Daisuke Fukumoto wasn’t waiting around any longer.
Just over half a mile into the $150,000 Valedictory Stakes (G3) on December 6 at Woodbine, the 1 1/2 mile event that is the last graded race of the meeting, Fukumoto asked his mount HAMMERHEAD to move from fifth spot to the lead. It was a quick move to take over from the Maryland invader Passing Game but the pace fractions were slow, 25.69. 51.83 on the way to six furlongs in 1:19.43.
It proved to be the winning move as one of only two 3-year-olds in the Valedictory field nailed down his second career win and first stakes win with a one-length score in 2:34.40 for a huge Beyer Speed Figure of 96.
The Kentucky bred colt by War Front is owned by U.S. based Gold Square LLC and trained by Kevin Attard, who had two other horses in the field and finished second with Jokestar.
It would be a fair statement to say Hammerhead has been a bit of an underachiever, with a dash of bad luck, since his maiden win last October on the inner Woodbine turf. Attard and Gold Square sent the colt to Gulfstream Park for the Dania Beach Stakes on January 1 of this year and he was a closing second to the talented Mi Bago.
Gold Square then sent Hammerhead to trainer Chad Summer and two spring runs in graded stakes in Kentucky did not work out. Back at Woodbine, Hammerhead and close finishes in two turf races at the optional/allowance level before he was a troubled 11th in the Toronto Cup. He was fifth in the Grade 2 Jockey Club Derby at Aqueduct and then second to stablemate Zabo in an optional race.
The blinkers came off for the Valedictory and perhaps more significantly, he was moved back to the Tapeta surface.
“We always thought that those kinds of marathon type races would be up his alley,” said Attard, who won the 2015 running with Melmich and the 2018 and 2019 editions of the race with Pumpkin Rumble. “Unfortunately, things never went well for him, in the sense that every time we were in a spot we thought we could win, it didn’t pan out. It’s hard to tackle, on some of those bigger horses, those types of races, without a little confidence, right? So, there was a little bit of a delay getting there.”
The Valedictory was the 10th stakes win for Attard at Woodbin this year. He is four wins away from 900 career wins.
Fukumoto, an underrated rider at Woodbine, has won 40 races at all tracks this year and that is his best season since 2020, his ‘Mighty Heart’ year when he won two thirds of the Canadian Triple Crown on that champion colt.
PEDIGREE NOTES: Hammerhead was bred by Glen Hill Farm and he is by War Front (Dan zig), soon to be 24 years old and a top sire. Hammerhead’s dam is Sanibel Island Stakes winner Figarella’s Queen by Medaglia d’Oro and she has produced two other winners. Second dam Neireid is a Grade 1 winner of the American Oaks by Rock Hard Ten. Hammerhead was bought for $225,000 from the Keeneland September yearling sale in 2023.
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