Gambling Girl pays off in Gimma Stakes

By Joe Clancy

Generations. You really want to succeed as a Thoroughbred breeder? Generations of talent will take you a long way. And New York’s Gallagher’s Stud possesses that and then some.

Two-year-old filly Gambling Girl took it another step when she won the $125,000 Joseph A. Gimma Stakes at Aqueduct Friday. Racing for Repole Stable and trainer Todd Pletcher, the daughter of Dialed In and the Empire Maker mare Tulipmania outran even-money favorite Miracle in the stretch to score by 1 3/4 lengths with Les Bon Temps third after 7 furlongs in 1:27.62. Irad Ortiz Jr. rode the winner, who won her second consecutive race after losing her first two.

The delayed success runs in the family according to Mallory Mort, longtime farm manager at Gallagher’s, the Ghent farm founded by Jerry and Marlene Brody and carried forward by Marlene after Jerry’s death in 2001.

“Tulipmania was a terrible disappointment in her first two races, like she had no desire to run at all,” Mort said. “Then in the third race, the lightbulb kind of came on.”

Eleventh in her debut and seventh in her second race for trainer Tom Bush, Tulipmania followed with back-to-back seconds. She won her fifth start and finished with three wins and seven seconds in 15 starts before retiring to the broodmare band.

She came into the job with plenty of background, dating to an Illinois-bred foaled in 1979. Campaigned by Jerry Brody, Grand Bonheur won twice and earned $22,420. As a broodmare, she produced six winners, but left a mark with unraced daughter Felicita. By Rubiano, Felicita produced Grade 1 winner and Take Charge Lady and stakes winner Eventail and Commendation. Gallagher’s sold Felicita while carrying Take Charge Lady – who turned into a Grade 1 producer too as the dam of Will Take Charge and Take Charge Indy – but hung on to Eventail.

The latter’s racing career included a New York Oaks win in 2000 and four other victories. Eventail’s broodmare career started with Fanfire, who lost all six starts, but progressed to three-time winner Tulipmania and Grade 2 winner Straight Story (who earned $736,393). Gallagher’s sold the latter for $400,000 as a yearling and got $925,000 for Eventail while in foal to El Prado. Purchased by Japan’s Shadhai Farm, she has run her produce record to six winners.

Tulipmania kept the family tradition going, producing four winners so far. Gambling Girl sold for $200,000 at Fasig-Tipton’s New York-bred yearling sale last summer via the Denali Stud consignment, joining the Repole team on a bid by West Bloodstock. Like her dam, the bay filly lost her first two – a fourth going 5 furlongs at Belmont Park in June and a third going 6 furlongs at Saratoga – then dominated a 7-furlong New York-bred maiden race at Saratoga in late August. She rallied from fifth early to take over and win by 10 1/2 lengths.

That win sent her to Friday’s stakes, a 7-furlong test against four other state-bred fillies. Miracle, a $360,000 purchase at the OBS March sale, also won a Saratoga maiden race and was favored Friday after finishing third in Saratoga’s Seeking The Ante Stakes. Gambling Girl broke well from post four, then let the others go through a first quarter-mile in :24.11. She advanced outside horses to third after a half-mile in :48.76, took the lead after switching leads at the three-sixteenths pole and seeing out the win. Worth $68,750, the win more than doubled Gambling Girl’s earnings to $132,210.

“Irad let her settle and she made a good run around the turn,” said Byron Hughes, Pletcher’s Belmont-based assistant trainer. “She seemed to be finishing up well and she galloped out well, too. She showed talent in the mornings and she really put it together in her last start at Saratoga and followed up with a good effort today against a talented filly.”

With Gallagher’s since 1979, Mort called the win a satisfying one for the farm.

“Most of us have been here a long time, we don’t have much turnover here,” he said. “They still do a heck of a job. They know how to get a horse ready for the sale. We do all the prep with them so when something sells well, it’s great. Then when they race well it’s very, very rewarding.”

Tulipmania’s 2021 foal Gallant Greta, a filly by Twirling Candy, sold for $90,000 at Saratoga this summer. This year, the mare delivered a full-brother to Gambling Girl and was bred to Medaglia d’Oro. Gallagher’s kept a daughter of Fanfire, Sweet Mystery, who won a Belmont maiden race in July and has placed in two allowance races since for trainer Pat Quick.

Source URL: https://www.nytbreeders.org/news/2022/09/23/gambling-girl-pays-off-in-gimma-stakes/

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