McPeek notched his third victory this season at Oaklawn with Lat Long in Sunday’s sixth race, an 8 ½-fulrong maiden allowance race for 2-year-olds. “This is the strongest group I’ve ever had,” McPeek said. McPeek said he also has around 30 horses at Fair Grounds and maintains a winter presence in New York and Kentucky. Other Oaklawn-based runners for McPeek include Thorpedo Anna, runner-up in the $400,000 G2-Golden Rod Stakes for 2-year-old fillies at Churchill Downs Northern Flame, fourth in the $600,000 G1-Breeders’ Futurity at Keeneland Mystik Dan, a swift 2-year-old colt Triple Crown starters Creative Minister and Sun Thunder and stakes-winning filly One More Kelly. McPeek said Indiana-bred standout Ice Cold is pointing for Oaklawn’s one-mile $200,000 Year’s End Stakes for 2-year-old fillies Dec.

McPeek said Butterbean is pointing for Oaklawn’s $250,000 G3-Bayakoa Stakes Feb. McPeek’s first victory of the meeting came with Butterbean in the one-mile $150,000 Mistletoe Stakes for fillies and mares Dec. 20 and the 8 ½-furlongs $600,000 G3-Razorback Handicap Feb. McPeek said next-race plans are pending for Frosted Departure, but he’ll probably be nominated to the one-mile $150,000 Fifth Season Stakes Jan. And it seems like he wasn’t quite like a top 3-year-old in the nation going longer, although he tested several of those stakes here last year. “I think he loves Oaklawn, first, but he won that sprint stakes here last year, which kind of entices you to keep sprinting him.

“He will stay long from now on,” McPeek said. He was exiting a lackluster ninth, beaten 17 ¾ lengths, in the six-furlong $300,000 Steel Valley Sprint Stakes Nov. 31, 2022, at Oaklawn.įrosted Departure’s subsequent racing journey included multiple Kentucky Derby graded stakes preps around two turns at Oaklawn and a graded turf sprint stake in Kentucky. Frosted Departure hadn’t won since the inaugural $150,000 Renaissance Stakes for 2-year-olds at 6 furlongs Dec.

Frosted Departure snapped a nine-race losing streak. The allowance race, Frosted Departure’s first start against older horses, marked a happy homecoming for the 3-year-old gray son of Frosted. The well-traveled Frosted Departure delivered the most eye-catching score, rolling home by 7 ¼ front-running lengths Dec. McPeek, who has approximately 40 horses on the grounds, already has three victories through the first five days of the 2023-2024 meeting that began Dec. Trainer Kenny McPeek is off to a fast start at Oaklawn.

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