Eric Wing: Welcome indeed to this NTRA Communications National Media Teleconference.
Another important weekend on tap as we get closer to the Triple Crown. On Saturday, a pair of Grade 2 events on the dirt: the $350,000 Tampa Bay Derby at Tampa Bay Downs, of course, and out west the $300,000 San Felipe Stakes at Santa Anita. Also, we’ve got a grass event that has some Kentucky Derby implications, and that would be Sunday’s Grade 3 $150,000 Palm Beach Stakes at Gulfstream.
A little bit later in the call we’ll check in with trainer, Eddie Kenneally, who will send out the Sam F. Davis winner, Battle Hardened, in the Tampa Bay Derby. And we’ll also talk to Mike Harrington, who has a pair of very intriguing candidates for the San Felipe in Creative Cause and Empire Way. First up, though, we’ve got with us Dale Romans, who has last year’s Breeders’ Futurity winner, Dullahan, ready to make his three year old debut in Sunday’s Palm Beach Stakes at Gulfstream. Dale, it’s Eric Wing. How are you today?
Dale Romans: I’m doing well.
Eric Wing: Glad to hear it. Well, Dale, it looks like you’ve chosen the same Palm Beach to Bluegrass path to the Kentucky Derby that worked so well for Paddy O’Prado a couple of years ago. Is this a simple matter of sticking with what’s worked in the past?
Dale Romans: Yes, I think we’re all creatures of habit, and it did work for us with Paddy, and this is a horse who’s proven that he can run on the turf and the synthetics winning the Grade 1 at Keeneland, so it made sense.
Eric Wing: And, Dale, Dullahan is a half brother to Mine That Bird, who was a very lightly made horse and pretty easy on himself; perhaps that helped him get the longer distances. Is that how Dullahan is as well?
Dale Romans: Well, he’s not a big robust horse, but I think he’s a little bigger than Mine That Bird. I’ve seen—I’ve seen a couple of the foals out of the mare, and I thought that he was her best individual. And, you know, he’s just such an easy mover just like Mine That Bird was. He covers a lot of ground, and he’s very easy on himself.
Eric Wing: And before we throw it to the media, Dale, Dullahan wracked up a bunch of graded earnings last year, not just with the Breeders’ Futurity win, but—you know—fourth in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile that’s worth $120,000. Does that take some pressure off as a trainer in terms of allowing you to plot the path that you absolutely like the most for a given horse?
Eric Wing: Well, it does, but it’s a different kind of pressure. The last couple of years we were scrambling to get horses into the Derby, and get them into the right races to get enough purse money. It’s a little different type of pressure when you have a horse that’s already banked the money, and now you just have to keep him safe and sound and get your few races in before the big race.
Danny Brewer: Hey, the versatility of Dullahan, is that one of his really strong assets?
Dale Romans: I think it is. And I think this—you know—like Paddy O’Prado, he’s proven he can run on anything. He ran a monster race on the poly at Keeneland, and he’s run some really nice turf races, and his race in the Breeders’ Cup was sneaky good. I don’t know if people picked up on how good it was. I mean he got really squeezed. He shut off in the first turn, was all the way back to last, and showed a big run down the lane on the dirt. So he is very versatile, and that’s a good thing in any horse.
Danny Brewer: Now, you had a lot of success there at Churchill, and him having that good run, is that something that you put a lot of stock in his Breeders’ Cup, do you (inaudible) that is?
Dale Romans: Repeat that one more time. I couldn’t hear the end of it.
Danny Brewer: Did you put a lot of stock in him running good at Churchill in the Juvenile last year?
Dale Romans: Yes. I thought that he proved to me and to the whole ownership group of Donegal that he can run with the best horses in the world on the dirt. You know, so he kind—we were kind of wondering ourselves if he was going to be a poly or turf specialist, but the race he ran in the Breeders’ Cup I thought was as good as any race he’s run, and proved he can run on the dirt.
