Decorated Solider Makes the Grade in Seagram Cup

Longshot Decorated Solider earned his first graded stakes victory Aug. 12 when he upset an accomplished field in the $125,000 Seagram Cup Stakes (G3) at Woodbine.

Norm McKnight trains the 5-year-old Proud Citizen gelding, who was claimed for $20,000 April 13 at Oaklawn Park for owners Racer's Edge and Maxis Stable. Gary Boulanger was aboard for the gate-to-wire victory over 1 1/16 miles on the synthetic main track.

Decorated Soldier led the way through fractions of :23.54, :46.69, and 1:10.77 while pressured by Shakhimat, then drew clear off the final turn to win in 1:43.71 by 2 1/4 lengths.

"He's just been a diamond in the rough—a real treasure," said McKnight, who has watched Decorated Solider win three of his four starts since arriving at Woodbine. "We took a look at this horse in Oaklawn when we were down there. We liked everything we saw about him. The reason we were particularly interested is he'd never been on the synthetic and never been on the grass, so I thought they were two angles that he possibly might have a big move, but we never dreamt that he'd be doing what he's been doing. We just thought he was a nice, solid horse at the time, but he's just kept getting better and better.

"I know Gary's rode him a few times for us, but right from day one, when he rode him, he said, 'This is a serious horse.' So we've just gone with that, and until he dropped the ball, we were just going to keep being aggressive with him and putting him in spots and let him show us whether he belonged or not."

The McKnight-trained Florida Won, who won the 2015 Seagram Cup and was a $40,000 claim by Bruno Schickedanz this spring, was just nosed out by Gigantic Breeze in a photo for second.

"I would have loved to have been second with the other half, but he ran a great race as well," McKnight said. "Going into the race, I thought we had two different types of horses—one off the pace and one that I knew could go to the front. And I thought if the lead horse weakens, hopefully we're setting it up for the horse coming off the pace. It almost worked out to perfection, but the head bob got us."

Favored millionaire Are You Kidding Me finished fourth, defending champion Melmich rounded out the top five, and Shakhimat faded to last.

The McKnight trainees were the longest shots on the board, each at 9-1 odds.