Wathnan Racing buys Instant Replay, will keep him with Cox

When Texas Derby winner Instant Replay runs in Saturday’s Grade 3, $300,000 Indiana Derby at Horseshoe Indianapolis it will be with a new owner, Wathnan Racing.

Owner-breeders Gary and Mary West sold Instant Replay, a four-time winner of $479,858, this week to Wathnan, the Emir of Qatar’s horse-racing operation that has become globally prominent in just a few years. According to its website, Wathnan is named after a desert Arabian, “a beloved stallion of Al Thani family folklore. He, in turn, was named for his kind and eager disposition. ‘Wathnan’ can be translated as ‘a crown of ears,’ referring to his pricked ears, the surest sign that a horse truly is your friend.”

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Instant Replay will continue to be trained by Brad Cox, who has other horses for Wathnan. Case Clay, advisor and racing manager for Wathnan Racing U.S., said the operation is looking to buy horses who can race longer distances on dirt in America and the Middle East. The goal is to try to win marquee races around the world.

The Indiana Derby is one of eight stakes on Saturday’s 13-race card that also includes the Indiana Oaks (G3). Instant Replay is the 4-1 second choice in the morning line behind 7-2 favorite Coal Battle. First post for the day is 12 p.m. EDT with the Indiana Derby set as Race 12 with an estimated post time of 6:33 p.m.

“He’s a horse, to me, who looks like he ought to get better as he goes longer. So we’re going to take a shot with him,” Clay said. “Watching his races, he ran some good (handicapping) numbers. He’s only 3. It’s a horse I hope would improve. He hasn’t been worse than fourth, and he was third to some very good horses in the Louisiana Derby (G2). I hope and think he has potential. This is a tough race. I think the goal for Instant Replay is to try to do well with him over a long period of time.”

Wathnan Racing has bought several Cox-trained horses, including Hit Show from the Wests last summer. Hit Show won Churchill Downs’ Lukas Classic (G2) in his first start for Wathnan and in April captured the $12 million Dubai World Cup (G1). 

“It’s been a pretty great few years for Wathnan Racing, and hopefully it continues,” Clay said. 

Instant Replay could be an appropriate name as Cox shoots for his third straight victory and a fourth in six years in Indiana’s biggest horse race. 

Cox won the 1 1/16-mile Indiana Derby last year with Dragoon Guard and in 2023 with Verifying. Shared Sense won the race in 2020, when COVID delayed the Kentucky Derby until the first Saturday in September. Even in the two years he didn’t win, the Cox-trained Best Actor was second by a half-length to Actuator in 2022, and Cox was third with Fulsome in Mr. Wireless’s 2021 victory.

“We try to come with horses that can compete, and I think we’re doing it again this year,” Cox said.

The Wests also bred and raced Instant Replay’s sire, the Ashford Stud stallion Maximum Security, who finished first in the 2019 Kentucky Derby but was disqualified for interference. Winning three other Grade 1 stakes, Maximum Security was voted 3-year-old champion. Instant Replay is the most accomplished horse from Maximum Security’s first crop.

“I feel like we stack up,” Cox said of the Indiana Derby. “It’s a good group of horses. I think it’s a little bit tougher than what he’s been facing, but it’s time for him to step up and see if he can pick up a graded stakes.”

Instant Replay started out last summer at Ellis Park with a fourth in a maiden special-weight race. He was dropped into a pair of high-end maiden-claiming races, for $150,000 then $100,000 claiming prices, producing a second and then an 8 3/4-length victory. After a five-length allowance win at Oaklawn, Cox ran Instant Replay in the $1 million, 1 3/16-mile Louisiana Derby, rallying late to finish third.

“He just came up a little short,” Cox said. “Obviously distance shouldn’t be an issue. I wish this race actually was a mile and an eighth, but this is where we are. We feel we need to run him, and I think he’ll show up and run his race.”

Instant Replay comes into the Indiana Derby off a two-stakes win streak, ripping off victories in Oaklawn’s $200,000 Bath House Row and Lone Star Park’s $300,000 Texas Derby, both at the Indiana Derby distance.

Luan Machado, who won Turfway Park’s Jeff Ruby Steaks (G3) for Cox aboard Final Gambit, has the mount. Machado was Kentucky’s winningest jockey in 2024.

“It seems like most of the Maximum Security (horses) do a little better going long,” Cox said. “And they seem like they get a little better with a few starts under their belts. He’s continued to get better.

“He’s running with some confidence right now. He had a really good breeze last weekend. He obviously knows how to win, and hopefully we can keep it going.”

Cox has Heavenly Sunset cross-entered in the Indiana Oaks and the Iowa Oaks. The filly was second in a May 31 allowance race at Churchill Downs won by Indiana Oaks favorite Clicquot. 

Heavenly Sunset is owned by Qatar Racing, a global racing and bloodstock operation founded in 2012 in the United Kingdom and owned by Sheikh Hamad bin Abdullah Al Thani and his brothers.

The Cox-trained Encino, winner of Turfway’s 2024 John Battaglia and Keeneland’s Lexington (G3), makes his turf debut in the $100,000 Jonathan B. Schuster Memorial on the Indiana Derby undercard. Alpine Princess, third in Churchill Downs’ tough edition of the Shawnee (G3), is the 5-2 favorite in the $100,000 Marie Hulman George for older fillies and mares on dirt.