Frostmourne earned his first graded stakes victory Saturday with a 1 1/4-length tally in the $500,000 Penn Mile (G2) at Penn National. The 3-year-old Speightstown colt won the $100,000 Awad S. last October and has now won three of five lifetime starts.
Frostmourne is Speightstown’s ninth stakes winner of 2017 and his 38th lifetime graded stakes winner. His runners have earned more than $3.7 million this year, among the top-10 on the General Sire list.
Breaking sharply from the outside post in the field of nine, Irad Ortiz, Jr. took Frostmourne back off the pace as the field entered the first turn. Content to track in the three path on the backstretch, Frostmourne began to close in on the leaders as the field made their way around the second turn.
Four-wide coming into the stretch, Frostmourne kicked into high gear with a furlong to run and swiftly pulled clear for the eye-catching win. The final time for the mile on the firm turf was 1:35.04 (VIDEO).
“I was a bit worried he was going to get caught three-wide down the backside but, I was very confident around the turn, because when (Ortiz) started letting him go, he was not asking him and then it was just a matter of time before he got to the lead,” said Christophe Lorieul, assistant to winning trainer Christophe Clement.
Frostmourne is owned by his breeder Green Lantern Stable and has now earned $417,800 after the $300,000 payday. The dark bay colt is out of Leaning Tower and is a half-brother to Grade 1 winner Karelian.
