Toronto, ON – Charles Fipke’s homebred Perfect Shower became the highest-priced winner (46-1) of the Breeders’ Stakes since the inception of the Canadian Triple Crown in 1959, taking the 119th edition Sunday at Woodbine.
At the finish of the mile and one-half turf contest, Perfect Shower, ridden confidently by Jono Jones and trained by Hall of Famer Roger Attfield, had scored a three-quarter length win over another outsider, 29-1 Guipago, with 5-1 Reservoir a further two and one-quarter lengths back in third. The final time over a firm turf was 2:29.39.
The odds-on favourite, Queen’s Plate winner Eye of the Leopard, failed to fire after stalking the early leaders, but slowed through the E.P. Taylor Turf Course stretch, finishing 11th, more than 16 lengths behind the winner in the field of 13.
For Attfield, it was a record eighth Breeders’ Stakes win (but his first since 2001 with Sweetest Thing), especially after he conditioned the two shortest-priced Breeders’ winners in Peteski ($2.20) in 1993 and Izvestia ($2.30) in 1990. Perfect Shower lit up the tote board with a $95.30 mutuel in winning the third leg of the Canadian Triple Crown, eclipsing the former mark of $43.70 paid by Social Wizard in 1981. In his last start, Perfect Shower had finally broken his maiden in his seventh lifetime outing in a $25,000 claimer over Woodbine’s Polytrack on July 17. In fact, in five previous races on turf, the best the son of Perfect Soul could manage was a second-place finish.
Genius Kinshasa took the field through the first mile, timed in 1:39.53, while being pressed by Full Throttle and Eye of the Leopard. Meanwhile, Jones had Perfect Shower in a ‘perfect’ spot, fifth on the outside, when suddenly he moved to challenge the leaders around the turn and quickly opened a two length lead in early stretch. Despite drifting out through the lengthy lane, Perfect Shower was able to maintain his dwindling advantage to the wire.
“Obviously, we took a big shot here,” said Attfield. “These ‘Perfect Souls’, they want to be three and four-year-olds anyway. This horse is just starting to come around. We ran him for $25,000 because I knew nobody would take (claim) him for 25 anyway off his past form. A win picks a horse up big time. Then to step up to a $500,000 Triple Crown race is a big step, but he’d been training so very, very well.
“His owner, Mr. Fipke, he’s a true optimist. He said ‘go for it’. I said there were three very legitimate horses in there and then there was the rest of us all bunched together. So I said let’s give it a go.
“He’s still a big green, gangly horse. He’s still learning. I was sitting in the stands with a cold beer watching the race and I thought he was coming over to get some of it at one point (while drifting out). He just got lost, I think.”
“Roger told me this morning he (Perfect Shower) can’t lose,” kidded Jones, who was celebrating his third Breeders’ Stakes victory, after steering A Bit O’Gold in 2004 and Jambalaya in 2005. “I saved him until the end. I always had horse under me and I said, at 40-1, we can make it a race. He was good enough to hang on. I had confidence in him.”
Last year, Fipke, Attfield and Jones teamed to win the Queen’s Plate with Not Bourbon, Canada’s top three-year-old.
For the victory, Perfect Shower earned $300,000, a sum which dwarfed his lifetime earnings of $37,200 coming into today’s classic.
Perfect Shower paid $95.30, $34.80 and $13.60, combining with Guipago ($23, $11.90) for a $2,170.50 (12-6) exactor. A 12-6-13 (Reservoir, $5.90 to show) $2 triactor fashioned a $32,715.50 payout.
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