By Joe Bianca
Much was said and written about several performances on the GII Wood Memorial S. card Apr. 8 at Aqueduct. Irish War Cry (Curlin) appeared to stamp himself as a leading GI Kentucky Derby contender with a convincing victory in the Wood and Miss Sky Warrior (Sky Mesa) stole the show with a 13-length romp in the GII Gazelle S.
Earlier, in what looked on paper like an unremarkable renewal of the GIII Excelsior S., a pair of older males locked horns in a thrilling stretch battle. An entertaining race to be sure, but its significance wasn't made apparent until that night, when the Beyer Speed Figures for the day were released.
Send It In (Big Brown), an honest New York-bred campaigner for Paul Pompa, Jr. who had never run higher than a 104 previously, earned a gigantic 119 Beyer for his half-length win, a figure matched only by the world's highest-rated racehorse Arrogate (Unbridled's Song) in the past six months.
But it was the horse Send It In collared late, Tu Brutus (Chi) (Scat Daddy), who really opened eyes. Setting a blistering pace for the slow track and 10-furlong distance of :23.40, :47.20 and 1:11.19, he held on gamely to be 14 lengths clear of third, posting a 118 Beyer of his own. The Excelsior was the chestnut's first start in over four months and his first North American outing after running 16 times in his native land.
Many scoffed at these monster numbers, maintaining that they were aberrations and neither horse could actually hold a candle to Arrogate.
No one's laughing now though. Not after Tu Brutus returned to post a front-running, 11-length romp in Sunday's Flat Out S. at Belmont, earning a 109 Beyer with speed to spare and stamping himself as a major player in the older male division.
Tu Brutus's trainer, Gary Contessa, has shown a keen eye for picking out a Chilean import. Turco Bravo (Chi) (Caesarion {Ire}), transferred to Contessa's barn from Chile in the fall of 2014, earned back-to-back upset scores in Aqueduct's Stymie S. in 2015 and 2016 and added a victory in the Birdstone S. at Saratoga last August. The success of the now 8-year-old gelding, who was a distant fourth behind Tu Brutus Sunday, gave Contessa the backing to take another stab in Chile.
“It helped, because now people think I know what I'm doing looking at a South American horse,” the lifelong New Yorker said of buying and campaigning Turco Bravo. “People look to me and they think, 'well he got it right the first time, maybe lightning will strike twice,' and sure enough, it did. From the moment I got Tu Brutus, I knew he was a better horse, he was a different kind of horse than Turco. Turco is a good horse, but this horse trains like he could be something special. So far, he hasn't disappointed.”
Contessa was approached by native Chilean and Hall of Fame former jockey Jose Santos last fall to take a look at a horse he thought might be an upgraded version of Turco Bravo. The colt had made some waves on turf in Chile, winning a Group 3 at Valparaiso in December of 2015 (video) and running third at 44-1 in the G1 El Derby (video) there two months later. But Tu Brutus fully blossomed once switched to dirt during the Chilean winter, reeling off four consecutive easy victories by a combined 26 1/4 lengths.
“I sat there watching all the replays and every race he wins, he wins with something left,” Contessa recalled. “And it's every distance, every imaginable kind of race, every direction. He's really an amazing horse. I loved his body language, and I got Winning Move [Stable] to watch the replays also. [Managing partner] Steve Sigler loved his body language as well and he said, 'OK, I'm in.'”
Contessa cobbled together a partnership of six owners, including longtime clients Winning Move and Leonard Green, and purchased Tu Brutus for $175,000. The horse shipped to Miami in January and was put through quarantine, a harrowing experience according to Contessa, before joining the conditioner's Florida string.
“He did not take the quarantine well,” Contessa said. “In quarantine, they don't let the trainers in there, they don't let your veterinarians go in there, they handle everything. I don't know what they feed them, but they don't exercise them, they stay in a stall and they're monitored. It's not a very nice thing. But then I took him to my barn at Palm Meadows and he rebounded quickly. I would say within a month or so, he was really training well, with enthusiasm. He was starting to look good and he put back on the weight he had lost.”
By mid-March, Contessa had Tu Brutus ready to run, but that became another ordeal, one that makes his Excelsior run all the more impressive.
“I had a race picked out for him at Gulfstream, I entered him and the race didn't go,” Contessa relayed. “So I want to run him now, and I van him from Gulfstream to Laurel for a stake race. Then it snows and they cancel racing. So then I van him back to my barn in New York and we miss like a week of training. I really wanted him to have one under his belt before I ran him in the Excelsior, so my feeling was he was maybe 75-80% ready and boy, he ran his eyeballs out. It was a really, really good race, but he's a good workhorse. He's the kind of horse you can bring to the races on works, because he gives you a lot in the morning.”
Now, with Tu Brutus having legitimized the Excelsior effort with his Flat Out romp, Contessa and his partners can start to dream. And there's no greater dream than challenging the big horse on the block.
“I actually look forward to the day when we get to run against Arrogate,” Contessa says. “Will we? I don't even know. Maybe in the Pegasus, maybe in the Whitney, I don't know what his plans are. But yeah, there's a gaping hole [in the older male divison] after Arrogate, and let's not forget [Send It In], he ran a big race too. I'm sure we're gonna meet him again shortly and I really think that my horse is a better horse than he was when he ran in the Excelsior. More than likely, this is the best horse I've ever had. I think the sky's the limit for him.”
Tu Brutus, who will be pointed next to either the GII Brooklyn Invitational S. June 10 or the July 8 GII Suburban H., has already made one thing certain for Contessa. In the future, when he wants to import a Chilean runner, he won't have much trouble finding owners to take that leap of faith with him.
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