Asmussen Breaks Out Of ‘Slump,’

Winning Two As Golden Mischief Puts n show In Maiden Score

Newly-inducted Hall of Fame trainer Steve Asmussen didn’t accrue the second-most victories (7,386) in racing history by going very long without a win. So, with Ellis Park’s meet-leading stable going all of two weeks without an Asmussen horse hitting the wire first, you knew the barn soon would burst back into the winner’s circle.

That happened twice Friday, as Asmussen went 2 for 3, winning the second race for $5,000 claimers with Kitchen Boss and the seventh as the 2-year-old filly Golden Mischief captured a maiden race by eight lengths over early pacesetter Defy. That put Asmussen’s meet-leading total up to 14 victories, four ahead of second-place Ian Wilkes with six days left in Ellis’ summer meet. Asmussen also has nine seconds and five thirds in 63 starts. Wilkes has run 33 horses.

“That’s part of horse racing,” said Christy Hamilton, who oversees Asmussen’s Ellis Park operation. “Especially with a stable as large as ours, we’ve got so many horses all over. You’ve got to run where they fit. Sometimes they might not have a race here that fits a horse, and they’re shipping around.

“Clearly when you start off as strong as we did and as good as we did, and you go two weeks and don’t win a race, it is a little hard. You take it a little personal and you come back with a vengeance. It makes you work harder, wanting to get there.”

Golden Mischief, owned by Asmussen’s long-time clients Bill and Corinne Heiligbrodt, was making her fourth start. She lost her May 20 debut at Churchill Downs by a neck but showed enough that Asmussen shipped her to New York, where she was a very respectable fourth in the $200,000 Astoria. She led all the way until weakening at the end for another fourth in a Belmont maiden race.

With Didiel Osorio up for the first time, Golden Mischief broke sharply but quickly relaxed into third, some seven lengths behind the stern pace set by Defy. On the far turn, Golden Mischief began reeling in the field, exploding through the top of the stretch before Osorio wrapped up on her late. Even then, the daughter of Into Mischief powered 5 1/2 furlongs in 1:03.32, the Equibase chart footnotes saying “drew away to score as the rider pleased.”

The track record is 1:02.73, set in 2014 by Royal Saint, who coincidentally also was trained by Asmussen.

“I had a lot of horse,” Osorio said. “The last sixteenth, I looked back and little and saw nobody was coming.”

“She ran impressive. I’m very proud of her,” Hamilton said. “I loved how she rated. Man, she’s nice. Yesterday in the (barn) office, we were looking horses up and I pulled her up on my laptop. We were looking at her results, and when we saw her fourth in the Astoria, all of us just started smiling. That kind of told up what we needed to know – the fact that Steve thought that much of her.”

Eight different riders won Friday’s eight races. On a day where favorites ruled, jockey Ty Kennedy won the sixth race aboard the Marty Rouck-trained Keepinyourchinup, paying $34.60. The 22-year-old Kennedy, who had been riding at Prairie Meadows, said not only was it his first mount at Ellis, he’d never before stepped foot in the state.

Corey Lanerie won the nightcap on Freedom Works for a meet-leading 20th victory, two more than Miguel Mena and three more than Osorio, Brian Hernandez Jr. and James Graham.

Racing resumes Saturday at 12:50 p.m. Central, the card including the return of three-time Kentucky Derby winner Calvin Borel, who rides Ellis’ sixth race. Reminder that the schedule for Labor Day weekend is live racing on Thursday, Friday, Sunday and Monday. There is no live racing next Saturday, Sept. 3, that being opening day at Kentucky Downs.