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Check the Label verifies talent in Appalachian
Although Rose Catherine won the pace battle with Go Ask Alex, and clung to a narrow lead at the top of the stretch, she was about to lose the war. Check the Label had all the momentum straightening up for home. In short order, Check the Label overwhelmed the favorite and pulled 1 1/2 lengths clear. Meanwhile, Bay to Bay rallied from well back. Steadily erasing her deficit, Bay to Bay got closer with each and every stride, but Check the Label would not be denied. The winner stayed on determinedly to reel off one mile on the firm turf in 1:34 4/5 and returned $11.20, $5.80 and $2.80 as the 9-2 second choice. "This filly is very consistent, very honest," Motion said. "She ran well at Gulfstream (where she was second, third and fourth in three consecutive stakes). Julien did a great job with her today. We were a little worried about how the race would set up, but I felt pretty good down the backside, the way things were going." Bay to Bay, the third choice at 5-1, gave back $7 and $3 and ended the $54.60 exacta. The top two dominated the finish, for it was another 4 3/4 lengths back to Rose Catherine in third. Show was good for $2.10, and the trifecta totaled $150.80. Orchestrator (Bernstein) ran evenly in fourth, wrapping up the $487.60 superfecta (7-5-1-3). All County (Medallist), Red Hot Buddha (Buddha), Go Ask Alex and Cactus Cadillac (Cactus Ridge) rounded out the order under the wire. Check the Label improved her record to 10-3-2-1, $163,927. The bay has spent most of her career on the grass, expressing a clear preference for that surface. A good-looking maiden winner on the Colonial Downs turf last July, Check the Label made her stakes debut in the Junior Champion S., but she failed to put her best foot forward when the race was transferred to the sloppy Monmouth main track and wound up fourth. She eventually got the chance to run in a turf stakes in the final start of her juvenile campaign, rallying for second in the Caressing H. at Churchill Downs. Check the Label was again adversely affected by a stakes being rained off the turf in her sophomore debut, the Sweetest Chant S. at Gulfstream, where she checked in a distant third. Back on the grass for her next two, she finished a closing second in the Coconut Grove S. and fourth in the Herecomesthebride S. (G3). The Kentucky-bred is out of the unraced Mazel Trick mare Don't Trick Her, making her a half-sister to stakes queen On the Menu (Canadian Frontier), a juvenile filly named Include Me Out (Include) and an unnamed yearling colt by Include. Check the Label hails from the immediate family of millionaire Sweet Talker, also by Stormin Fever, who scored her biggest career triumph over Keeneland's turf in the 2005 Queen Elizabeth II Invitational Challenge Cup (G1). Check the Label's fourth dam is the influential producer *Nato II (*Court Martial), ancestress of such noted performers as Quack (T. V. Lark), It's Freezing (T. V. Commercial), Flemensfirth (Alleged) and Wild Rush (Wild Again).
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