Sept 25, 2023 – As the horses were loading into the gate before Sunday’s Victorian Queen Stakes, Woodbine track announcer Robert Geller noted the impressive success that the Canuck Racing Club has had in its first year. He then went on to call an exciting race and what he later dubbed “a classic ride” by War Painter.
War Painter broke sharp from the gate before settling into the back of the pack where she stalked the field, loping along easily. Favourite Olivia Rose under Kazushi Kimura called the shots and dictated the pace through half the race. Still on top around the turn for home, she put away Never Silent and looked to dart away. But Patrick Husbands had already asked War Painter to go and she was in full flight. “She was just watching them the whole way and then I chirped at her and she responded,” our jockey shared in his post-race interview. “I was on a nice filly today.”
Fast closing four-wide around the far turn, War Painter powered from last to first, turned heads by boldly splitting two rivals in the stretch, and flew past favoured Olivia Rose to win by a length. The filly ’s time of 1:21.70 for seven furlongs on turf was 1.07 seconds faster than the boys over the same distance in the preceding Bull Page Stakes, something you don’t usually see as male thoroughbreds are typically stronger and more muscled. War Painter ran the final two furlongs in just 22.91 on the way to winning her first stakes race – as BloodHorse phrased it – “with authority”
With the win, Canuck Racing Club became a Stakes Winning Owner in its first stakes attempt and now owns the #1 ranked Ontario-bred 2YO filly in Canada and the first-ever stakes winner for her sire Danish Dynaformer.