Forged Steel defies perceptions going into Pacific Classic

Go figure Forged Steel. He was 20-1 on the morning line before being scratched from one Grade 1 race. Now he is the 5-1 second choice in another this weekend.

He was viewed as a rabbit for the Whitney at Saratoga before he was taken out of consideration two weeks ago. Now he is seen as one of the pack of early pacesetters in the Grade 1, $1 million Pacific Classic going 1 1/4 miles on Saturday at Del Mar.

In truth, a lot of these perceptions bear little resemblance to reality.

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“First, we were never going to run in (the Whitney) unless everything worked out, if the track came up muddy, and we got a couple of scratches, and I scratched White Abarrio. Then we were going to run, but none of that came to fruition,” said Mark Cornett of C2 Racing Stables, the lead owner of Forged Steel. “We always had this race in the back of our mind with (Forged Steel) as plan A, really.”

So much for those early predictions that Forged Steel would be a rabbit for his stablemate White Abarrio. C2’s grand gray was retired after finishing seventh in the Whitney.

“He’s not in as a rabbit,” trainer Saffie Joseph Jr. said that week. “He’s in it on his own right.”

“They weren’t ever going to run against each other,” Cornett told Horse Racing Nation on Friday.

Since it did not rain at Saratoga until late on Whitney day, Forged Steel was refocused on California. That was where he won the five-horse Hollywood Gold Cup (G2) two starts back, running away by 9 1/2 lengths on May 25 at Santa Anita.

Forged Steel’s program odds this weekend are more a reflection of that performance than they are of his last start July 4 at Saratoga. The 4-year-old Vekoma colt shuffled and stumbled his way out of the gate and was hustled into contention by jockey Flavien Prat before he wilted to finish a distant fifth in the Suburban (G2).

Cornett may as well have used indelible ink to draw a line through that disappointment.

“A hundred percent,” he said. “The horse was completely taken out of his gait. This horse is a front-running horse. He needs to be either on the front end or sitting off the hip of a horse in a high-cruising speed. Prat, once he didn’t make the lead, he got crossed over on, and he was wrangled and rank and everything you didn’t want going a mile-and-a-quarter.”

Losing to Phileas Fogg by 12 lengths, Forged Steel still was second at the eighth pole before he faded off the board. Even so he earned a 104 Brisnet Speed Rating, second only to his 107 for the Hollywood Gold Cup.

Cornett said this third consecutive 10-furlong start for Forged Steel presents a challenging pace puzzle not only for handicappers but for jockey Edwin González coming out of post 2 on Saturday in the field of 11.

“I don’t know what Full Serrano is planning on doing, but you’ve obviously got (5-2 morning-line favorite) Knightsbridge on the outside. He’ll probably be up there,” Cornett said. “Forged Steel is a warrior. He definitely won’t be up there. He’ll be sitting probably fourth or fifth. Maybe he can get a good trip.”

Cornett and his brother, Clint, own Forged Steel in partnership with Mathis Stable and TCC Stables. He also is the racing manager for the team that entered Navajo Warrior in the Pacific Classic. The 5-year-old Candy Ride gelding also is trained by Joseph, who had both horses flown west from New York on Tuesday.

Navajo Warrior comes into the Pacific Classic on a three-race winning streak that includes his victories as the favorite in both the Pimlico Special (G3) and last month’s Prairie Meadows Cornhusker Handicap (G3).

“We were very conservative with him after I bought him (in 2022),” said Cornett on behalf of BAG Racing Stables, Miller Racing, Dr. Derek Paul, Mathis Stable, Paul Braverman and Timothy Pinch. “I kind of managed him in some starters and some conditional allowance races.”

The winning streak actually began March 21, when Navajo Warrior won a $125,000 allowance race at Gulfstream Park. At the end of that four-horse race he overtook 3-10 favorite and 2025 Preakness runner-up Gosger.

“He’s just blossomed in those last three races,” Cornett said. “We expect a big run. We expect the right kind of a running style even though he was on the lead the last two races. That was just because he overpowered the field. I would expect to see him sitting fourth or fifth, probably three or four lengths off that speed, and get first run at the quarter pole if everything works out right.”

The three-race hot streak contributed to Navajo Warrior getting 8-1 program odds for the Pacific Classic, just behind Hit Show at 6-1 and sharing fourth choice with Full Serrano and Japan import Finger. Micah Husbands will start with Navajo Warrior from post 9.

The Cornetts made their biggest impression with White Abarrio, who won four Grade 1 races and earned $8,598,170. They found recent success with Joseph in their management of Eunomia. The 4-year-old filly owned by St. Elias Stables and WSS Racing won three weeks ago in the Clement L. Hirsch (G1). She will take aim on the Spinster (G1) on Oct. 4 at Keeneland.

“I’ve had the flexibility really to buy the horses and not miss horses that I wanted to buy,” Cornett said. “The last 24 months we’ve been lucky enough to have a great group of partners and owners that have supported us. You know I haven’t missed the ones I wanted to buy. That’s the half of it. You identify horses, but getting them bought is half the battle.”

Cornett, who has worked in bloodstock circles for more than three decades, knows that racing success is fleeting. He and his brother and the rest of the team are enjoying it with a sense of that reality.

“Everything is cyclical,” he said. “You kind of get in a zone. You get in a zone looking for horses. You get in a zone managing them. And then the right races come up at the right time.”