Ex-Baffert colt Hozier goes from worst to 1st in 8 days
Henderson, Ky.
Only eight days after finishing a disinterested last in the Grade 3 Ohio Derby, ex-Bob Baffert trainee Hozier was back on the racetrack Sunday to make amends before a possible trip to the sales ring next week.
With trainer Rodolphe Brisset making the decision only hours earlier to take on allowance company in a $52,000 race at Ellis Park, Hozier looked like a different horse than he did at Thistledown.
Left to relax and stalk this time instead of trying to set the pace, Hozier (6-5) went four wide around the far turn and closed to win the one-mile race by a half-length against five other horses that never had more than two prior victories.
In his second race for Brisset, the 3-year-old Pioneerof the Nile colt found the winner's circle for the first time since his maiden breaker in February at Santa Anita.
“We may have ridden him too much for the win last time,” Brisset told Horse Racing Nation by phone from his home in Versailles, Ky. “When he switched leads there on the backside, he stopped. We just decided to change the way we wanted to ride him.”
Jockey Chris Landeros, who has ridden Hozier in these last two races, concurred.
“I didn't want to rush him too early,” he said as he walked away from the fast main track over which Hozier was clocked at 1:36.41. “I felt like last time it was a little bit of a detriment. Going into the first turn I rushed him to get into position to try to win the race, and I don't think he wanted to do that. I think he wants to sit, relax, make a run and not get so buried on the inside. So I kept him to task (Sunday), and he handled it well.”
Bought at auction for $625,000 nearly two years ago by a partnership led by Gavin Murphy's SF Racing, Hozier might be right back in the ring next Monday in Lexington, Ky., for the Fasig-Tipton July sale of selected horses of racing age. He carries hip No. 659 in the catalog.
Whether the colt is kept, sold or ends up failing to attain his reserve price, Brisset hopes he will still be the trainer. If he has learned anything in the last eight days, it is that a mile might be Hozier's limit.
“Looking at his pedigree just changed the way we wanted to go with him,” Brisset said. “We'll wait for the number to come back. Fresh off this win, it will be something to think about for the people who may want to buy him.”
Not that looking ahead is necessarily de rigeuer for Brisset. Asked when he decided to run Hozier at Ellis Park, he laughed and said, “This morning. That's when we shipped him over from Keeneland.”