Stellar Wind ends Beholder's wiing streak to take Hirsch Stakes

DEL MAR >> Say one thing about trainer John Sadler — he knows how to celebrate his birthday.

Sadler tued 60 Saturday and watched as the filly he saddled, Stellar Wind, snapped Beholder’s eight-race wiing streak with a half-length victory in the $300,000 Grade I Clement L. Hirsch Stakes at Del Mar.

“You usually don’t get what you want for your birthday, but today I did,” Sadler said in the wier’s circle after Stellar Wind avenged Beholder’s 1 1/2-length victory in the Grade I Vanity Mile at Santa Anita on June 4.

Sadler said wiing jockey Victor Espinoza was optimistic following the Vanity Mile, a race that was Stellar Wind’s first in nearly eight months.

“When Victor got off her the other day, he said, ‘You know, I think we can get her next time.’” Sadler said. “But I’ve kept my mouth shut all along because you don’t want to look like an idiot if it doesn’t work right. But we thought we had a chance.”

Beholder was sent postward as the overwhelming 1-9 favorite, having won both her starts this year in convincing fashion. She won the Hirsch by seven lengths last year, a race that set her up for a smashing 8 1/4-length victory in the Pacific Classic.

But Stellar Wind, the 9-2 second choice Saturday, didn’t run in the Hirsch last summer.

“You’ve got to give them (Stellar Wind’s camp) credit,” said Beholder’s jockey, Gary Stevens. “(Beholder) was comfortable up front. The fractions weren’t hard for her. At the three-furlong pole, I saw that shadow (Stellar Wind) and I knew we might have a race.

“My mare hit another gear at the three-sixteenth (pole), but (Stellar Wind) stayed right with us. I was surprised that she was staying with us. All credit to them. They were ready and they ran great.”

Said Richard Mandella, Beholder’s trainer: “It was a good race for my horse. That other mare ran a helluva race.”

Beholder took the lead out of the gate in the short five-horse field, carving out comfortable fractions of 23.63, 47.38 and 1:10.70 as Stellar Wind sat second, never more than a length back. Stellar Wind pulled even at the head of the stretch and the two Eclipse Award wiers raced as a team down the lane before the wier pulled ahead at the finish.

Espinoza, who’s been on a magical ride the past three years with horses like Califoia Chrome, American Pharoah and Stellar Wind, said the Vanity was the perfect prep for his filly.

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“This time she was ready,” he said. “I knew I was riding against a Hall of Fame jockey on top of the best mare in the country. That’s hard. That’s not easy at all, but some luck and some skill got it done.

“When I came up alongside Gary, it was exciting. She’s a special filly. She showed it today.”

Final time for the 1 1/16 miles was 1:41.24 -- the fastest in the stake since Paseana ran 1:40.40 in 1994. Beholder’s wiing time last year was 1:43.81 when she routed her opponents.

Sadler said Stellar Wind’s light campaign has been by design. The filly’s camp wants her at 100 percent for the Breeders’ Cup Distaff on Nov. 4 at Santa Anita.

“We want to have three or four races before the Breeders’ Cup,” Sadler said. “She’s not a horse to run every month. So we’ll run her probably in the Zenyatta (at Santa Anita) and then the Breeders’ Cup Distaff.

“We’re actually trying to follow Beholder a little bit. We have a lightly raced mare and we’d like to race her two more years.”

Sadler will be 62 then. No telling how he’ll celebrate those birthdays, but Saturday’s won’t soon be forgotten.

How special was it?

“One of the best,” he said. “Right up there.”