Toinette hands Rushing Fall first defeat in Churchill's Edgewood Stake
Ken Baca, Lisa and Nicholas Hawkins and Lynne and Joseph Hudson’s Toinette caught the previously undefeated Rushing Fall just before the wire to win the 34th running of the $200,000 Edgewood Stakes presented by Forcht Bank (Grade III) for 3-year-old fillies by a neck.
Trained by Neil Drysdale and ridden by Flavien Prat, Toinette covered the 1 1/16 miles on the firm Matt Winn Turf Course in 1:41.60 in her stakes debut.
“She broke slow," Prat said. "I was expecting to be a lot closer than that. Around the turn when everybody made their move I was able to go around people and then just put her straight. She gave me a good run down the lane and I guess she likes the distance, too.”
Longshot Figarella’s Queen took the early lead but as the field reached the backstretch, Rushing Fall dragged Javier Castellano to the lead with Daddy Is a Legend and Irad Ortiz Jr. following right behind through a half-mile in :48.21
Those two sped off as team hitting six furlongs in 1:11.37 and maintaining a daylight advantage on the field until deep stretch when Toinette went rushing by.
Toinette is a Kentucky-bred daughter of Scat Daddy out of the Sunriver mare I Bet Toni Knows. The victory was worth $117,800 and increased Toinette’s earnings to $198,120 with a record of 4-3-0-0 stakes debut.
“She missed the break and Prat didn’t panic," said Drysdale. "He’s a very good rider. He’s a developing rider and he’s getting better and better and better. She got a little stuck in the rail and he was able to get her out. She has a great turn of foot and when you ask her, she goes. She’s growing so we’ll back off on her now. The race at Keeneland was a very strong race. What do they call it? A hot race? That’s why we felt we could make the jump to this. Now we’ll give her a breather.”
Toinette returned $12.80, $5.20 and $3.60. Rushing Fall returned $3 and $2.40 while finishing a half-length in front of Daddy Is a Legend, who paid $3 to show.
It was another half-length back to Got Stormy in fourth with Altea (FR), Beyond Blame, Bo Peep, Kabella, Figarella’s Queen and Beach Waltz.