It was a big day of racing at Arlington Park
on Saturday, Aug. 15, with five big stakes races on the card.
In the biggest race of the day, the Arlington Million (G1),
The Pizza Man, who just seems to love Arlington Park,
rallied down the stretch under jockey Florent Geroux, and then out-dueled Big
Blue Kitten at the wire to score a neck victory in one of the most exciting
finishes of the day.
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The Pizza Man, who seems to just love Arlington Park,
proved that again on Saturday, Aug. 15, with a neck victory in the Arlington
Million. (Photo by Four Footed Fotos/FourFootedFotos.com)
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Finishing third in the 13-horse race for 3-year-olds and up was
Shining Copper, who had led almost the entire race until the end.
"I'm always confident when I ride him, he loves to win
and knows where the wire is," said Geroux in an Aug. 15 BloodHorse.com
article. "But, I had no horse the whole way. It looked like he was struggling
over the very soft track.
"But, when I put him outside, he started to hold up and
grabbed the bit again and I was thinking, 'Oh boy, he's going for a big one
here!' He is a local horse and even going to the track there was a lot of
people cheering for us, and I'd like to thank them."
The Pizza Man, who is by English
Channel-I Can Fan Fan, by Lear Fan, ran the 1-1/4-mile race on a
turf track rated Yielding, in 2:02.20.
Rounding out the field was Up With the Birds in fourth,
followed by Elleval (Ire), Wake
Forest (Ger), Belgian
Bill (GB), Slumber (GB), Bookrunner, Quiet Force, Triple Threat (Fr), Legendary
(GB) and Maverick Wave.
Since the Arlington Million is a Breeders' Cup "Win and
You're In" race, The Pizza Man also secured a spot in the Breeders' Cup
Turf (G1T) at Keeneland on Saturday, Oct. 31, with his win.
Owned by Midwest Thoroughbreds and trained by Roger
Brueggemann, The Pizza Man now has 14 wins, one second, two thirds and $960,537
in earnings in 22 career starts. He also won the American St. Leger Stakes at Arlington a year ago on
Arlington Million Day.
In the other stakes races at Arlington Park
on Saturday, the winners were:
* Pucker Up Stakes (G3): Mizz Money
* American St. Leger Stakes
(G3): Lucky Speed (Ire)
* Secretariat Stakes (G1): Highland
Reef (Ire)
* Beverly
D. Stakes (G1): Watsdachances (Ire) got the win following a DQ of Secret
Gesture (GB), who crossed the wire first, but
(Information gathered from EquiBase.com, BloodHorse.com and
Brisnet.com.)
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