Twilight Gleaming getting the victory in the Giant’s Causeway. (JennyPhoto/Past The Wire)
Del Mar Stable Notes By Jim Charvat
DEL MAR, Calif.—Breeders’ Cup winners are a rare breed. In some cases, the Breeders’ Cup victory is the culmination of a great career, and they are retired soon after the race. Some continue to race but never win again. In the case of 2-year-old Breeders’ Cup winners it’s often their peak performance and they never live up to the promise that comes with such a victory.
But then there are those who continue racing after their Breeders’ Cup victory and go on to score multiple graded stakes wins and maybe even another Breeders’ Cup. Others never quite get back to the level reached on the first Friday and Saturday in November but continue to show the heart of a champion and race successfully for several more years.
Enter Twilight Gleaming, who won her Breeders’ Cup race, the Juvenile Turf Sprint, here at Del Mar in 2021, and will be back to race Friday in the $100,000 Daisycutter Handicap.
The English-bred daughter of National Defense won a pair of races the year following her Breeders’ Cup triumph, including the 2022 Daisycutter last summer. She added another victory in the Giants Causeway at Keeneland earlier this year.
“This year she looks bigger,” says Blake Heap, the assistant for trainer Wesley Ward and the one who is tending to Twilight Gleaming on the West Coast. “I showed her to some people who had seen her here last year and they said she looks bigger and stronger and really looks good. All dappled out, got good weight and very happy. We’ll keep our fingers crossed.”
The Daisycutter will be her first race since returning from Royal Ascot, a trip that did not turn out nearly as well as the connections had hoped. Twilight Gleaming ran 16th in the G1 Kings Stand.
“I don’t know what happened to her,” Heap says. “She just never really got into the race. She wasn’t eating good over there. Not like here, she’s eating great. She’s back to herself here.”
Not exactly what her competition wants to hear.
Twilight Gleaming drew the inside post for the Daisycutter, which is not quite the disadvantage on the turf as it has been on the dirt so far at the meet. Heap acknowledges it will all come down to the break.
“You need luck, not bad,” Heap says. “You know who wins is the horse that usually gets the good trip, especially when they’re all evenly matched. They’ll know she’s in there if we get lucky.”
Twilight Gleaming will have the services of Hall of Fame rider Mike Smith.
Competition is expected to come from Amy C, a Philip D’Amato trainee who is making just her third start this year. She won the G3 Las Cienegas at Santa Anita in January then got a five month break before running a close third in the G3 Intercontinental at Belmont Park in June. She’ll be ridden by Umberto Rispoli.
The Daisycutter is the seventh race on the eight race Friday afternoon card. Approximate post time is 7 p.m.
Here’s the field:
1. Twilight Gleaming (2-1)
2. Tom’s Regret (scratched)
3. Sassy Nature (Edwin Maldonado, 10-1)
4. Unbridled Mary (Hector Berrios, 6-1)
5. Amy C (Umberto Rispoli, 5-2)
6. Xmas Surprise (Joe Bravo, 12-1)
7. Wide West (Juan Hernandez, 12-1)
8. Tony Ann (Kent Desormeaux, 6-1)
9. Princess Adaleigh (Ramon Vasquez, 8-1)
AE – Secrets Told (Antonio Frescu, 15-1)
AE – Kitty Kitana (Giovanni Franco, 6-1)
