Grade 2 Winner Chatalas makes 3-year-old debut in Indiana Oaks at Horseshoe Indianapolis

Rancho Temescal Thoroughbred Partners’ Grade 2 winner Chatalas makes her first start of the year and her first for Louisville-based trainer Grant Forster in Saturday’s $200,000 Grade 3 Indiana Oaks for 3-year-old fillies at Horseshoe Indianapolis.

“Mark Glatt is the trainer,” Forster said. “He and the owners were in a position where, in California for the summer, the nicer races are primarily on turf. They wanted to have a Midwest, East Coast campaign with her with all the dirt races back here for 3-year-old fillies. They sent her to me a few weeks ago. She came in wonderful shape. Just a lovely filly to be around.”

The 1/16-mile Indiana Oaks (11th race, 6:04 p.m. Saturday) takes second billing only to the $300,000 Grade 3 Indiana Derby (12th race, 6:41 p.m.) on the state’s most important day of racing. First post is noon for a card that includes four $100,000 open stakes (the Mari Hulman George Memorial, Jonathan B. Schuster Memorial, Michael G. Schaefer Memorial and the Indiana General Assembly Distaff Handicap) as well as a pair of $100,000 stakes for registered Indiana-bred 3-year-olds (The Snack) and state-bred 3-year-old fillies (The Ellen’s Lucky Star).

Chatalas (photo) managed to win one of the few graded stakes for 2-year-olds in California not won by Hall of Famer Bob Baffert, doing so in Santa Anita’s Grade 2 Chandelier. She lost all shot in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies after being jostled hard at the start, taking her out of her up-close running style and never getting closer to the lead than ninth. Her traffic troubles continued in Los Alamitos’ Starlet (G2), only at the end of the race. She was in prime striking position before being impeded by the eventual runner-up, with Chatalas promoted to third from fourth upon the offending filly’s disqualification.

Chatalas finished her season with a second by a neck in a $100,000 turf stakes at Santa Anita.

“Obviously it’s impressive form,” Forster said. “They gave her a break by design just to have her freshened up and ready for the latter half of the 3-year-old year. She’d run six times as a 2-year-old, had a wonderful campaign. They just wanted to make sure they had a nice filly for the rest of the year this year rather than keep going.

“She really trains forwardly. She’s a beautiful mover, covers a lot of ground. We’re really excited about getting her started this weekend and hopefully setting her up for a big second half of the season.”

Antonio Fresu, the Italian jockey who is a rising star in California, comes in to ride Santa Anita Derby (G1) winner Stronghold in the $300,000 Grade 3 Indiana Derby and Chatalas, upon whom he won the Chandelier.

“He’d had a lot of success with her,” Forster said. “Obviously he’s a very talented rider, had a great winter at Santa Anita and had a stakes winner at Churchill on Sunday (Raging Torrent in the Maxfield) for Doug O’Neill. With her not having run since she was a 2-year-old, hopefully he’s going to feel a bigger, stronger filly than he was on the last time.”

Forster’s entry in the Indiana Derby, Sir Greylind, had a minor issue and will be scratched, he said.

Five Star General once again using Schaefer as prep for the Longacres Mile

The Grant Forster-trained, well-traveled Five Star General returns to Horseshoe Indianapolis to run in Saturday’s $100,000 Michael G. Schaefer Memorial, a dirt stakes at a mile and 70 yards in which he finished second last year. As with last year, Forster wants to use the Schaefer as a launching pad for the Longacres Mile at Washington state’s Emerald Downs.

That’s not only where Forster, who grew up in western Canada in a racing family, got an important part of his early racetrack education, but it’s a race that the now 8-year-old horse has competed in four times. After a second and two thirds with three different trainers, Five Star General finally won the Longacres Miles last year for Forster.

“That’s the same plan again,” Forster said. “Last year we were second to Trademark, who of course went on to have a really nice second half to his season, winning the Clark (G2). He’s entered again this year. It came up a very solid, tough race for $100,000. The General is just a really neat horse. But yeah, the plan is to go back out to the Longacres Mile after this. Hopefully we get a really good race out of him on Saturday and we get to make the trek to the Pacific Northwest again.”

Five Star General has won 12 of 37 starts, with six seconds and eight thirds, for earnings of $808,594. He comes into the Schaefer off a front-running off-the-turf victory at Churchill Downs.

Forster subsequently noted: “He’s the coolest horse. I’m sure he’s the only horse in history to have won at Churchill, Keeneland, Aqueduct, Laurel, Hasting, Emerald Downs, Fair Grounds and Evangeline Downs!”

And now could add Horseshoe Indianapolis to that far-flung list.

Drury runs Claiborne’s Misread in Indiana General Assembly Distaff

Eight years ago, Tom Drury brought the 6-year-old millionaire Departing — the most accomplished horse that Claiborne Farm had ever sent him up to that time — to Horseshoe Indianapolis for what proved a victory in the Michael G. Schaefer Memorial.

It was a big deal for Drury then, and remains a big deal every time he sends out a horse for the legendary breeding and stallion farm in Paris, Kentucky. That includes Saturday when Drury runs Misread in the $100,000 Indiana General Assembly Distaff at 1 1/16 miles on grass.

Drury had had a solid career racing all around the Midwest, but Departing proved a turning point that put him on an upward trajectory, including winning Keeneland’s 2020 Covid-delayed Toyota Blue Grass with Art Collector. Drury-trained horses have run out more than $1 million each the past five years, including $1.12 million already in 2024.

“It was a huge deal,” he said of Departing’s Schaefer triumph. “Indiana has been good to us. I think one of my first stakes wins was with an Indiana-bred up there (Models Memo in the 2008 Indiana First Lady). And my first stakes win for Claiborne was with Departing.

“… Just as a fan of horse racing, you get to suddenly include yourself in a list of trainers who have won stakes for Claiborne: Frankie Brothers, Bill Mott, Woody Stephens, Shug McGaughey, Richard Mandella — guys I’ve grown up watching and wanting to be like. Suddenly you get to say you’ve got something in common with them. It was huge.”

The 5-year-old Misread, a daughter of Claiborne’s 2010 Breeders’ Cup Classic winner Blame, has two allowance wins and two seconds in six turf starts, most recently a fifth place in Churchill Downs’ Mint Julep (G3).

“The first time I ran her here on the dirt, it was a sealed racetrack and she won pretty impressively (by 9 1/4 lengths),” Drury said at Churchill Downs. “Obviously being a Blame, she’s got a license to be anything. I talked to Walker (Claiborne’s president Walker Hancock), ‘What about maybe trying her on the grass?’ It just seems like she found another gear once we did that. She’s been good to us.”