Danny Brewer: Dale, I appreciate your comment. I wish you the best of luck.
Dale Romans: Thank you.
Operator: Thank you. The next question comes from Jennie Rees from Louisville Courier-Journal. Please go ahead.
Jennie Rees: Dale, you’ve called the Juvenile sneaky good. Could you just kind of also comment through the filter of what—you know—Handsome (ph) came back and won, Union Rags just won the—you know—the Fountain of Youth quite impressively, and—you know—we’ll see what Creative Cause does in his next race, but just maybe the competition, and does that come into play at all in your assessment of the race?
Dale Romans: It does. I think that it was a quality race. There was the—some really good horses. I think it’s a good group of three years olds from what I’ve seen around the country; some pretty impressive performances, and Dullahan showed he can run with them. It was a—like I said, it was a little better race than it looks like on paper. Anybody who watched it up close saw the trouble he got in early and saw the ground he made up on a speed (inaudible)—a little bit of a speed (inaudible) racetrack, so I was impressed with him. I’m impressed with this whole crop. I think it’s a bunch of good three year olds.
Jennie Rees: Now, speaking of the crop, you lost one of the—you know—horses that would’ve been one of the favorites in O’Prado again. The (inaudible) to injury, and then just in the last week and a half we’ve had two of the favorites go by the wayside. Does it make you hold your breath when you show up at the barn in the morning?
Dale Romans: Well, you hold your breath any time you have these top caliber horses like this. I mean they—to lose a horse like O’Prado, again, was a big blow to the stable. Fortunately, he’s going to be back. He’ll be back late summer running again, and it wasn’t career ending. But—you know—you’ve got such a tight window to get a horse to the Triple Crown, that—you know—you can’t have any bumps in the road, and we’ve been very fortunate with Dullahan that he hasn’t had any problems. A little bit of a cough down here for a couple of days, but other than that, there hasn’t been any bumps in the road.
Jennie Rees: Speaking of tight windows, Paddy O’Prado broke his maiden in the Palm Beach I believe it was, and then this horse of course broke it in the Breeders’ Futurity, Battle Hardened broke his in the Sam Davis. What is it like for you when you have horses like this? At a certain point do you just say we can’t wait around on another maiden race, we think they’re good enough; we’ve got to go on with it?
Dale Romans: Well, my personal philosophy, I’ve run quite a few maidens in stakes and it’s been to try to time their big effort. When you see them turning the corner and getting better and they’re training very well, just go ahead and hope that their big effort comes in that stake instead of having to see it in an allowance race and then move on to a stake. And we’ve been lucky—you know—taking that path with some horses.
Jennie Rees: And do you have a sense of—you’ve raced on all three surfaces, which is his best? You talked about versatility, but like Paddy O’Prado ended up being a superior grass horse.
Dale Romans: Yes, Paddy O’Prado I think was a little better on the grass. I think this horse is—personally, I feel like he’s going to be his best on the dirt. I thought—like I say, I thought the race at Churchill was maybe his best race that he’s run, and I think he’s—you know—the grass and the synthetic, we know he likes them both, and they’re going to be easier on him as stepping stones to get to the Derby, and that’s why—another reason for taking those steps. But I think in the long run, his—the dirt is going to be his surface.
Jennie Rees: Final question. I assume you were involved in the purchasing process at some point with this horse
Dale Romans: Yes, Jerry Crawford put the whole team together for Donegal’s purchases at the yearling sale, and there’s a big group of us. And then the final say is always Jerry’s, but we go through and end up with—he does a pedigree analysis, and we’ve got several steps we go through, and this was one of the horses that jumped through every hoop perfectly.
Jennie Rees: Did he jump through an extra hoop because he was a half to a Derby winner? I mean how much more appealing did that make him as a yearling?
Dale Romans: Well, it was very appealing to us and to me, and the fact that we knew the family and we thought that he was probably the best looking yearling that the mare had had. And she’d already had a derby winner and a very productive allowance horse that (inaudible) had, and I thought this was the best of her foals. So that had quite a bit to do with it. If you can get a half to a derby winner, you should try to get it.
