Photo by Bill Denver/EQUI-PHOTO

(9/24) What's Your Edge wins $200K Monmouth event by 2-3/4 to go 2-for-2
Klaravich Stables' New York-bred WHAT'S YOUR EDGE lent further justification to his $150,000 March purchase price by scoring his second victory in two starts in the $200,000 Monmouth Park NATC Futurity for two-year-olds that had been cataloged for sale in 2005, capturing that six-furlong event by 2-3/4 lengths in 1:08.99. Sent off as the 3.90-to-1 second choice among 10 starters with jockey Joe Bravo riding him for the first time in competition, the chestnut colt tracked close behind the early pacesetters -- including odds-on (.50-to-1) favorite Diabolical -- through a 21.82 opening quarter-mile. He challenged for the lead while three wide on the turn, ranging up on the outside of Diabolical and pushing his head in front as he approached the stretch to set a half-mile fraction of 44.59. Diabolical, a 9-3/4-length debut winner at Belmont in July who had placed second in Monmouth's Grade 3 Sapling Stakes on August 20 despite being rank, dug in to meet the challenge, but at mid-stretch he was a length behind, as What's Your Edge set a five-furlong fraction of 56.41. In the final furlong, the New York-bred pulled away, giving jockey Bravo his second of three winning rides on Monmouth's Saturday card.
Owned by the Klaravich Stables, Inc. of Seth Klarman of Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, who had purchased the colt for $150,000 at the Ocala Breeders' Sales Company's (OBS) 2005 March sale of two-year-olds in training in Florida, What's Your Edge boosted his earnings by $120,000 to $147,000 in two starts. He had won his Saratoga debut on August 1, and in the interim trainer Richard Violette Jr. had given the precocious youngster five workouts -- three half-mile drills at Saratoga followed by Aqueduct works on September 15 and 20 that concluded with a five-furlong blowout in 59 3/5. In an under tack show prior to the OBS sale, What's Your Edge had worked a furlong in 10 2/5. Owner Klarman is an investment banker who had paid $320,000 at Fasig-Tipton Midlantic's May 2003 sale of two-year-olds to purchase New York-bred Read the Footnotes ($450,660), subsequent winner of Aqueduct's 2003 Grade 2 Remsen and Grade 3 Nashua and victorious in Gulfstream's 2004 Grade 2 Fountain of Youth. What's Your Edge (originally named Atlantic Breeze) was bred by Jack Hammer of Atlanta, Georgia, doing business as (d.b.a.) Buckingham Stables, Inc., and was foaled at Mark Spitzer's M D S Farm in Pine Plains. He is by the multiple stakes-winning Storm Cat stallion Stormy Atlantic and is the second offspring produced from three-time winner Advantage, who is a full sister to Grade 2 record-setter Forty One Carats ($828,843) and is inbred 4 x 4 to Raise a Native. Hammer Stable had purchased Advantage for $130,000 at Fasig-Tipton Florida's February 1999 sale of two-year-olds in training barely more than a week after the filly's future Grade 2-winning brother, Forty One Carats, had broken his maiden by 13-3/4 lengths as an early three-year-old at Gulfstream Park.
What's Your Edge is the 20th New York-bred winner of an open (to horses bred/conceived anywhere) stakes in 2005, and the Monmouth NATC Futurity was the 26th open stakes won this year by a New York-bred. New York-breds in 2005 have won open stakes in eight different U.S. states and two foreign countries.
