Warm-up. (Benoit photo)
Trainer Graham Motion and jockey Juan Hernandez double up on weekend stakes
Santa Anita press box
ARCADIA, Calif. – A day after co-winning the GII Twilight Derbv with Test Score at Santa Anita, trainer Graham Motion and jockey Juan Hernandez joined forces again Sunday to win the Grade III Autumn Miss Stakes with Warm-up.
Warming was dismissed at 5-1, settling at the back of the field and then firing through horses at the top of the stretch to win comfortably by one and a half lengths. A Thousand Miles, the longest shot on the board at 95-1, finished a brave second under Diego Herrera after splits of 22.78, 46.63 and 1:11.48 for six furlongs. It was another 1 ¼ lengths back to Precise Timing (71-1) in third, followed by Wink and a Grin (46-1). The trio of expensive horses in the lower rankings posted a $4,709.01 payout in the $1 superfecta.
The Autumn Miss was the first stakes win for Warming, a daughter of Global Campaign, owned by Eclipse Thoroughbred Partners. She won in a time of 1:34.44.
“She broke a step slow,” Hernandez said. “The plan was to stay close to the pace, but after the gate opened the plans changed. I just went in a bit to save ground. They set a good pace so that helped me a lot. I just waited for my move. Around the quarter pole the horse dropped in front of me and I saw the opportunity to shoot between them. I asked my filly to go in through that gap and she did. She just kept accelerating all the way to the thread.”
Warming was purchased for $100,000 last year at the OBS March sale of 2-year-olds in training. She is now 7:3-0-1 with $191,100 in earnings. In three previous stakes attempts, Warming finished fifth in both the GI Belmont Oaks and the GII Lake Placid this summer at Saratoga, and most recently finished third by three-quarters of a length in the GIII John C. Harris, sprinting about 6 ½ furlongs on the grass field on the hill at Santa Anita on September 27.
Warm-up paid $12.40, $6.20 and $4.60. A Thousand Miles, trained by Vann Belvoir, earned $92.80 and $30.00. Precise Timing, ridden by Antonio Fresu for trainer John Sadler, paid $27.
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