The 2024 Triple Tiara series for Canadian-bred three-year-old fillies wrapped up on Sunday, September 8 at Woodbine with a fabulous edition of the 1 1/4 mile Wonder Where Stakes on turf.
Bison City Stakes winner STORMCAST, owned by Tracy Farmer and trained by Mark Casse, was so dominant in that race that she was 1-to-5 for the Wonder Where, meeting just six rivals including two maidens. But the gritty bay filly HURRICANE CLAIR (Silent Name (Jpn) – Hurricane Lorraine by Weather Warning), third in the Woodbine Oaks and second in the Bison City, was just a bit better on this day and grabbed a well-deserved victory.
Owned by Albertans David Rowbotham, Tony Boogmans and Rodney Carpenter and trainer by Martin Drexler, Hurricane Clair was placed nicely behind front-running Stormcast by her rider Sahin Civaci from the start of the marathon race, which carried a purse of $250,000. Patrick Husbands on Stormcast let his filly gallop along over the good turf course in 25.05, 48.38 and 1:12.01 while Clair was always close behind.
Into the stretch run, Hurricane Clair drew alongside Stormcast and the two fillies battled to mid-stretch before Clair took a short lead and finally won by 1/2 a length in 2:01.14. It was 2 3/4 lengths back to Chiefswood Stables’ Saccharine, trained by Rachel Halden.
Hurricane Clair was let go at a fat 7-to-1 and paid $16.40. Greg Howell is the groom.
Civaci noted that in the Oaks, Hurricane Clair was “a little bit lazy” and it took her a while to move from ninth place early in that 1 1/8 mile Canadian classic. She was finally third behind Kins Concerto and Caitlinhergrtness, the latter who came back and won the King’s Plate. With the Plate winner on a short break, Stormcast romped in the 1 1/16 mile Bison City, setting up for the good match in the Wonder Where.
“We’ve been a little bit quiet the last couple of weeks, so it’s been a needed a confidence builder here,” said Martin Drexler, whose biggest win prior to the Wonder Where was the Bison City in 2022 with Il Malocchio. “This filly has been doing everything right the whole time.
“I figured the way that the track’s playing today, you had to be in the race early. I told Sahin to just don’t let the other one get away too far, and then we’ll just see what we’ve got.”
Bred by Helen Bruno’s Bru-Mel Stables Co., Hurricane Clair was $35,000 purchase at the 2022 CTHS Canadian-Bred Yearling Sale. The filly has a record of 3-3-2 from 10 races and earnings of $330,276.
Hurricane Clair’s dam Hurricane Lorraine won five of 40 races and over $263,000. Hurricane Clair is the second foal for her dam and her two-year-old of this year, Princess of Storm (Cairo Prince), was an impressive maiden winner on turf last weekend for Gary Barber
Rowbotham, a lawyer from Calgary, has been a longtime owner of Thoroughbreds but was out of the country for the big win.
Read more about owner David Rowbotham and partners in a Canadian Thoroughbred story here.
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