Peacock Racing Stables' Gunnevera (Dialed In), a romping 5 3/4-length winner of Saturday's GII Xpressbet.com Fountain of Youth S., came out of the race in fine shape, trainer Antonio Sano reported Sunday.
“He's very good this morning, 100% sound,” Sano said. “He's very good.”
Gunnevera's last-to-first victory in the Fountain of Youth put him atop the leader board for the Road to the Kentucky Derby with 64 points.
“It was very exciting,” Sano said of the Fountain of Youth. “The horse demonstrated that he was the best horse in the race. Right now, the horse has demonstrated he's the best, to me.”
Sano said Gunnevera, who was coming off a runner-up effort behind Irish War Cry (Curlin) in the Feb. 4 GII Lambholm Holy Bull S., was “90%” likely to run next in the Apr. 1 GI Xpressbet.com Florida Derby.
Trainer Chad Brown reported Fountain of Youth runner-up Practical Joke (Into Mischief) was also doing well Sunday, but that there were “no plans moving forward yet.”
Plans for third-place finisher Three Rules (Gone Astray) are also up in the air.
“He came out of it good,” trainer Jose Pinchin said. “I thought he ran a very good race. I thought he ran very well considering the track was slow and he didn't get a break. [Irish War Cry] really went with him the first five furlongs and Gunnevera passed him, but he stuck with [Practical Joke]. It was a good run.”
Pinchin continued, “Right now [his next start] is up to the owners, so I'll wait to hear from them. He's got a lot of options.”
Even-money favorite Irish War Cry suffered the first defeat of his career when he came home a disappointing seventh in the Fountain of Youth, but trainer Graham Motion found no excuses for the dull effort.
“Really, he seems fine,” Motion said. “I have no issues with him. He seemed to cool out fine and he looked good this morning. It's a real head-scratcher.”
Irish War Cry was loose on the lead when he captured the Holy Bull last month, but Saturday he sat behind Three Rules through fractions of :23.43, :47.18 and 1:12.37 under jockey Joel Rosario before fading on the turn for home.
“The one thing I blame myself for perhaps is not telling Joel he should have taken a hold of him and taken him back,” Motion said. “I think to compete in these races, at some point you've got to be able to be adaptable to different scenarios. This horse, if he's going to compete at this level, he's got to be able to relax,”
Of the handsome chestnut's next likely start, Motion said, “I've got to sit on him for a couple of weeks and see where we're at. My instant gut reaction is I would have a hard time running this horse back in four weeks off of that kind of a race. I don't want to make a hasty decision. Whatever the decision, he's not going anywhere for a couple of weeks. I'll keep him down here while we try to figure out the next step.”
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