Saturday, June 15, 2019
March to the Arch's thrilling victory in Saturday's $250,000 Wise Dan S. (G2) at Churchill Downs marked the first graded stakes score for the Live Oak Plantation homebred 4-year-old.
Winner of Tampa Bay Downs' Turf Classic in March and the 2018 Toronto Cup at Woodbine, March to the Arch is now 5-2-1 in 13 starts and has earned $429,514.
Saturday's breakthrough win certainly didn't come easy. In the back half of the field for the first six furlongs, the son of Arch was bottled up behind horses on the far turn with seemingly nowhere to run. Still behind a wall of horses with a furlong to go, Tyler Gafflione swung his mount four wide to swoop past and take the lead over All Right in the final strides, winning by a neck, with less than a length separating the top four finishers.
The final time of 1:40.58 for the 1 1/16-miles was less than a second off the track record.
“The race set up beautifully,” said Gafflione. “The speed went ahead and I was able to tuck in going into the first turn. So, we were saving ground all around and I kind of just followed Corey (Lanerie, on 4th place finisher Parlor) when he started making his move. When I got him outside, he really exploded. He just kicked it into gear.”
Trained by Mark Casse, March to the Arch is out of the multiple graded winner Daveron (GER), who also produced Live Oak's Grade 3 winner Global Access.