Hot Rod Charlie

Tenacious to the end, Red Oak Stable and Madaket Stable's Mind Control (Stay Thirsty) closed out his career with a win in the 2022 GI Cigar Mile, his third Grade I win and his 11th black-type victory. In a remarkable 29 starts over five years, Mind Control amassed total winnings of $2,185,834. In that race, as in all of Mind Control's stakes wins, he beat an impressive field of competitors, including favored Zandon, White Abarrio, and Get Her Number. Big numbers, indeed. Numbers, as it turns out, will also be...

Grade I winner Hot Rod Charlie (Oxbow--Indian Miss, by Indian Charlie) will stand at Shadai Stallion Station in Japan beginning in 2023. The GI Pennsylvania Derby hero and half-brother to Eclipse Champion Sprinter Mitole (Eskendereya) will stand for ¥2,000,000. Eisuke Tokutake of Shadai Stallion Station said, "Hot Rod Charlie has only one [Grade I] win, but he is running steadily, and his pedigree background is a stallion that is definitely a Japan stallion [in the making] with a champion sprinter as his half-brother, [Mitole]." Purchased for $17,000 as a short...

Old Friends, the Thoroughbred Retirement Farm in Georgetown, KY, will host an Open House Saturday, Nov. 26 from noon until 2pm for fans to meet new retiree Lava Man (Slew City Slew). The event is free and open to the public. Pizza and lava crunch cakes will be served. The now 21-year old posted an impressive resume during a racing career that spanned seven years including victories in the GI Pacific Classic, GI Hollywood Gold Cup, and the GII Goodwood H., now called the Awesome Again. Lava Man retired as...

Unbeaten sensation and guaranteed GI Breeders' Cup Classic favorite Flightline (Tapit) put in his final prep for the World Championships at Keeneland Saturday. The 'TDN Rising Star' covered five furlongs solo in 1:00.60 (4/62) shortly after 7:30 a.m. under assistant trainer Juan Leyva. "I told Juan to go in a minute and change and out [seven-eighths] in 1:26, and that's what he did," trainer John Sadler said. "Juan's a great work rider. It was not about going fast today, just getting around there happy today." Flightline arrived at Keeneland Sunday...

The early-morning activity at racetracks across the country was ablaze Saturday, with horses targeting next month's Breeders' Cup races dominating the scene. Well represented at Keeneland, trainer Chad Brown had the bulk of his championship team working on both the main track and the turf. "Everything went really, really well this morning, considering everything that was going on," Brown said, referring to the volume of horses that featured 190 works on the main track. "They all did very well and they will have another work next week, but these were...

Unbeaten sensation Flightline (Tapit) headed a bevy of Breeders' Cup workers across the country Saturday. The likely favorite for the GI Breeders' Cup Classic covered six furlongs at Santa Anita in 1:11.80 (1/3). Flightline entered the main track via the quarter-mile chute with John Sadler assistant Juan Leyva aboard just prior to 6:35 a.m. Accompanied by a stable pony, he galloped under the wire and around the clubhouse turn and was set down approaching the five-furlong pole. From there, he clicked off splits of :23.60, :35.40, :47.80 and :59.40 en...

Well, that was one even I managed to see coming. With sterling bleeding at the bottom of the stairs, the most expensive yearling transaction of 2022 was duly enacted at Tattersalls this week. It was always going to be a wild market: Keeneland had shown the big spenders to remain impervious to war and inflation, while the local currency had been set aflame after new leaders sent home the babysitter and started playing with fiscal matches. Sure enough, Book I catapulted to giddy new heights, recording surges of 45 percent...

The Churchill Downs stewards have suspended jockey Sonny Leon 15 days for his controversial ride on second-place finisher Rich Strike (Keen Ice) in Saturday's GII Lukas Classic S. The head-on view of the race clearly showed Leon leaning into jockey Tyler Gaffalione on winner Hot Rod Charlie (Oxbow) and he appeared to elbow his rival rider. In a ruling issued Sunday, the stewards determined that Leon was guilty of "intentionally attempting to interfere with and impede the progress of a rival by repeatedly making physical contact with another rider in...

   The gutsy Hot Rod Charlie clawed his way back late to deny a late rally from GI Kentucky Derby winner Rich Strike in the GII Lukas Classic S. Saturday beneath the Twin Spires. Favored at 6-5, the bay hustled up to press Art Collector (Bernardini) through opening splits of :23.55 and :47.94. Turning up the heat as three-quarters went in 1:11.77, the bay took control entering the far turn and had his nose in front at the top of the stretch. Rich Strike rallied up the outside and briefly...

Life Is Good (Into Mischief) caught a flier right out of the gate, strutted his stuff up front for six furlongs and fought off a pair of stubborn challengers through the Saratoga stretch to capture Saturday's $1-million GI Whitney S., punch his ticket to the GI Longines Breeders' Cup Classic and stick his nose in front of a crowded Horse of the Year race. Running away to a 9 1/2-length debut romp and 'TDN Rising Star' honors for Bob Baffert in November of 2020 at Del Mar, the $525,000 Keeneland...

SARATOGA SPRINGS, NY - At this time last year, trainer Todd Pletcher and his staff were getting to know Life Is Good (Into Mischief). Some 400 days after he arrived and with four wins from six races, the bay colt is an unquestioned standout in Pletcher's powerful and deep stable. Up next for Life Is Good in a season that could yield an Eclipse Award and possibly even a Horse of the Year title is the $1-million GI Whitney S. Saturday at Saratoga Race Course. The historic Whitney, first run...

When the late John Brunetti Sr., the colorful and sometimes controversial owner of Hialeah Park and the Red Oak Stable breeding and racing operation, died at 87 in 2018, his racing manager, Rick Sacco, told TDN, "He's been active right up until the very end [and] this is probably Mr. Brunetti's best crop of homebred 2-year-olds that we've ever had." The standout from that Red Oak foaling class of '16 ended up being GISW Mind Control (Stay Thirsty), who at age six edged up over the $1.5 million earnings mark...