Kimari returned to winning ways and scored her first black-type victory on dirt in the Purple Martin S. The bay settled in mid-pack off a sharp first quarter in :21.63. Tipped out two wide for running room, she improved her position through a half in :45.26 and unleashed a powerful rally in the stretch, charging clear to score.
“I was really, really super confident going into this race,” trainer Wesley Ward said. “I'm kind of a positive guy, anyways, but after seeing those two works, I knew it would take a really, really tough filly to beat her. Take nothing away from the others in there, but I was really confident. The owner and Ben McElroy, who bought her and manages her, they were a little apprehensive when we drew the one hole because she always gets away just a little slow. I kind of laid it all out there and assured them, 'Don't worry about anything.' I was a little nervous that I might have stuck my foot in my mouth, but thank God I didn't.”
Dominating by 15 lengths in her Keeneland unveiling on dirt last April, good for the 'TDN Rising Star' designation, Kimari missed by a head when shipped across the pong for the G2 Queen Mary S. at Royal Ascot in June. Capturing the Bolton Landing S. on the Saratoga lawn in August, she won the grassy Indian Summer S. at Keeneland Oct. 6 with a similarly impressive stretch rally and was fourth last time in the GII Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf Sprint S. Nov. 1.
Kimari is the second foal out of GSW Cozze Up Lady, who has since produced a juvenile colt by Exaggerator and a yearling colt by Quality Road. Click for the Equibase.com chart or VIDEO, sponsored by Fasig-Tipton.
PURPLE MARTIN S., $100,000, Oaklawn, 4-4, 3yo, f, 6f, 1:10.57, sy.
1–KIMARI, 119, f, 3, by Munnings
1st Dam: Cozze Up Lady (GSW, $407,169), by Cozzene
2nd Dam: The White Lady, by Johannesburg
3rd Dam: Maha Al Iman, by Pulpit
($152,000 Ylg '18 FTKJUL). O-Ten Broeck Farm, Inc.; B-China
Horse Club International Limited (KY); T-Wesley A. Ward;
J-Channing Hill. $60,000. Lifetime Record: GSP-Eng, 6-4-1-0, $351,646.
'TDN Rising Star'
2–Frank's Rockette, 119, f, 3, Into Mischief–Rocket
Twentyone, by Indian Charlie. O-Frank Fletcher Racing
Operations, Inc.; B-Frank Fletcher (KY); T-William Mott. $20,000.
3–Edgeway, 117, f, 3, Competitive Edge–Magical Solution, by
Stormin Fever. ($35,000 Wlg '17 KEENOV; $275,000 2yo '19
OBSAPR). O-Hronis Racing LLC; B-Pope McLean, Valerie &
David Blethen (KY); T-John W. Sadler. $10,000.
Margins: 1 3/4, NK, 4 3/4. Odds: 2.90, 1.40, 2.80.
Also Ran: Wasabi Girl, Bootytama, Lady Glamour, Kiss the Girl, Ring Leader, Lexi On the Move. Scratched: Flat Out Speed.
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