.

"This is a really nice filly," Rosado said. "I just sat there."

Breaking on top out of the gate, Cathryn Sophia galloped through fractions of :23.02, :46.63 and 1:11.07 and was never challenged

"She does everything so easy and she's very well behaved and acts like a race horse," Servis said. "She was a little bit of a challenge getting there, but once we got over the hump and she started training on a regular basis she showed some talent. But I had no idea she was going to be this good."