Woodbine: Ticker Tape Home makes the grade in Seaway for Casse

Live Oak Plantation’s Ticker Tape Home tallied her first graded success after taking the Grade 3, US$99,811 Seaway Stakes on Saturday at Woodbine. 

Owen’s Tour Guide and Time Passage dueled soon after the gates opened in the Seaway, a seven-furlong main track feature for fillies and mares, 3-year-olds and up. Swall and Ticker Tape Home were a few lengths off the pacesetters in third and fourth, respectively, through an opening quarter in 22.62 seconds.

It was status quo for the top four after a half mile in 45.98 seconds, while mutuel choice, Gal in a Rush, began to make some headway as the field started the turn for home.

Owen’s Tour Guide and Time Passage found themselves under intense pressure from a host of rivals coming off the turn, including Gal in a Rush, who pounced on the outside and was full of run. Ticker Tape Home began to make inroads along the rail, but still had work to do to collar the new leader.

With less than 70 yards to run, Ticker Tape Home reeled in Gal in a Rush and went on to notch a neck triumph in a time of 1:23.10. Queen Macha was third and Metaphysical was fourth.

“The two starts (earlier this year at Gulfstream) she had over the border were sprinting, and she doesn’t really have speed going five-eighths,” jockey Patrick Husbands, who was fourth with Ticker Tape Home in last year’s Seaway, said. “But going, six, six and a half, and seven – she’s deadly.”

It was the first graded crown for the daughter of Medaglia d’Oro, who took last year’s Fury Stakes at Woodbine.

Trained by Mark Casse, the 4-year-old dark bay was bred by Sam-Son Farm. She won her prior start to the Seaway, a 1 1/4-length score at six furlongs on the E.P. Taylor turf on July 21.

Sporting a mark of 4-2-0 from 15 starts, Ticker Tape Home was a US$625,000 purchase at the 2021 Fasig-Tipton New York Saratoga Select Yearling Sale.

She paid $12.40 for the Seaway win.