Bravazo back to Calumet Farm as retirement decision pends

Bravazo, the hard-knocking son of Awesome Again known for his close call with Justify in the fog of the 2018 Preakness Stakes, may have run his last race.

Eddie Kane, general manager of Calumet Farm, said Bravazo is scheduled to ship from trainer D. Wayne Lukas’ care at Oaklawn Park back to Kentucky on Monday for further evaluation.

Despite reports elsewhere — word got out when Lukas’ wife, Laurie, announced a retirement on her Facebook page — Kane said Bravazo's not officially finished.

“He’s kind of run sub-par the last couple of races,” Kane said, with Bravazo off the board in four Oaklawn stakes starts this season. “We’ll evaluate and see how we go. Mr. (Brad) Kelley is still undecided.”

Bravazo underwent knee surgery in the spring of 2019 to remove chips, at which point Lukas still maintained high aspirations for the colt, who in addition to his second in the Preakness won the 2018 Risen Star (G2) and placed in each of the Haskell, Travers, Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile and Clark Handicap.

In the 2019 Clark, however, Bravazo ran a non-competitive eighth off the bench. Lukas later scrapped plans to try the Pegasus World Cup (G1), looking to ease his barn star back in at Oaklawn.

“Sometimes with those knee surgeries, they don’t come back to the level they were running at,” Kane said.

Kane added that stallion plans for Bravazo have “been kicked around a little bit, but nothing’s etched in stone.”

Bravazo was 11th over the weekend in a loaded edition of the Oaklawn Handicap (G2). If this is it for his racing career, Bravazo will finish with a 3-4-3 record in 22 starts with earnings just north of $2 million.