Mo Tom Set for Grass Debut, Likely Retirement

Mo Tom, a grade 3 winner as a 3-year-old in 2016, will make his grass debut Jan. 5 and then could be retired to stud in Louisiana.

The Uncle Mo  colt, owned by Gayle and Tom Benson's G M B Racing and trained by Tom Amoss, has won or placed in 10 of 18 starts, including four wins, and has earned $665,356. He was most recently eighth in the Clark Handicap presented by Norton Healthcare (G1) at Churchill Downs and is scheduled to contest a conditioned allowance race around two turns on turf Jan. 5 at Fair Grounds Race Course & Slots.

Depending upon how he runs, there is a strong possibility Mo Tom will then be retired, according to Greg Bensel, the Bensons' racing manager. Mo Tom also is cataloged in the Jan. 8 session of the Keeneland horses of all ages sale but most likely will be withdrawn from the auction.

With a tentative agreement reached between the owners and a breeding farm in Louisiana for Mo Tom to enter stud beginning with the 2018 breeding season, the Jan. 5 race could be his career finale.

"He turns 5 in January and he's had a nice career. We were thinking what is the end game and the Keeneland sale was one of the options, but we'll probably scratch him out of the sale," Bensel said. "But he's been training great and doing well at the track so we're going to give him one peek at the grass."

With the Bensons recently retiring grade 2 winner Tom's Ready , a son of More Than Ready , to stand at Spendthrift Farm near Lexington, they are opting to send Mo Tom to Louisiana as a way to help boost that state's stallion ranks.

"At the end of the day, the primary goal of the Bensons and G M B Racing is to support Louisiana breeding any way we can," Bensel said of the Bensons, who own the NFL's New Orleans Saints and NBA's Pelicans. They also own farms in Kentucky and Louisiana. "Right now, the plan is to get him to the farm during the first couple of weeks of January. If he wins by 20 lengths Jan. 5 we will have to re-think that, but that's the plan."

Mo Tom has not been tested on grass and is unable to train over it at Fair Grounds, and Amoss said the connections are giving him an opportunity based on the turf breeding in his female family and the versatility of Uncle Mo as a sire of successful dirt and grass runners.

Although the colt has placed in three of his eight starts this year, including a third in a stakes race at Indiana Grand Race Course, he has not shown his previous form, thus the attempt on grass.

"We just haven't seen the consistent performance we would like to see, so we're trying some different options to see if we can get him going again," the trainer said.

Bred in Kentucky by Hargus and Sandra Sexton and Silver Fern Farm, Mo Tom was foaled May 6, 2013, two days after that year's Kentucky Derby Presented by Yum! Brands (G1). He was purchased by G M B for $150,000 out of the Warrendale Sales consignment to the 2014 Keeneland September yearling sale.

Despite being a late foal, Mo Tom was one of the precocious stakes-winning 2-year-olds of 2015 that helped propel Ashford Stud's Uncle Mo to the top of the first-crop sire list. The colt was on the Triple Crown trail in early 2016 after winning the LeComte Stakes (G3) over stablemate Tom's Ready. Third in the Veterans Ford Risen Star Stakes (G2), the colt ran fourth as the favorite in the Twinspires.com Louisiana Derby (G2) before finishing eighth in Nyquist 's Kentucky Derby.

In June of 2016, he returned to win the Ohio Derby and has been winless in nine subsequent starts.

"Everything up to and including the Ohio Derby was everything we expected from Mo Tom," Amoss said. "He was a May foal so we were really excited about what he would do as he got older. Our biggest setback was in the fall of last year at Saratoga when he just didn't care for the track and it took its toll on him. It was nothing major but he didn't train well after that.

"He got very unenthusiastic about his training; he wasn't into it any more. He'd been going for a long time. We just gave him some time off with the expectation he would come back at 4."

Overall, Amoss said Mo Tom "is an easy horse to train. Very straightforward. He's had a tremendous maturity since he was a 3-year-old getting ready for the Kentucky Derby. He was always tall and had a lot of frame but that frame never filled in until he came back at 4 and was a very attractive horse."