William Rickman's PRECISE MOTION looked like a little more distance was precisely what he wanted in Belmont's seven-furlong Saturday nightcap, a restricted N2X allowance for three-year-olds and up, breaking from the outside post among nine starters and pressing the pace before pulling away decisively through the stretch. The three-year was odds-on (.90-to-1) with New York Thoroughbred Breeders 2002 Jockey of the Year John Velazquez on board for the second time in competition, and he boosted his earnings by $27,000 into six figures at $111,355 while improving his record to 3 - 3 - 1 in nine starts. For Velazquez, who had ridden Precise Motion to a fourth-place finish among nine at Saratoga on August 4 when the colt had to be checked on the backstretch, the victory marked his fourth winning ride of the day. The New York-bred was the second winner on the card sent out by trainer Linda Rice, who had given him a sharp half-mile workout (47 2/5) over Belmont's training track just four days prior to Saturday's score. Three weeks earlier on September 3, the bay colt had placed a game second -- beaten a neck -- in a six-furlong restricted N2X allowance at Saratoga. Precise Motion had broken his maiden last December at Aqueduct and had gone through his restricted N1X condition with a gate-to-wire Belmont victory by a length and a quarter at six furlongs on June 25. Purchased at the Ocala Breeders' Sales Company's April 2004 sale of two-year-olds in training in Florida by Triumph Racing Stable for $85,000, Precise Motion has made all of his starts for owner Rickman, whose family owns majority interest in Delaware Park. He is by former New York-based stallion Precise End, who had stood at Becky Thomas's and Lewis Lakin's Lakland North, LLC in Hudson before going to Japan and whose former partnership connections qualified for a $1,890 stallion award. Precise End currently ranks as the sixth-leading North American second-crop sire of 2005 and has achieved that status from the earnings (over $1.4-million in 2005 to date) of exclusively New York-conceived progeny. Precise Motion was bred by the Sez Who Thoroughbreds in Stillwater of Florida resident Richard Simon, which qualified for a $5,400 breeder award, and is the fourth starter and fourth winner produced from winner Lookaway Dixie, being a half-brother to New York-bred stakes-placed winner Swinging Ghost ($112,040 through 2004). Lookaway Dixie, who is by Dixieland Band, is a half-sister to stakes winner Movant ($137,865 through 2004) and to stakes-placed winner Brazen Bride ($151,974) and had been purchased by breeder Simon for $38,000 at Keeneland's 1999 November sale. Precise Motion is inbred 3 x 5 to Northern Dancer.
Seven New York-bred six-figure-earners competed in Belmont's seven-furlong Saturday opener, a restricted allowance for three-year-olds and up that had started for $25,000 claiming prices or less in 2004-2005, and horseplayers correctly identified the top two in the contest, which was won by Flying Zee Stable's homebred TAKING THE REDEYE. It was the four-year-old gelding's fifth consecutive outing under jockey Edgar Prado and his third win at three different distances at Belmont since June with that rider in the irons, increasing his earnings by $21,600 to $161,756 while improving his record to 6 - 0 - 2 in 21 starts. He went off narrowly favored at 2.65-to-1 over 2.80-to-1 second choice Unswept, who finished a length and a quarter behind Taking the Redeye and four lengths ahead of third-place finisher Wild Vicar. The victory also qualified Taking the Redeye's owner-breeder, the Flying Zee Stable(s) of Carl Lizza Jr. of Wharton, New Jersey, for an additional $4,320 stallion award. The dark bay gelding was conceived and foaled at Lizza's and Joseph Bartone's Highcliff Farm in Delanson from the cover of New York-bred champion and New York-based stallion Scarlet Ibis (Cormorant - Fifties Galore, by Cornish Prince), who has cumulative progeny earnings exceeding $8.6-million. Scarlet Ibis's owner, Michael Martin of Madison Avenue in Manhattan, qualified for a $1,512 stallion award as a result of Taking the Redeye's victory, which came 20 days after an unplaced turf experiment at Saratoga that had been the gelding's first start off a 64-day layoff. Saturday's sprint score marked Taking the Redeye's first tally at a distance of less than a mile. Trained by Frank Martin Sr., the Flying Zee Stable homebred is the fourth New York-bred winner that Lizza has bred from yet another New York-bred, Ribboned, who won Finger Lakes' 1991 Niagara Stakes by six lengths while racing for Lizza's Tri-Noble Stable. Taking the Red