Servis considers next step for Kentucky Oaks winner Cathryn Sophia
LOUISVILLE, Ky. - A day later, the glow from Cathryn Sophia's overwhelming win in Friday's $1 million Kentucky Oaks before a record Oaks Day crowd of nearly 125,000 had not come close to wearing off for her Philadelphia connections.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. - A day later, the glow from Cathryn Sophia's overwhelming win in Friday's $1 million Kentucky Oaks before a record Oaks Day crowd of nearly 125,000 had not come close to wearing off for her Philadelphia connections.
"There is the queen," her groom, Harry Harcourt, said early Saturday morning.
Friends of Cathryn Sophia owner Chuck Zacney repaired to the Galt House downtown for a fairly subdued Friday night celebration. Trainer John Servis could not get a restaurant reservation for Friday but called a friend who told him about a place on Bardstown Road that was practically empty. Now Servis knows why. His meal made a personal top-10 list, and not in a good way.
It wasn't about dinner, anyway. It was about Cathryn Sophia. The filly is scheduled to head to Delaware Park on Monday. Servis' base at Parx Racing is under quarantine because of an equine virus - horses can go there, but can't leave until the quarantine is lifted - and he does not want his filly stuck.
Servis had thought the Acorn Stakes on the Belmont undercard would be her next start, but is now wondering whether that 1-mile race is too short. Whatever he and Zacney decide, Cathryn Sophia will have plenty of opportunities in major stakes races this summer and fall.
Servis, a West Virginia native who has lived in Bensalem for years, has started one horse in the Kentucky Derby (Smarty Jones) and one in the Oaks and won with both.
"You're talking about a kid who grew up in a town that didn't have 5,000 people," he said. "To be able to win both those races is just incredible."
Tepin to Royal Ascot
The brilliant 5-year-old mare Tepin won the Churchill Downs Turf Mile for the second consecutive year on the Derby undercard Saturday. She has won six straight, and her two career losses were by a head and a nose. Her next start will come in England at the Royal Ascot meeting, the world's most prestigious race meet (June 14-18), which begins each day when the Queen of England arrives in a horse-drawn carriage.