Kentucky Oaks prep: White Rocks holds on, wins Cincy Trophy
In only her third start, White Rocks raced to a huge lead early and held on late to win by 1 1/4 lengths in the black-type, $175,000 Cincinnati Trophy, a points prep Friday night at Turfway Park for the Grade 1 Kentucky Oaks.
Quickly sent from post 4 to the front of the field of 11, the daughter of Frosted widened her advantage to seven lengths through the first half of the two-turn mile. Jockey Víctor Carrasco took White Rocks (5-1) through early fractions of 24.38 and 47.79 seconds on the Tapeta surface.
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“The (first) turn is pretty quick, so I felt like you had to be very alert and try her best at least to send a little bit just so you can get a good position coming into the turn,” Carasco said. “But she has some natural speed, so I really didn’t have to do too much to get her there.”
As White Rocks raced into the second turn, her margin grew to eight lengths through three-quarters of a mile in 1:12.54. Just Ruthless (4-1), who had been in second, began to lose ground, and Admit (8-1) and Bracelet (6-1) took up the pursuit.
Straightening for home, White Rocks began to lose her big edge, but she dug in. Admit kept charging under jockey Irving Mondaca as the difference shrunk to three lengths through seven-eighths in 1:25.74. Even after the Somethinabouther (6-1) and Bracelet (6-1) joined the late rally, the outcome was no longer in doubt.
White Rocks won with a time of 1:39.69 on the dry, 22-degree night. It was the slowest running of the Cincinnati Trophy since it was lengthened from 6 1/2 furlongs to one mile in 2022.
Trained by Arnaud Delacour, White Rocks paid $13.30, $7.06 and $3.98. Second-place Admit returned $8.94 and $6.22. Somethinabouther took third and paid $6.40 to show. Bracelet came in fourth. Post-time favorite Girl Math (2-1) raced near the back most of the way and managed to finish fifth. Those top five finishers earned 20-10-6-4-2 points toward qualifying for the Kentucky Oaks on May 2 at Churchill Downs.
It was the second consecutive victory for White Rocks, who won by a widening six lengths to break her maiden going the same mile last month. She was promoted from third to second in her debut loss to Admit over the same course and distance Dec. 12. Carrasco has ridden all three of her races at Turfway.
Jastar Capital, Polivka Equine Holdings and Tim Madden own White Rocks, a $180,000 purchase in May at the Fasig-Tipton Midlantic sale of 2-year-olds in training. Out of Kitten’s Joy mare Kitten’s Catch, she was bred in Kentucky by Sandra Sexton and Silver Fern Farm.
White Rocks added $102,850 in first-place money to bring her earnings total to $166,354 from a record of 3: 2-1-0.