Jennie Rees: And this is my really, really final question. What about—you know—no mare has ever had two Kentucky Derby winners. Were those stats made to be broken, or…?
Dale Romans: Seems like it’s time for one to have one.
Jennie Rees: All right. Thanks, Dale.
Dale Romans: All right, okay.
Paul Daley: Yes, Dale. To follow-up on Jennie’s question, the Donegal Racing operation, it seems like it’s out of Ireland with the name Dullahan. Where does the name come from?
Dale Romans: I don’t know the story exactly right, so I might be wrong. The horse is by Even the Score. And from what I’ve been told, Dullahan is a character in Ireland that rode around on his horse with a sword made from a (inaudible) of the country. And so it kind of fit. He was evening the scores and the—Donegal does have Irish roots, and it was a pretty clever name.
Paul Daley: Okay, and…
Dale Romans: (Inaudible) credited to I guess Jerry Crawford.
Paul Daley: Okay. And he was a top seller at Keeneland in 2010 when the sire average was $37,000. What stood out for the connections to be able to—you know—pay that price for it?
Dale Romans: Well, the sire average was high, but I would venture to say that the average for mares that have produced derby winners was low. So—you know—you had a very strong mare, and we liked the cross, the mix were all right, and the stamina and the pedigree. Those were the things that stood out. That’s what we look for when we go to the yearling sale for Donegal.
Paul Daley: Okay, and last question is what did the workout last Saturday of a minute and three at Gulfstream tell you about this race?
Dale Romans: Well, it tells me he’s sharp and he’s ready to go. He’s actually turned the corner from two to three like you want to see a horse do, and he’s doing everything on his own right now. And I think he’s fit and ready. I mean—you know—this race isn’t the end all; we’re not going to squeeze the limit. We want to make sure that he’s peaking the first Saturday in May. But this—I’m expecting a big effort out of him.
Carol Holden: Hi, Dale. Thanks for joining us today. Most trainers seem to work backwards form the Derby with a horse. I was wondering if you did that, and at what point you realized you might have a Derby horse and you started working in that direction?
Dale Romans: Well, we always liked this horse, and everything we buy at the yearling sales we consider a Derby horse until they prove us wrong. This horse kept taking little steps in the right direction in his training and in his races, and then when we decided to run him in the Futurity at Keeneland and he ran such a big race, that’s when we realized that we have a legit contender. We’d already banked enough money, and start working back from there. The Breeders’ Cup was a pretty easy choice, and then really if you look at it, the Palm Beach and the decision—the big decision was just to only have two races before the Derby. And—you know—that was a lot of discussion with Jerry, and we decided that we thought two was enough for him, and that he would be peaking in his third race. And at that point, the Bluegrass and (inaudible) on the track seemed logical, and then took (inaudible) bringing him out in the (inaudible) as far as we could find, and the Palm Beach to me was a logical race to bring him out.
Carol Holden: You as a trainer like most trainers started out with claiming horses and that in your background. You have been very fortunate to step up into the national scene. What are some of the things that you can attribute to the fact that you have been able to make that step forward to the stakes company and that as opposed to some trainers just never seem to get out of the claiming ranks?
Dale Romans: I mean that’s a tough question to answer. You know, you said there’s some great horse trainers out that have trained in claiming horses that don’t get the opportunities that I’ve been fortunate enough to get. And I don’t know why they don’t, and I just feel fortunate to have had the owners come to me and give me the horses that we could develop into stake horses. And—you know—Ken Ramsey was a big part of that. He—when we started together he allowed me to have some really good horses, and gave me the confidence to run them in the big races. And then this—we were successful, and it’s just kind of grown from there. But you’re right, there’s a lot of great horseman trainers out there that aren’t getting the opportunities they deserve.
Carol Holden: Well, congratulations to you and continued success.
Dale Romans: Thank you.
