Favourite for the Horse of the Year honours, Wise Dan will return to races in 2013
There should be no doubts or questions over Wise Dan’s chances of getting the Horse of the Year Honours, especially after a brilliantly run season, and to put the cherry on top he goes on to win the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Mile, and not just win it, broke the course record while doing so, fitting end to a great season.
After getting the job done at Santa Anita this weekend, Wise Dan was eager to get on the van and get back to his homebase in Keeneland, said trainer’s wife Amy Lopresti.
The 5-year-old gelded son of Wiseman’s Ferry, Wise Dan will go through a familiar routine, the one he has been following for the past two years at the end of both seasons, as he is scheduled to go on a vacation to spend the winters at Lopresti farm, and his return to the races is expected to be somewhere around April next year.
"He will probably get 45 to 60 days at the farm, but it is up to him," Amy Lopresti said of Wise Dan. "Charlie won’t get in a big hurry with him because the goal is to have the horse at his best toward the mid- to late-summer and the fall for the big races."
Wise Dan this season has won almost everything that had been thrown his way by Charles Lopresti, and it’s not just this season, he has been that prolific since last season, and in his last eight races, he has visited the winner’s circle seven times, with a lone second place finish in the Grade 1 Stephen Foster Handicap to, Ron the Greek, otherwise it would have been a perfect season.
Out of Wolf Power mare Lisa Danielle, Wise Dan capped off the 2011 season by landing the Grade 1 Clark Handicap, and he carried that winning momentum into the 2012 season and dominated the field in his seasonal debut to win the Grade 3 Ben Ali Stakes.
Before the Breeders’ Cup Mile victory, Morton Fink’s rampant gelding was on a three-race win streak, bouncing back from the Stephen Foster Handicap defeat to win the Grade 2 Fourstardave Handicap, million dollar Grade 1 Woodbine Mile, and the Grade 1 Shadwell Turf Mile.
Tags: