Schuylerville Dreaming for Hudsons

Andrew Hudson and his father Greg and brother David, long involved in racing through various partnerships, decided only last year to buy horses together and the fledgling Hoolie Racing Stable, which began with the purchase of three yearlings last summer, has found immediate success with the speedy Dream It Is (Shackleford). The 2-year-old filly will put her unbeaten record to the test when she ships south from trainer Barbara Minshall's Woodbine base for Friday's GIII Schuylerville S. on Saratoga's opening-day card.

“We're super excited,” Andrew Hudson said Monday. “We can't wait to get up there and see how she handles the deeper waters on Friday.”

Dream It Is has made two starts, both over Woodbine's Tapeta surface. The filly captured her 4 1/2-furlong debut May 27 before adding an impressive 4 3/4-length tally in the June 24 My Dear S. (video) going five furlongs last time out.

“My family has been involved in racing for a long time,” Hudson said. “My grandfather owned horses many, many years ago–he was a big Ellis Park guy back in the '60s, '70s and '80s. I've kind of dabbled in it for quite a few years here and there and my dad has been in it as well. Just last year, we decided to really take a bigger step into it. We put the partnership together, it's actually named after my grandfather, and we bought three horses. We bought two with Bruce Lunsford at the Saratoga sale and we ended up buying this one horse at the Keeneland sale and got lucky.”

Hoolie Racing Stable began with two purchases at the Fasig-Tipton Saratoga Selected Yearling Sale last August; hip 35, a son of English Channel now named Admiralty Pier was a $100,000 acquisition; and hip 115 is a daughter of Violence purchased for $250,000 and now named Goodnight Lady.

Dream It Is was the final purchase of the trio. With the assistance of Travis Durr from Webb Carroll Training Center, the Hudsons purchased the bay filly (hip 1807) for $50,000 at the Keeneland September Yearling Sale.

“We had narrowed our short list down to three horses at the Keeneland sale that day and this was the third one that went through,” Hudson said of Dream It Is. “The first two exceeded our budget, luckily. So this is the one we got.

He continued, “All three of our horses are in Canada right now and we are hoping to find one or two more. We love the way Barbara handles the 2-year-olds and we like running up there with the Tapeta–I think it's a little easier on the horses. We've got one [Admiralty Pier] that will probably start in August. And we bought a very nice filly, but she's a big, big Violence filly, so hopefully we'll get a start into her at some point in time around November or December, but the plan with her is two-turn races next year. It was nice to have this one pop up and be an early runner and pretty quick.”

While Hoolie Racing Stable was formed solely with the intention to race, Hudson admitted Dream It Is, whose third dam is the legendary Bosra Sham (Woodman), will leave the family with plenty of options.

“We are sticking to racing at this point in time, but obviously this filly will have some value as a broodmare,” Hudson said. “We'll have to make a decision at some point if we want to sell her as a broodmare prospect or potentially keep her and breed ourselves. Ideally, we got into it to race horses. Down the road, who knows what will happen, but we're buying to race.”

After growing up in western Kentucky, Hudson now lives in Charlotte, North Carolina, where he helps run the Hudson Automotive dealerships founded by his father. While they missed her first start, there will be plenty of family on hand to cheer Dream It Is on at Saratoga Friday.

“We were actually down in Disney World for her debut, but we watched it on our phones,” Hudson said. “I went up there for the My Dear and her race was obviously spectacular. We didn't think in a million years that she would win in the way that she did. We knew she was fast, but that was a very impressive race.

He continued, “My entire family is going to be in Saratoga on Friday. My sister is coming in from San Francisco and my daughter and my niece will be there. We'll have a large contingent up there and we'll keep our fingers crossed. We've been around the horse business long enough to know that there is one thing that can go right and a 150 things that can go wrong.”

The Schuylerville will also mark a return to Saratoga for Minshall, who hasn't been back since campaigning her family's graded stakes winners Mt. Sassafras and Bold Ruritana at the historic oval back in the 1990s.

“I raced at Saratoga many years ago,” Minshall said Monday. “But I have not raced a horse at Saratoga since [1999], so it would be a very special thing to have a horse do well there.”

Minshall knew early on that Dream It Is looked like a filly with a future.

“She just did everything right, right from the get-go,” the trainer said. “She keeps growing. She was not a big filly, but she's growing all the time. And she handles everything really well. Once we started breezing her, we knew she had some special talent and definitely had some special qualities to her.”

While Dream It Is has only raced on the Tapeta, the filly has trained well over the dirt, according to Minshall.

“Woodbine has a mile dirt track, so all of my babies train a lot on the dirt,” Minshall said. “Dream It Is has trained a lot on the dirt track. Going into both her races she worked over the dirt and I've had her behind horses and the dirt doesn't seem to phase her and she's trained well over it.”

Dream It Is's two works since the My Dear have both been over the dirt. She worked five furlongs July 8 in 1:01.20 and the same distance July 14 in 1:01.80.

“We are just hoping for a big effort,” Minshall said. “She is a very honest filly, she's very kind and very sensible, so I don't think having to ship is going to bother her. We're not that far away, I think it's about a six-hour van ride. So it's not too, too far. We just hope for everything to go well and we have a good safe, trip and have some luck. So far, knock on wood, as we speak, she's ready.”