Jon White: Dale, I wanted to talk to you about News Pending who ran such a good race in the Fountain of Youth. How’s he doing, and tell us your thoughts again on his race in the Fountain of Youth?
Dale Romans: Well, you know, he’s a horse that’s steadily improved also, and—you know—he was a long shot in the Fountain of Youth. I felt like he was going to run big he was just training so well, and I thought—I think that down the road, the further you go with him the better he’s going to be, and that’s why it was important to try to start getting some earnings. Now—you know—there really aren’t any races further than a mile and an eighth until that last group of preps, and then you’re just waiting for one big hit to try to get in. So we decided to give him one shot in the Fountain of Youth and it worked out, and he came out of the race in really good shape, and I think that he could be a contender.
Jon White: Is the plan to go on to the Florida Derby?
Dale Romans: That’s most likely what we’ll do, but we’re going to keep our options open and look around the country at all the preps that—and just make sure we pick the right one. But the Florida Derby right now would probably be the top of the list, but I have to talk to Mr. (inaudible) about it, and we’ll make a decision here in the next few days.
Jon White: What is he like physically, and what’s he kind of like personality-wise?
Dale Romans: Well, he’s a big, strong colt, and—you know—we gave $250,000 for him at the two year old sale, and—you know—his sire, Harlan’s Holiday, he’s really getting it done I think, and he’s—this is just a big, pretty, flashy black horse who’s got a very good head on his shoulders. Like all good horses; they’re all smart.
Jon White: You’ve been coming close to the Derby—Kentucky Derby. Just what would it mean for you to win the Kentucky Derby?
Dale Romans: Well, I mean it would be big. And there’s a lot put in—there’s always a lot talked about that I’m from Louisville and grew up right there on the backside of Churchill Downs, and I mean it would be—it would be the highlight of my career. But it would be for any trainer’s career. I don’t care where you come from or where you’re raise, if you’re in the thoroughbred business you want to win the Kentucky Derby, and—you know—it just—it puts you in the history books.
Eric Wing: Dale, Jon asked you about News Pending, I want to ask you about a couple of the other three year olds in your stable just to get an update. Finnegan’s Wake, who was third behind Handsome and My Adonis in the Wood and also Cozzetti, who I know you’ve thought had some potential at some point.
Dale Romans: Well, first of all, Cozzetti, I still think he has potential. I don’t’ think—I think he’s a horse that really hasn’t turned the corner for us yet that’s going to keep improving. Physically and natural ability is all there, he’s just got—it’s just got to click mentally for him. And we’re going to give him another big shot probably Tampa, and see if he can get on the Derby trail. I think Finnegan put himself on the Derby trail last week in New York. I thought it was a big effort out of him. And he’s another colt that just wants to run all day long, and it’s—you know—we’re just now getting to the point where the races are running as far as he wants to run, and I think we’ll probably end up back at the Wood. I’m going to talk to Jerry about it more. We talked about it a little last night, and we may end up back at the Wood to run a mile and an eighth.
Eric Wing: Okay, and so it looks good for Cozzetti running this Saturday at Tampa then?
Dale Romans: Yes.
Eric Wing: Okay. Well, Dale, thank you as always for being with us on these calls; always enjoy having you. And I guess we will wish you the best of luck not just in the Palm Beach with Dullahan, but also Saturday in the Tampa Bay Derby with Cozetti. Thanks again, Dale.
Dale Romans: Thanks for having me.
Eric Wing: That’s trainer Dale Romans. He’ll send out, as we mentioned, Dullahan, in the Palm Beach Stakes. That’s on Sunday, and that’s a stepping stone for that colt to go on to the Toyota Blue Grass Stakes. And we also heard that Cozetti will throw his hat into the Tampa Bay Derby ring on Saturday at Tampa Bay Downs, when he’ll take on the likes of Battle Hardened, and Motor City, and the others.
