OZONE PARK, NY – Earlier this week, trainer Jorge Delgado praised apprentice jockey Madison Olver, who guided Super Chow to her first career stakes victory in last month’s Grade 3 Toboggan at Aqueduct.
“Olver has been doing a good job with him, and with the barn in the last year. She was a regular rider for us at Monmouth and did great stuff in the mornings as well,” Delgado told NYRA publicity. “She earned this kind of mount.”
Super Chow is not an easy horse to ride. He often drifts out considerably in the stretch, but Olver kept him going in the Toboggan, and she did it once again in Saturday’s Grade 3, $175,000 Tom Fool Handicap for 4-year-olds and upward traveling six furlongs at Aqueduct.
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As in the Toboggan, Olver placed Super Chow on the lead, and they controlled fractions of 22.74 and 46.06 seconds while racing inside of favored Rotknee.
Super Chow was strong turning into the stretch but got his usual case of the drifts at the furlong pole. Unfazed, Olver pressed on with the colt, and Super Chow stayed to his task to best Manny Wah by 1 1/4 lengths in 1:10.96 over the sloppy track, and earn a 90 Beyer Speed Figure.
Stage Left finished third, 2 1/4 lengths behind the runner-up. Then came slow starting Twenty Four Mamba, Downtownchalybrown, Rotknee, and Listentoyourheart. Super Chow returned $7.60 as the second choice in the betting.
“Horses weren’t really winning on the lead today, but I really wanted it [the lead] and I didn’t see Rotknee right away, so we had a little bit of a duel,” Olver said. “In the stretch when he switches to his right lead – even though he drifts – he takes another big step forward and accelerates.”
A 4-year-old son of Lord Nelson, Super Chow won for the eighth time from 17 starts. He has earned $686,900. Bred in Kentucky by Spendthrift Farm, Super Chow was purchased for $70,000 as a yearling, then was bought for $75,000 by Lea Farms at the 2022 OBS April sale for juveniles in training.
Super Chow won six of his first eight starts, including stakes races at Keeneland, Tampa Bay, and Gulfstream. The Toboggan win snapped a seven-race losing streak, but Super Chow appears back to his best form.
Aqueduct’s Grade 2, $300,000 Carter Handicap at seven furlongs on April 6 is a potential next start.
Kinetic Sky best in Stymie
Although stable star White Abarrio recently stubbed his toe in the $20 million Saudi Cup, trainer Rick Dutrow, Jr. picked up a consolation prize when Kinetic Sky rallied from off the pace to capture the $150,000 Stymie for 4-year-olds and upward at one mile.
A 6-year-old son of Runhappy, Kinetic Sky broke from the rail post position, but was guided to the preferred outside paths to race in midpack as Quality Chic set fractions of 23.96 and 46.64 seconds while staying well off the rail.
Quality Chic shrugged off pace challenges from favored Petulante and Laughing Boy, then turned away a strong bid on the turn from Coastal Mission. He still had the lead after six furlongs in 1:11.50 but began to feel the effects of his early efforts while drifting nearer to the rail.
At this point, jockey Jose Lezcano had Kinetic Sky rolling on the far outside, and they caught Quality Chic by a nose on the wire in 1:37.08. Petulante, returning from a lengthy layoff in his first start for Dutrow, re-rallied in between horses to finish a half-length behind the runner-up.
Then came Coastal Mission, Double Crown, Castle Chaos, Iron Works, and Laughing Boy. Kinetic Sky returned $11.80 as the fourth choice in the betting.
“I got kind of a tough [post] position inside today and when I asked him to go and get position outside, he was there for me and went on to finish up,” Lezcano told track publicity. “My horse was always there. He broke good and we were sitting well where we sat.”
Dutrow claimed Kinetic Sky for $62,500 at Aqueduct during the spring of 2023. He won two allowance races at Aqueduct during the fall and winter, then finished a game third, a nose behind runner-up Quality Chic, in the Queens Country on New Year’s Eve.
Sent off the odds-on favorite in his seasonal debut, the Grade 3 Toboggan over muddy going on Feb. 3, Kinetic Sky was compromised by a slow pace when wired by Super Chow.
Bred in Kentucky by Elm Tree Farm, Curt Leake, Time Will Tell LLC, and Warren Harang, Kinetic Sky is owned by Sanford Goldfarb, Aland Kahn, David Tanzman, and Steven Speranza. He has won 7 of 27 starts for lifetime earnings of $598,768.
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