Bobby Flay

Still riding high from a scintillating victory in the GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf with fast-finishing Pizza Bianca (Fastnet Rock {Aus}), celebrity chef, restaurateur and owner/breeder Bobby Flay joined the TDN Writers' Room presented by Keeneland Tuesday afternoon. Calling in via Zoom as the Green Group Guest of the Week, Flay appreciated the significance of winning on racing's biggest stage with a homebred, teased a potential Royal Ascot trip with Pizza Bianca and discussed how he would approach racing's marketing challenges and more. Flay made a huge splash at...

Riding high from a scintillating victory in the GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf with his homebred Pizza Bianca, celebrity chef, restaurateur and owner/breeder Bobby Flay joined the TDN Writers' Room.

In the 1997 Breeders' Cup not far away at old Hollywood Park, trainer Christophe Clement made a favorable impression with his first-ever starter at the championships, sending out Allen Paulson's Flag Down (Deputy Minister) to a sound third-place effort behind Chief Bearhart (Chief's Crown) in the GI Breeders' Cup Turf. Thirty-nine starters had represented the stable in the 22 years since, each walked back to the barn a defeated animal. You couldn't have faulted the Frenchman if he'd begun to feel a bit like the late Bobby Frankel, who saddled...

The fleet-footed filly Caravel (Mizzen Mast) rides a hot streak into her first try for Graham Motion and first at the highest level in the GI Highlander S. at Woodbine. Bred and raced by her previous trainer Elizabeth Merryman, the gray captured The Very One S. at Pimlico May 14 and followed suit with a win in Monmouth's Goldwood S. June 25. Bobby Flay bought into the filly after that score and she carried his silks to victory in Saratoga's GIII Caress S. July 24. While Merryman remains part-owner, Caravel...

   Lynn Hancock breezed through the Fasig-Tipton sales grounds early Tuesday morning last week, heading for Barn 1 wearing a baseball cap and a smile. After a long stretch of days running a successful consignment at the Fasig-Tipton Saratoga Selected Yearlings Sale, Stone Farm's Director of Racing and Sales had enjoyed a night of celebration when her consignment sold the highest-priced yearling of the auction's first session. "I didn't want to get out of bed this morning, but the horses needed fed," she said with a grin, nodding toward the...

By Jessica Martini & Christie DeBernardis The 100th anniversary of the Fasig-Tipton Saratoga Selected Yearlings Sale, delayed a year due to the global pandemic, kicked off with a lively session of trade at the Humphrey S. Finney Pavilion Monday evening. "It was a very solid opening session of the 2021 Fasig-Tipton Saratoga Sale," said Fasig-Tipton President Boyd Browning. "It was certainly a very healthy market. It was very similar and reminiscent of the 2019 marketplace. Overall, we are off to a very good start." A colt by Uncle Mo brought...

Agent Jacob West, acting on behalf of Robert and Lawana Low, saw off all challengers to take home an Uncle Mo colt out of GISW Dame Dorothy (Bernardini)--a half to the Lows' GSW 'TDN Rising Star' Spice is Nice (Curlin)--during Monday evening's Fasig-Tipton Saratoga sale. When the dust had settled, the price tag was $1.6 million. The May 2 colt was consigned by Stone Farm as hip 73 on behalf of breeder Bobby Flay. Flay also bred and still co-campaigns the 2019 Saratoga sale co-topper and GSW First Captain (Curlin).

Caravel (Mizzen Mast) carried the colors of her breeder, trainer and now co-owner Elizabeth Merryman to six victories in her eight previous starts. Irad Ortiz climbed aboard Caravel sporting the silks of her new part-owner Bobby Flay for this Saratoga debut and she took her career to the next level with a decisive score in the GIII Caress S. Saturday. Backed to even-money favoritism off a pair of stakes wins, Caravel was away well from her rail draw and settled to track from third off pacesetting New York native Robin...

5th-Saratoga, $100,000, Msw, 7-22, 2yo, f, 1 1/16mT, 1:46.88, gd, 3/4 length. PIZZA BIANCA (f, 2, Fastnet Rock {Aus}--White Hot {Ire}, by Galileo {Ire}), sent off at 5-1, settled well back in last as Hope Over Fear (Cupid) took the field through fractions of :24.88 and :50.53. Expand the Map (Ire) (Dark Angel {Ire}) made an eye-catching move on the far turn and Pizza Bianca shadowed the move of that favorite before unleashing a powerful rally to inhale that foe in deep stretch and graduate by three-quarter lengths. Pizza Bianca...

5th-SAR, $100k, Msw, 2yo, f, 1 1/16mT, 3:21 p.m. ET Woodslane Farm homebred HAIL TO (Kitten's Joy), a full-sister to GISW Sadler's Joy, debuts for Tom Albertrani. Still going strong at age eight for these same connections, Sadler's Joy registered a career high over the Saratoga turf course in the 2017 GI Sword Dancer S. Bobby Flay homebred Pizza Bianca (Fastnet Rock {Aus}) gets her career underway for Christophe Clement. Flay purchased her unraced dam White Hot (Ire) (Galileo {Ire})--a half-sister to group winners Gagnoa (Ire) (Sadler's Wells) and Pour...

Sponsored by Alex Nichols Agency 7th-SAR, $100k, Msw, 3yo/up, f/m, 7f, 4:29 p.m. ET Bobby Flay's MEZCAL (Pioneerof the Nile), the first foal out of 2016 GI Kentucky Oaks winner Cathryn Sophia (Street Boss), makes her debut in the seventh race at Saratoga Sunday. The 3-year-old filly, a $625,000 KEESEP yearling, is trained by Todd Pletcher. Bridlewood Farm and Don Alberto Corp. purchased Cathryn Sophia, with this filly in utero, for $2.3 million at the 2017 Keeneland November sale. Courtlandt Farms' Big City Momma (Quality Road), a $700,000 KEESEP purchase,...

Southern California native Kevin Grigsby, the Executive Producer and Senior Vice President of Television at FanDuel Group & TVG, doesn't give a lot of interviews. "It's a personal preference of mine," says Grigsby. "I love having the network speak for itself, more so than I like to speak for the network." But when the Del Mar meet opens Friday, the network will kick off a comprehensive programming schedule that includes hundreds of hours of live coverage, seven on-air talent, dozens of cameras, and new technology, and so Grigsby has come...