The Unknown Filly Sprinter

What if I told you there was a horse out there that has already run 13 times this year, 12 of them coming in stakes races, and has competed in a total of 22 stakes races in the last two years? What if I told you that same horse has four wins, three seconds, and a third place finish in her last eight races? What if I also told you that her recent consistency has come exclusively in stakes races and were contested on fast dirt, a sloppy track, turf, and synthetic surfaces? And finally, what if I told you that she won a $400,000 race last month, and lost a grade 1 race this summer in the very last jump?

Pretty solid stats wouldn’t you say? Yet this iron filly remains a relative unknown on the national landscape. That could change in a matter of days though, as her anonymity is likely to come to an abrupt end if she can win on the biggest of all stages. As per usual, Musical Romance will not be one of the favorites in the Breeders’ Cup Filly & Mare Sprint, that will be left to bigger names like Turbulent Descent, Switch, and Pomeroy's Pistol, but all you need to do is look at her racing form in the last six months to realize that this is a filly with a realistic shot at Breeders’ Cup glory.

Out of a sire who only fetches $2,500 per cover, and trained and ridden by men who are not household names outside of Florida, Musical Romance always figured to a have a bit of an identity crisis. She sold for only $22,000 at the Ocala two-year-olds in training sale and was snatched up at the bargain basement price by trainer Bill Kaplan in partnership with the Pinnacle Racing Stable. But, the Florida bred daughter of Concorde’s Tune, now four, has been a solid performer for Kaplan since the beginning, and is now in the form of her life.

I know what you’re thinking … you still can’t quite place this filly. Let’s see if I can refresh your memory. This is the same filly that spurted clear against a strong field in the Grade 1 Princess Rooney, looking to be home free, only to succumb in the last stride to a Sassy Image middle-of-the-track rally from the clouds. After the race, Sassy Image had praise heaped upon her. Musical Romance became the unlucky footnote.

None the worse for the heartbreaking defeat, since then she has done nothing wrong, including her last pair in which she won the Grade 2 Presque Isle Masters by a neck, and most recently just missing in the Grade 2 Thoroughbred Club of America by a head.

Her name is Musical Romance, and by next Friday evening she may be very well known indeed.