BRACE yourself. The return of one of America’s fastest fillies is imminent.
Applauding, a daughter of former champion freshman sire Congrats, is set to resume for another campaign a nine month absence.
Applauding burst on to the scene posting back to wins by a combined margin of 15-lens, debuting as a 2yo in track record time at Keeneland running the six furlongs (1200m) in 1:07.76s.
Her second win was just as phenomenal – she ran away to score by 6-lens as the 1-9 on favourite at Fair Grounds in neighbouring Louisiana.
Applauding was the red-hot for the Listed Silerbulletday Stakes at her scheduled third start but was scratched on the morning of the race displaying colic-like symptoms.
Trainer Al Stall Jnr told Thoroughbred Daily News that Applauding was due to make he return to racing in Kentucky last week but for a minor incident getting in the way of proceedings.
“She actually was going to run at Keeneland last week, but of all things, kicked a wall and caused herself to miss a couple of days of training,” Stall said.
Fortunately all of Applauding’s major issues are well behind her now according to her conditioner.
“She’s very sound and looks great,” he said.“We still don’t know what happened to her. She got a little inside-out on us in January. We decided to pull the plug and gave her a bunch of time off, and let her put on some weight and all of that stuff.
“We brought her back gradually and everything is fine now. You’re going to look up and she’s going to be away from the races for 11 1/2 months and you’re going to say to yourself,
God, that looks like a bowed tendon, a fracture, a condylar with screws, etc, and it’s none of that.
There’s a whole lot of ways these horses can get themselves behind the eight ball and that’s what happened to her,” Stall concluded.
Applauding, who happens to be bred on the same cross as Congrats’ four-times Grade 1 winner Turbulent Descent will make her much anticipated comeback in a 1200m Churchill Downs Allowance race on November 21.
Her most recent piece of work would indicate that she should have no trouble remaining undefeated when she steps out again this time next month.
Applauding worked over four furlongs (800m) on the Keeneland Polytrack in :48.60s.
“She did those two fist races in hand, no whip – just raw talent,” Stall says, ”hopefully we’ll see that again.”
