Pure Silver romps home in the Grade 2 Adirondack

Unbeaten, but never having faced open company before, Pure Silver had things to prove in today's Grade 2 Adirondack Stakes. Consider those things proven, as the grey daughter of Mission Impazible went to the lead soon after the break from her inside post, and blitzed the field to the tune of a 9 1/2-length victory in the co-feature today at Saratoga. 

The Twin Creeks Racing Stables owned miss was sent off as the 17-10 favorite, off a pair of  wins at Belmont Park. The first came in a maiden race on June 22, and she followed that up with victory in the Lynbrook Stakes, less than four weeks later. Both of those races were restricted to New York-bred fillies, but today she was the only statebred in the field of eight. 

At the break, Southampton Way broke like a shot from the outside, while Stainless stumbled out of the gate. In between was the rest of the field, which included the pretty gray down on the rail. Encouraged by Hall of Fame rider, John Velazquez, Pure Silver shot to the lead and there she would stay through solid early fractions of :22..44 and :45.48.

Trained for Twin Creeks by Todd Pletcher, her first real ask came from a sharp move made from a filly shipping in from Laurel Park, Limited View. That one put the pressure on Pure Silver on the far turn, but the leader was more than up to the challenge.

As they turned the corner into the Saratoga stretch, Limited View had little left to stay with Pure Silver. With no other filly coming, the stretch became an official coming out party for the race favorite. She opened up quickly, and continued to pour it on down the lane.

"We expected to be on the lead," said Velazquez. "We did break very well. I used her a little bit to make sure I was going to be close the pace. Once I got to the spot I wanted to be in, I just waited there. She did a good job settling around the turn and finished up really well."

Final time for the 6 1/2-furlongs over the fast main track at Saratoga was a solid 1:17.22. Left in the wake of the dazzling performance of the young New York-bred filly was Southampton Way, who held second over a rallying Wall of Compassion.

"She won pretty convincingly," remarked Pletcher. "She's pretty fast. She didn't actually get away quite as easily as she normally does, but she made up for it quickly and got to the lead the right way. She kind of ran them off their feet from there. It's been a hard track sometimes to make up a lot of ground on. We knew that this filly was naturally fast and we were going to let her do her thing."

Ran them off their feet indeed. The future seems nothing but bright for this good looking young filly. As for her immediate future, Pletcher said that the Grade 1 Spinaway Stakes, here at Saratoga on September 2, is a possibility.

Pure Silver (Mission Impazible--Jehan, by Forest Wildcat) is a homebred for Twin Creeks. Now perfect in three starts, she has raised her career earnings to $217,200. As the choice, she returned $5.40, $3.30, and $2.90 across the board. The $2 exacta over the Sagamore Farm owned Southampton Way was good for $24.00, while the 1-8-7 trifecta paid $287.50.