Flavien Prat capped a four-win Saturday by riding 4-5 favorite Program Trading to a neck victory over Webslinger in the Grade I, $300,000 Hollywood Derby at Del Mar.
The win was trainer Chad Brown’s fourth in the 1 1/8-mile turf run for 3-year-olds — and his 17th win since he started shipping horses west in 2016 for Del Mar’s annual Turf Festival.
But horses trained by Phil D’Amato swept the two, $100,000 supporting features on the turf on Saturday’s card with Unconquerable Keen and Turn On The Jets running 1-2, respectively, in the five-furlong Stormy Liberal Stakes and 10-1 long shot Zona Verde winning the Grade III Jimmy Durante Stakes.
Prat won two of Saturday’s three stakes, also scoring with Unconquerable Keen. He finished second aboard Brown’s Lady de Berry in the Durante.
Prat also won Saturday’s first race on Kerry Gold ($5.40) and the eighth race on Havoc ($10.60). He also had three second-place finishes, including being caught at the wire by Mike Smith and Better than Gold ($21.60) while aboard 1-5 favorite Imagination (a $1.05 million purchase as a yearling) in the sixth race for 2-year-olds.
In the Hollywood Derby, Webslinger followed Program Trading ($3.80) most of the way — the pair charging forward from the back of the seven-horse field coming out of the far turn.
“He was pretty relaxed before the race,” Prat said of Program Trading. “We had a good trip. The pace was pretty fair. Lucky there was a horse (Brown’s Redistricting) in front of me that bolted around the turn so that I had a clear path.”
Webslinger also ran second to Program Trading in the Grade I Saratoga Derby on Aug. 5. It was Program Trading’s fourth win in five starts since coming to the United States.
D’Amato’s horses pocketed $148,500 from the Stormy Liberal and Durante races.
Like Unconquerable Queen in the Stormy Liberal, Zona Verde ($23.60) broke third in the Durante — a one-mile turf test for 2-year fillies — then led to the finish under Juan Hernandez to finish a length ahead of Brown’s 7-5 favorite Lady de Berry.
“They told me to save ground on Zona Verde,” said Hernandez. “But I saw the other horses and saw Zona Verde wanted to take the lead. She felt comfortable and finished really well, taking off again in the stretch.”
“I think the turf course is a little speedy today,” said D’Amato. “Zona Verde broke good and Hernandez just took the initiative … and that was the winning move. She got in the clear today and ran really well.”
Prat rode favored Unconquerable Keen ($5.40) to a near wire-to-wire victory in the Stormy Liberal, finishing 1¾ lengths ahead of Turn On The Jets (Hernandez). Second-choice Lane Way was third.
“I thought that’s the way they would sit,” D’Amato said of his 1-2 in the Stormy Liberal. “Unconquerable Keen has a little more speed than Turn On The Jets. They both ran hard.”
“Unconquerable Keen was very quick out of the gate, which was great (from the inside post) to get a good position,” said Prat of the Irish-bred, 4-year-old gelding. “I think he really like the distance. He took a nice breather around the turn and responded well when I asked him to make a move.”
Del Mar’s fall meeting ends Sunday with a nine-race card highlighted by a pair of graded stakes completing the annual Turf Festival — the Grade I Matriarch Stakes and the Grade III Cecil B. DeMille.
The D’Amato-Brown rivalry will peak in the Matriarch — a one-mile run on the grass for older fillies and mares. Brown trains four of the 10 entries in the $300,000 feature while D’Amato has three horses.
Brown has won the Matriarch three straight years — the past two with the since-retired Regal Glory — and five of the past six years.
Brown has the morning-line favorite in the Matriarch in Whitebeam, who won a the Grade I Diana Stakes at Saratoga in July under Prat, who will again be aboard Sunday. The 4-year-old filly also has a Grade III win this year and most recently finished fourth in the Oct. 7 Grade I First Lady at Keeneland.
Notable
Jockey Geovanni Franco scored the 1,000th win of his career via a disqualification in Saturday’s second race. Frano’s Miss Commander ($6.40) was a head behind Unkept Secret (Jose Valdivia Jr.) at the wire, but the winner was dropped to second for coming out in stretch and fouling Miss Commander.
Other Saturday winners — first race: Kerry Gold (Prat, $5.40); fourth race: Ghost of Midnight (Antonio Fresu, $3.60); ninth race: Golden Ghost (Tyler Gaffalione, $7.80).
Center is a freelance writer.