And speaking of Battle Hardened, our next guest is trainer Eddie Kenneally. Eddie has something in common with Dale Romans in that, like Dullahan, Battle Hardened also broke his maiden in a stakes. Dullahan did so in the Breeders’ Futurity, and Eddie Kenneally did so with Battle Hardened in the Sam F. Davis stakes at Tampa Bay Downs on February 4th, and Battle Hardened will be searching for career win number two in Saturday’s Tampa Bay Derby Battle Hardened, certainly on paper one of the horses to beat Saturday at Tampa Bay Downs in the Grade 2 $350,000 guaranteed Tampa Bay Derby.
Eric Wing: Eddie, welcome to the call. It’s Eric Wing in New York. How are you today?
Eddie Kenneally: I’m well, Eric. Thanks very much.
Eric Wing: Our pleasure. Thank you, Eddie. And it’s funny, we were talking earlier to Dale Romans about Dullahan who broke his maiden in the Breeders’ Futurity last year at Keeneland, and it’s always a gutsy move to run a maiden against winners let alone in a stakes. But Battle Hardened is owned by the very successful duo of Michael Tabor and Mrs. John Magnier. Did that make your decision to run him as a maiden in the Sam F. Davis all the tougher in that you’d have to explain it to Mr. Tabor and Mrs. Magnier?
Eddie Kenneally: Well, we certainly want to do good for all of our clients, as well as Mr. Tabor and the Magniers, and whatnot. And—you know—when you’re dealing with a horse of this caliber, and we feel like he’s got enough ability and quality to get to the Kentucky Derby, and he’s moving forward and improving all the time, and we’re kind of running out of time from a graded stakes earnings point of view if we wanted to take a run at—or look at the Kentucky Derby, so we felt like he’s an improving horse and he’s still a maiden, and he didn’t have any graded stakes earnings, and this was back in the January/February time, and looking at the Sam Davis race, it didn’t look like it was coming up super tough, so we looked at it real close, and we thought we’d take a shot at it. Because the option was to run him in a maiden race at Gulfstream, and we felt like even if he was to win the maiden race at Gulfstream, we still might be playing catch-up if we were trying to get to the Kentucky Derby. So we—at the end of the day, we chose to go to Tampa and run in the Sam Davis, and it worked out well; got the job done, and now we have a little cushion, let’s say.
Eric Wing: That you do. It was obviously a great gamble and a great decision on your part, Eddie. The water gets a little deeper this Saturday with horses like Take Charge Indy, Motor City, Spring Hill Farm among the probables. Is this the race that you think will tell you that you indeed have a Kentucky Derby horse, or might tip off how you might expect to do in Kentucky?
Eddie Kenneally: Definitely. We’ll learn a lot more again about our horse on Saturday, because you’re right, it is a tougher group of horses. But our horse went over there to Tampa from Palm Meadows and handled the surface really well, and sometimes that can be a little difficult shipping into Tampa. So he’s already jumped that hurdle successfully. So now he’s faced with a tougher group of horses for sure, but he’s improving, so I feel like we’re going in the right direction with this horse, and I think he’s ready to go.
Don Jensen: Yes, Eddie, you took Santiva to the Derby last year, and your first Derby horse. Can you compare how Battle Hardened—what stage of his career, how he’s—kind of shapes up with Santiva?
Eddie Kenneally: I can. Well, they’re two totally different horses even though they’re both sons of Giant’s Causeway. Santiva was a graded stakes winner as a two year old at Churchill Downs. He won the Grade 2 Kentucky Jockey Club. And in his preparation for the Kentucky Derby, his first race he was second and the Risen Star at Fair Grounds. And we opted to run him in the Blue Grass, and—as his final prep for the Derby, and just didn’t have a great trip that day and just things didn’t work out for him. But he did run quite well in the Kentucky Derby, and he was beaten five lengths. He ran respectable actually.
