Knightsbridge rolls to the front and doesn’t look back, Gulfstream Park Photo
Gulfstream Park Press
HALLANDALE BEACH, FL – Godolphin’s Knightsbridge doesn’t race all that often, but when the 4-year-old son of Nyquist does go to post, he usually makes the most of the opportunity, as he did Saturday at Gulfstream Park.
Sent to the gate as the prohibitive 1-5 favorite, Knightsbridge came through for the bettors, Godolphin and Hall of Fame trainer Bill Mott with a thoroughly dominant performance to register a 4 ¾-length triumph in the $150,000 Mr. Prospector (G3).
White Abarrio, who finished second in the Mr. Prospector prior to winning last season’s $3 million Pegasus World Cup Invitational (G1), was the even-money morning-line favorite for Saturday’s 71st running of the seven-furlong stakes but was declared as a non-starter by trainer Saffie Joseph Jr. Friday afternoon.
Knightsbridge, who was listed at 7-5 on the morning-line, captured his first stakes Saturday in the second stakes try of his six-race career, as well as notching his first graded-stakes win in his second start in a graded stakes.
“It’s been a long time. Our target when he was a 3-year-old was the Pat Day Mile at Churchill, but in his last work before the race he came up with a little issue,” Mott said. “It’s happened a couple times with him. Hopefully, now, he’s got everything in order. He’s solid. He appears to have come back solid. We’ve been able to run back here in four or five weeks, whatever it was. Hopefully we can move forward from here.”
Knightsbridge, a half-brother to Grade 1 winner Speaker’s Corner, went to the lead under Junior Alvarado and set fractions of 22.80 and 45.83 seconds for a half mile while stalked by Wound Up and Super Chow. On the turn into the homestretch, Super Chow made a three-wide move to draw on even terms with the odds-on favorite but would prove no match for the Mott trainee, who drew clear with authority to complete seven furlongs in 1:22.33.
“He broke very sharp today and he was cruising along pretty good for himself. I wasn’t going to take it away. He just traveled all the way pretty nice and turning for home, I checked my reins a little bit just to see where he was and he leveled off at the end,” Alvarado said. “He did what he needed to do today. It was a good prep race for whatever is coming ahead.”
Super Chow finished second under Jorge Ruiz, 4 ¾ lengths ahead of third-place finisher Wound Up and jockey Irad Ortiz Jr.
Knightsbridge had run only twice this year, finishing second at Gulfstream in a second-level optional claiming allowance Feb. 15 before coming off a nine-month layoff to win a Nov. 15 seven-furlong optional claiming allowance at Aqueduct by 2 ¾ lengths. The Godolphin homebred launched his career with a 10 ¾-length victory at Churchill Downs before winning a Gulfstream allowance by nine lengths in his second start during the 2023-2034 Championship Meet. Seven and a half months later, he finished third in the 2004 Perryville (G3) at Keeneland in his last start of his 3-year-old campaign.
The $150,000 Fred W. Hooper (G3), a one-turn mile for older horses on the $3 million Pegasus World Cup Invitational (G1) undercard Jan. 24, is a likely next-out target for Knightsbridge.
“I think that’s what we’re shooting for,” Mott said. “There are also two stakes going a mile here we’d be interested in, and I think Speaker’s Corner won them both.”
The Mott-trained Speaker’s Corner captured the Fred W. Hooper and the Gulfstream Park Mile (G2) back-to-back during the 2022-2023 Championship Meet.
