Champion Untapable Returns to Worktab

As racing manager David Fiske tells it, Winchell Thoroughbreds' champion Untapable has been hanging out in New Orleans this winter, "jogging and galloping and eating gumbo."

But the 5-year-old daughter of Tapit   returned to the worktab Jan. 28 with a four-furlong breeze in :52 at Fair Grounds Race Course & Slots, so perhaps her gumbo-eating days are coming to an end with a 2016 racing campaign just around the corner.

The last time fans saw the talented bay mare on the track, she gutted out a valiant second, a neck behind Got Lucky, in the Oct. 4 Juddmonte Spinster Stakes (gr. I). The race was supposed to set her up for a defense of her title in the Longines Breeders' Cup Distaff (gr. I), but instead she was declared from the Distaff after spiking a temperature three days before the race.   

SHULMAN: Untapable Out of BC Distaff

Following her fever Untapable spent time at KESMARC for turnout and treatments in the hyperbaric chamber.

"We just wanted to give her every opportunity to get healthy again," Fiske said. "She enjoyed the change of scenery and had a vacation over there for a month or so before she went down to Fair Grounds. She has been doing great; the work today was her first real timed work back so it wasn't anything too spectacular, but she has been moving great and hopefully we keep moving forward." 

The ultimate goal for Untapable is a return to the Breeders' Cup at Santa Anita Park, where she won the Distaff in 2014 as one of her five grade I victories for trainer Steve Asmussen. In 2015 she got the year started with a second in the Azeri Stakes (gr. II) at Oaklawn Park, then followed up with a win in the Apple Blossom (gr. I) at the Arkansas track.

LEWYN: Untapable Coasts Clear in Apple Blossom Win

It was her only victory of the season. She turned in seconds in the Ogden Phipps Stakes (gr. I) and Shuvee Handicap (gr. III), along with a third in the Personal Ensign (gr. I), before her Spinster run.

"I don't know if she'll get ready in time to defend her Apple Blossom title, but there are also big races for older horses at Churchill and in New York," Fiske said. "With the main goal being Breeders' Cup, it's not like we're in a big hurry. We may race her a few times, give her a little rest, and then ramp her back up for Breeders' Cup again."



While retirement could have been an option at the end of last year, Fiske said Untapable has been a remarkably sound and talented runner. A homebred out of the Prized mare Fun House, she has a 9-4-2 record from 17 starts for earnings of $3,816,513.

She was named champion 3-year-old filly in 2014 when she won six of seven starts, only missing when fifth against males in the William Hill Haskell Invitational (gr. I).

SHINAR: Untapable Powers to Breeders' Cup Distaff Win

"Knock on wood, she's been very sound up to this point," Fiske said. "Really, she has been remarkably illness- and issue-free. If she was something we were just trying to hold together or she'd had some chronic problems we might have decided to do something differently.

"Our main focus is breeding and raising racehorses, and she's the only champion we've got in the barn. We could have brought her home and bred her, but the probability of her producing something as good as she is—I don't know about that. We've already got a racehorse and a good one, so we might as well keep her in training."