Timelesswinner Two rocketed to the lead and didn’t stop until she had trotted a stakes record 1:54.4 in an elimination of the $168,215 Currier & Ives for 3-year-old fillies Monday at The Meadows.
SJ’s Minolta, sporting hobbles for the first time, captured the other elimination. The final, worth approximately $100,000, is set for next Monday.
Making her second start after a respectable fifth-place finish in the 2008 Breeders Crown, Timelesswinner Two was well tuned for the effort by trainer Julie Miller. Dave Palone gunned her through a front half of 57.4 and a back half of :57, all of which produced a 13-length romp over Nordic Nymph, with Broadway Paige third. Those three, along with fourth-place finisher Virgilyn Hanover, qualified for the final.
The mile shaved two ticks from the previous Currier & Ives mark established by TS Fastforward in 2007 and was the fastest this year by a sophomore trotting filly on a five-eighths mile track.
“She’s an impressive filly, a gritty filly,” Palone said. “The word from headquarters was to race her up close. Julie gave her a great prep —one race over the track with a conservative effort. We stretched her out a little bit tonight, and she was well within herself finishing.”
Rodney Mitchell Inc. and Freida Ivory own Timelesswinner Two. The daughter of Broadway Hall-Meadowbranch Lilly pushed her career bankroll to $115,138.
SJ’s Minolta, a stakes winner despite her ongoing battles with equine protozoal myeloencephalitis (EPM), an often debilitating disease of the central nervous system, made the front with a quarter-pole move for trainer/driver David Wade.
“She left quietly, which was good, and things got settled,” Wade said. “As fast as they were going, the pace wasn’t suiting her. She’d have been all right in there—-I could have stayed in--but I thought it would be a beautiful time to get to the front and let them catch me. “The hobbles are giving her confidence. She trotted through the turns much better. That’s been her difficulty,” he added.
SJ’s Minolta prevailed in 1:55.4, a length better than Allamerican Phoebe, with Caviar Forthe Lady third. The 1-2 favorite, Whispering Wind, endured a rough trip but finished fourth to qualify for the final. Wade owns SJ’s Minolta, a daughter of SJ’s Photo-TJ’s Royal Tigress, with Gerald Brittingham and Kelley Rogers.
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