Fort Larned 'got everything' Wilkes wanted from Homecoming Classic

Fort Larned 'got everything' Wilkes wanted from Homecoming

Classic

While his win as the odds-on favorite in the first running of Churchill

Downs' $191,275 Homecoming Classic was anything but a surprise, the effort by

the victorious odds-on favorite Fort Larned has trainer Ian Wilkes smiling as he

looks down the road toward his star's bid for a repeat victory in the $5 million

Breeders' Cup Classic at Santa Anita.

Janis R. Whitham's five-year-old son of E Dubai led from start to finish

under jockey Brian Hernandez Jr. in his 1 1/2-length victory over the

late-running Windswept to score his second victory in five 2013 races. The

winning time for 1 1/8 miles over a fast track was a very solid 1:48 2/5.

The race was the first for Fort Larned since a disappointing fifth-place run

as the favorite in Saratoga's Whitney on August 3. A planned start in the August

31 Woodward over the New York track was scrapped by Wilkes when Fort Larned was

determined to have suffered a muscle strain in his rear end. Training time lost

to that injury made Saturday's run in the Homecoming Classic critical to Wilkes'

preparation of Fort Larned for his bid for back-to-back Breeders' Cup Classic

wins.

"The horse needed the race," Wilkes said on the morning after the Homecoming

Classic victory. "He got everything out of it that I wanted from it, because we

had to miss a little bit of training with that muscle issue early on after the

Woodward. He just wasn't 100 percent. But he looked bright and alert this

morning and he got a lot out of the race, so that was good."

Saturday's win was the second in five 2013 starts for Fort Larned, who

collected his other win over the same surface with a dazzling run in the

$536,300 Stephen Foster Handicap on June 15.

With the Homecoming Classic underneath Fort Larned, Wilkes can now fine-tune

his reigning champion in the weeks leading up to his Breeders' Cup Classic

defense on November 2 at Santa Anita.

"Everything has to go right now," Wilkes said. "Everything has to be perfect,

timing has to be right, everything has to be spot-on. You can't make any

mistakes now going to the Breeders' Cup."

The Homecoming Classic victory boosted Fort Larned's career record to 10-2-1

in 24 races and lifted his earnings to $4,171,322.

Smiles also were the order for the morning about an hour west off Interstate

64 at the Keeneland barn of trainer Charlie LoPresti, who witnessed a flying

runner-up finish to Fort Larned by the Estate of Elaine Klein (Richard Klein)

and Bertram Klein's Windswept.

The strong Homecoming Classic run snapped a two-race win streak for the Klein

homebred. But it was good enough for LoPresti to circle the 139th running of the

$500,000-added Clark Handicap -- a 1 1/8-mile race for three-year-olds and up

scheduled for November 29 -- as the next target for his rising star.

"We'll shoot for the Clark if everything goes right, with no races

in-between," LoPresti said. "He seemed to come out of his race good. We thought

he ran good. He was flying late and we're proud of him."

The runner-up finish to Fort Larned improved the career record for the

lightly-raced five-year-old son of Arch to 3-2-1 in nine races with earnings of

$205,168.

LoPresti has been a regular participant in the Clark in recent years. He won

its 2011 running with Mort Fink's homebred Wise Dan, who would earn Horse of the

Year, champion older male and turf male honors in 2012. Fink's Successful

Dan finished first in the 2010 Clark, but the older half-brother to Wise Dan was

disqualified for interference in the stretch and placed third when Giant Oak was

awarded the victory.

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