French Import GOLDY ESPONY (FR) (f, Vespone {Ire}) registered her first Stateside black-type win while improving to 2-for-2 on the year in Belmont’s $100,000 River Memories S. Sent off a 3-1 chance in the 12-furlong turf event, the Chad Brown-trained 4-year-old was put on the lead by jockey Kendrick Carmouche and glided through favorable splits of :24 4/5, :51 1/5 and 1:17 4/5. The rest of the field began to line up as they hit the quarter pole, but GOLDY ESPONY had plenty in reserve and kicked away with ease to win by 2 1/2 lengths.
“She seemed to really like being on the lead in her last race,” Cherie DeVaux, assistant to Brown, said afterward. “Chad spoke with [jockey] Kendrick [Carmouche] and wanted him to get up there and set some nice, easy fractions, which he did. It worked out. In a couple of her races, it seemed as though she could handle more distance. I think getting on the lead and being able to set her own fractions really helped her today.”
GOLDY ESPONY had a pair of stakes wins on her resume while in France last year. She won the G3 Prix Penelope and the Prix Rose de Mai before being brought to America by Bradley Thoroughbreds and partner Swift Thoroughbreds.
GOLDY ESPONY ran a solid fifth in the G1 Belmont Oaks in her U.S. debut, then completed in the trifecta in the G3 Valley View S. at Keeneland in October in her seasonal finale. The gray filly opened her 2015 account with a smart one-length tally in a nine-furlong Belmont optional claimer May 8.
The River Memories was her longest race to date and opens up a range of possibilities. Congrats to the Chad Brown barn and to her co-owners!
