Musical Romance, a 5-year-old filly borne of a blue-collar pedigree and owned by a small partnership, won the Eclipse Award for top female sprinter in North America this week.
While other horses sired by Ocala Stud stallions have taken home Eclipse awards, a horse bred by the farm had never won. The farm has breed and sold 2-year-old horses since the 1950s.
“Everyone is ecstatic. It’s special because she’s by a stallion we stood on the farm, Concorde’s Tune, and she is out of a mare we bred by one of our other stallions we stood, Slew Gin Fizz. So it’s an Ocala Stud horse all the way around,” said David O’Farrell, assistant farm manager.
Musical Romance Eclipse win was sealed by her win in the $1 million Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint in November at Churchill Downs.
“It’s a blue-collar story. Horses that are bred like that have really long odds of winning a Breeders’ Cup or an Eclipse,” he said.
Musical Romance was not even nominated to the Breeders’ Cup races as yearling.
“We have 50 foals every year and at $500 a piece to nominate every foal, it can be very expensive. We have to pick and choose and usually nominate about 25. Honestly, we didn’t think she was Breeders’ Cup caliber,” O’Farrell said.
Musical Romance sold for $22,000 at the 2009 Ocala Breeders’ Sales spring 2-year-old sale. She was purchased by Bill Kaplan for a small-scale racing partnership called Pinnacle Racing Stables, based in South Florida.
“To go where we have with this filly is beyond our imagination,” said Adam Lazarus, managing partner of Pinnacle.
Kaplan trains and owns part of the horse. Kaplan met Lazarus through Lazarus’ father, who plays golf with Kaplan.
Musical Romance plugged away at the two South Florida tracks for two years before she caught fire in 2011. She won three of five stakes race at Calder between May and August and finished second in the Grade I Princess Rooney Handicap.
She won the Presque Isle Masters Stakes (GII) in September and then finished second in the Thoroughbred Club of America Stakes at Keeneland in October.
Still, since she was not nominated to the Breeders’ Cup, her owners had to pay $100,000 to enter the then 4-year-old filly into the race.
“We know those folks, they just don’t throw money around. They can’t. So when they nominated her to the Breeders’ Cup, you have to belive she was doing very well and you believe she had a big shot to win,” O’Farrell said. “We’re very, very thankful they did put that money up.”
Musical Romance earned $540,000 for the win, pushing her career earnings to more than $1.2 million. The filly was a 20-1 long shot and paid $42.40 for a $2 win bet.
“It’s really gratifying and it’s given us a boost to get that feather in our cap,” said O’Farrell.