Multiple stakes winning 7-year-old gelding Legendary retired

Walter Swinburn’s Grade 3 winner Legendary, who earned more than a half-million dollars over 36 starts in the United States and England and won the 2014 Japan Racing Association Stakes at Laurel Park, has been retired.

 

Fair Hill-based trainer Niall Saville said the 7-year-old gelding, winless in four starts this year and 12 overall dating back to his victory the 2014 Knickerbocker (G3) at Aqueduct, would remain on a small farm near the training facility until a decision is made on future plans in the spring.

 

In his last race, Legendary ran fourth of five behind Grade 1 winner Twilight Eclipse in a 1 3/8-mile turf allowance July 8 at Belmont Park, beaten 6 ½ lengths.

 

“We’ve dwelled on it for six months now. It was a very difficult decision because he’s doing everything quite well at home and never really changed,” Saville said. “The races this year you could really give him an excuse with bad ground or funny trips until the last day we ran him in New York. He had a perfect trip. He may not have won the race but he definitely would have got away from them and had a turn of foot that he used to have, and he just didn’t have that. We got back and digested it and decided it was time to stop on him while he was healthy.”

 

Bred in England, Legendary made his first 13 starts overseas before joining Saville in the spring of 2014. He was first or second in five of his first six starts for Saville, including the JRA Stakes and Knickerbocker, also running third behind Grade 1 winner Big Blue Kitten in the 2014 Lure Stakes at Saratoga Race Course.

 

He retires with six wins, six seconds, three thirds and $508,219 in purse earnings. Third in the Grade 1 Manhattan last June, he was fifth in the 2015 Dixie (G2) at Pimlico and second in the Commonwealth Cup (G2) and the Richard Small Stakes last year at Laurel in his other Maryland starts.

 

“He was a massive part of my stable and the reason that I’m in business now. He came along at the right time,” Saville said. “He was my first stakes winner and first graded-stakes winner, so I owe him a lot. I think I should have won the Manhattan with him. I thought he had that big race in him, but we were third and we never really got back to that race. Third was a pretty good run for him.”

 

Saville said Legendary will remain in the United States and possibly be retrained to be a riding horse. Saville and his wife, who often traveled in the back of a horse van with Legendary when he was shipped out of town for races, are keeping an eye on him.

 

“He’s been at the farm about a week. I actually stopped out to see him three times,” Saville said. “It’s a bit of a shame not having him in the barn. The ones like him, you miss them. Hopefully, I can find a new one because they don’t come along every day.”

 

Co-owned by Saville and High Creeks Racing LLC, North Star Boy is entered in Friday’s sixth race, a $45,000 optional claiming allowance for 3-year-olds and up going 1 1/16 miles on the Exceller Turf Course.

 

It is the first start for the Irish-bred 6-year-old stakes-placed gelding since finishing second in a 2 1/16-mile steeplechase allowance Aug. 13, 2015 at Saratoga Race Course and emerging with a leg injury. Three of his last four starts since last May have come in hurdle events.

 

North Star Boy was second in the 2013 Claiming Crown Emerald at Gulfstream Park and sixth, beaten 2 ½ lengths by two-time Horse of the Year Wise Dan, in the 2014 Bernard Baruch Handicap (G2) at Saratoga. He has been in steady training at Fair Hill.

 

Victor Carrasco will ride North Star Boy at 118 pounds from Post 8 in the nine-horse field.

 

“This might be a race to see if he’s got some of the swagger back that he used to have,” Saville said. “We nearly retired him after he was injured last year. It was talked about and we decided he really enjoyed doing his job and we’d give him another spin. That’s sort of where we are with him. We’re just waiting to see if he’s still got it and he shows that he still wants to be a racehorse.”

 

 

Country Life Farm’s multiple stakes-placed 3-year-old Flash McCaul, second against older horses in his most recent start, returns to Laurel Park in Friday’s co-featured seventh race.

 

Trained by Mike Trombetta, Flash McCaul drew Post 5 in the seven-horse field for the $45,000 optional claiming allowance for 3-year-olds and up going about 1 1/16 miles on the main track. The Trombetta-trained gelding is the 3-1 second choice in the morning line behind 5-2 favorite Cerebral, who drew Post 7.

 

Flash McCaul has two wins and four seconds from seven starts at Laurel, including runner-up finishes in the 2015 Maryland Juvenile Futurity and Private Terms in March. Fourth in the Federico Tesio April 9, he was most recently second in an optional claiming allowance June 29 at Delaware Park.

 

“He’s doing good,” Trombetta said. “He likes Laurel and he’s been training well, so I’m looking forward to running him. I think he should round back into good form.”

 

Trombetta is also debuting Live Oak Plantation homebred First On First in Friday’s fifth race, a $40,000 maiden event for 2-year-old fillies going 5 ½ furlongs on the main track. Alex Cintronis set to ride the bay daughter of Medaglia d’Oro, who shows a steady string of works at Fair Hill since late May.

 

“She’s doing well. I don’t know if she’s a sprinter type, but she’s definitely training pretty good and she’s ready for her first start,” he said. “She has a two-turn pedigree but we’ve got to get her started.”

 

Also in the race are Glen Hill Farm’s Deer Valley, a  Speightstown filly purchased for $340,000 as a yearling last fall at Keeneland; and Hillwood Stable’s Malibu Moon filly Shimmering Aspen, a $200,000 buy at Fasig-Tipton’s Mid-Atlantic Eastern Fall yearling sale last October.

 

Trombetta said multiple-stakes winner Marengo Road is getting the summer off before gearing up for a fall campaign. The 3-year-old Quality Road colt won the James Murphy Stakes on Preakness Day, May 21, in his most recent effort.