Screen Image and Eddie Keating near the wire in the $75,000 Randolph D. Rouse filly and mare stakes. ©Coady Photography
Owner-trainer Ted Gregory’s Screen Image, a six-year-old daughter of Giant’s Causeway, earned her first stakes victory today, landing the winner’s share of the $75,000 Randolph D. Rouse filly and mare stakes at Colonial Downs under Eddie Keating.
A veteran of eight efforts on the flat — including a 2018 start in a maiden claimer at Saratoga, Screen Image raced close to the pacesetter, Carrington Holdings’ Cainudothetwist, who held the lead for most of the 2-mile contest. Turning for home, Cainudothetwist was joined by Buttonwood Farm’s Lizzy and Joseph Fowler’s Down Royal and the battle was on. Under Keating, Screen Image made a move to the inside and prevailed under a vigorous hand ride by about four lengths over a game Down Royal and jockey Bernie Dalton. Lizzy and Richard Condon finished third.
Screen Image, who was bred in Kentucky by George Krikorian — who took Saturday’s Grade 2 Glens Falls Handicap on the turf at Saratoga with War Like Goddess — has now started four times over hurdles. She broke her maiden at Foxfield last fall, and followed it up with a third in her 2021 debut in a 115 ratings handicap, to Down Royal, at the Queens Cup Races in April. In her last out, she finished fifth to The Mean Queen in the Margaret Currey Henley Stakes in Nashville.
Boss Man and Jamie Bargary at the wire. ©Coady Photography
In the day’s other race at the New Kent, Va., course, Carrington Holdings’ Boss Man had better luck than his stablemate, going wire to wire in the 2 ¼-mile, $25,000 handicap for horses rated at 115 or lower. With Jamie Bargary riding for trainer Arch Kingsley, the gallant 11-year-old, an accomplished runner who won the 2018 William Entenmann novice stakes at Belmont Park, spurted to the lead and never looked back. Though pressed by Leipers Fork Steeplechasers’ Court Ruler — who appeared to actually take the lead in mid stretch — Boss Man met the challenge and pulled away by 2 ½ lengths in a driving finish. Sharon Sheppard’s Wightman, a 4-year-old Irish-bred making his first U.S. start after a career in Europe, mounted a charge of his own, finishing third after a wide trip.
Boss Man is no stranger to the winner’s circle. His victory was his ninth in 49 starts in a career that began on the flat in 2012 at Belmont Park. Over that time, he has amassed earnings of more than $380,000.