Now, Battle Hardened, of course, a different type of a horse because he’s a bigger, slower maturing horse that hasn’t fully developed or matured yet, and I feel like he’s going to peak some time here in the spring, which would be ideal. So he didn’t really get to anywhere near his best until, let’s say, the 1st of January really. So he was still a maiden as a two year old, even though he did run twice. He was second in a couple of maiden races. So he hasn’t accomplished as much as Santiva had at this time, but I feel like he’s a horse that’s going to continue to improve, and hopefully at the end of the day he’ll have accomplished a lot more.
Don Jensen: Great. Eddie, also—you know—these horses are going to be a little bit tougher this Saturday. How is your confidence level with him compared to Santiva at his stage also?
Eddie Kenneally: I’m real confident with Battle Hardened, because I know this horse is—we haven’t seen the best of him yet. He’s just now starting to—like I said, he’s a big horse, he’s not fully reached his full potential just yet, so I feel like I’m very confident, because I—I have a good feeling about him that he will continue to improve as the races get tougher.
Don Jensen: And, Eddie, one last question. If you can win this race, it pretty much punches your ticket to the Kentucky Derby. Have you thought about that yet?
Eddie Kenneally: I’ve thought about it quite a bit certainly. We know the Tampa Bay Derby is eight weeks before the Kentucky Derby. We know that if he could win the Tampa Bay Derby that we would definitely, as you say, punched our ticket to go to the Derby. Then he’s got to continue to do well in the eight weeks between there and the Kentucky Derby, and most likely run one more time between Tampa and the Kentucky Derby. So we’ve got to look at all of that, but certainly we’ve taken it all into consideration.
Paul Daley: Yes, Eddie. I saw in a report that Julien Leparoux may be the jockey. Is that so? And also, if it is so, he’s also been—you know—named on Union Rags, and what do you do as far as jockeys are concerned?
Eddie Kenneally: Well, Julien knows the horse, and he is riding him in the Tampa Bay Derby. We—after that we’ll see what happens. We’ll just take one race at a time, but we’re delighted that Julien is available to ride him back in the Tampa Bay Derby after winning the Sam Davis. And as far as Union Rags goes, I mean he’s by far the legitimate leader of the three year old division right now, so at some point perhaps we’ll be looking for a rider. But we’ll just stick with what’s working for right now, and figure it out as we go forward.
Paul Daley: And I know it’s a case of musical chairs—you know—with riders at this time of year, but if things work out and Julien can’t ride, are there any other riders you’re looking at?
Eddie Kenneally: We’ll just find out where we’re racing next after the Tampa Bay Derby, and then we’ll find out who’s available and then we’ll go from there. So we’re not going to—we’re not going to dive in and name any rider at this point, because, frankly, we don’t know where we’re running, and we don’t know who’s available until after the fact. So as it all unfolds, we’ll figure that one out.
Jennie Rees: Yes, Eddie, you mentioned that this was a big horse and it’s going to take some time to hit its best stride. Did it surprise you it took four races just for him to break his maiden? He was close in all of them.
Eddie Kenneally: Yes, perhaps. I mean he was—Jennie, his races were good even though—his first three races were good; the two of them were seconds, and they were both two turn races. He was just a little bit unlucky not to have won in his third start, which was a maiden race at Gulfstream going a mile and an eighth. He was second beaten a head after an extremely wide trip So I felt like he could’ve and was the best—could’ve won that race and was the best horse in the race, but he just didn’t have any luck with the wide trip. So thankfully he redeemed himself and came right back and ran a huge race after that in the Sam Davis. So at the end of the day, it did work out okay, Jennie.
Jennie Rees: Looking at the company he’s kept, too, I mean those are like Indian Ambush, Najar (ph), how do you pronounce it? I mean it looks like he ran into some tough maiden races as well as being unlucky. I’m just saying—you know—that it looks like he’s been keeping good company.
Eddie Kenneally: Yes, and that’s kind of what you run into in the fall at Churchill first off. He ran in a couple of maiden races at Churchill at the fall meet, and typically you run into some nice two year olds in all of those races. And then, of co