Julien Leparoux sent Sum of the Parts to the lead out of the gate and never looked back as the 3-year-old son of Speightstown led the entire six furlongs to take the Grade 3 Phoenix S. by 1 1/4-lengths Friday at Keeneland, earning his first graded stakes win of his career.
Speightstown is the nation’s second-leading sire, with $7.85 million in progeny earnings. He also ranks in the top five in the categories of stakes winners (18), stakes wins (21), winners (125) and repeat winners (55).
Sum of the Parts got away alertly from the middle of the ten-horse field, and had secured a length lead for the run down the backstretch. Still relatively unchallenged around the turn, the dark bay colt sprinted away from the competition in mid-stretch, then ran on gamely late to get the six panels in 1:09.88.
“I was really pleased that we made the lead as easy as we did,” said winning trainer Tom Amoss. “Julien’s a great rider here at Keeneland, handled the front end well with this horse. He knows this horse well. We got beat at Belmont with this horse about 3 ½ weeks ago (in the Groovy S. on September 13, in which he was second), but it probably was a blessing. (That) was his first start since June. I think it got him ready for this race.”
“The plan was to break good and see what the other horses were doing on the inside of us,” added Leparoux. “We wanted to be on the lead but not going crazy. I was glad to be on the lead and going easy. At the quarter pole, I had a lot of horse and he finished strong.”
The victory was worth $105,000 and increased Sum of the Parts’ earnings to $501,463 with a record of 10-5-2-0. Sum of the Parts is owned by Klaravich Stables Inc. and William H. Lawrence and was bred in Kentucky by Farfellow Farms Ltd. The colt was a $150,000 purchase at the Barretts 2011 March 2-year-old sale.
