OXO Equine LLC’s 4-year-old filly, Upper Case, secured her first stakes victory by running down a fading Accomplished Girl and out finishing Mystic Pleasure in the final furlong.
Winning the 19th edition of the $295,000 Dream Supreme (L) at Churchill Downs on Saturday by 1¼ lengths.
Guided by jockey Evin Roman for trainer Paulo Lobo, Upper Case completed the six-furlong race on a fast track in a time of 1:09.88.
For Roman, who was the 2017 Eclipse Award winner for outstanding apprentice jockey, this win marked his first victory in 20 starts at Churchill Downs after relocating from Northern California, where he was the leading rider at Golden Gate Fields, to the Kentuckiana area earlier this year.
The race dynamics shifted early when the anticipated pacesetter and even-money favorite, Spirit Wind, broke slowly from the gate, losing about 1½ lengths.
This allowed Accomplished Girl to take the lead down the backstretch, with Mystic Pleasure and Spirit Wind in pursuit, while Upper Case settled into fourth along the rail a few lengths behind.
After swift early fractions of :21.71 and :44.66, the field entered the stretch, and Upper Case swung out three-wide to unleash her closing kick, seizing the lead between horses with a furlong remaining and holding off Mystic Pleasure’s challenge.
“I’m so grateful for this team of (owner) Larry Best and Paulo for giving me these opportunities,” said Roman, a graduate of Puerto Rico’s renowned Escuela Vocacional Hipica jockey school.
“I sat a beautiful trip today, and this filly keeps improving with every race.”
The victory, worth $183,450, boosted Upper Case’s career earnings to $393,964, with a record of 4 wins, 6 seconds, and 0 thirds in 14 starts.
Prior to the Dream Supreme, she finished a close second to Mystic Pleasure by half a length in an October 13 allowance race at Keeneland over 6½ furlongs.
“She’s like a fine wine, getting better with age,” Lobo remarked. “We’re thrilled to get this stakes win today.
She’s performed well at Turfway in the past, so that could be an option for the winter. We had considered retiring her, but we’ll discuss it with Mr. Best before making any decisions.”
As the 9-2 third betting choice, Upper Case paid $11.24 for the win.
Mystic Pleasure, the 2-1 second favorite with Florent Geroux aboard, edged out Spirit Wind, ridden by Mike Smith, by three-quarters of a length for second place.
The remaining finishers were Accomplished Girl, Awesome Treat, and Into Love, with Girls Weekend, Lure’em In, and Miss Arlington scratched.
Bred in Kentucky by Thor-Bred Stables LLC, Upper Case is by American Pharoah out of the Smart Strike mare Rigged Smart.
The Dream Supreme Stakes is named after the celebrated sprinter Dream Supreme, who was trained by Bill Mott and captured the Derby City Distaff at Churchill Downs in 2001.
Dream Supreme earned over $1 million in her career, with two Grade 1 sprint victories among her six graded stakes wins between 1999 and 2001.
