Famed Equestrian Worth a Whopping $400,000,000 Makes a ‘Unique’ Call Ahead of $500,000 Race

This year the Hall of Famer trainer Steven M. Asmussen made history when he won his ten thousand thoroughbred race in February. Now, he becomes the only trainer in North America to have achieved that milestone. It seems his success never stops here after his trained filly is making noise nowadays.

Echo Zulu, the daughter of Gun Runner, is on the winning spree this year. She recently won  $200,000 worth of Grade 2 Honorable Miss Handicap. Her win at the event has brought smiles to the trainer and the owner. This gave the trainer more confidence for her upcoming race and made him make a unique call.

Steven M. Asmussen makes a unique statement

Encho Zulu marked her successful comeback to the Saratoga race course with an impressive win. The four-year-old filly defeated Frank’s Rockette, who came to the competition after winning many graded stakes. She won the race by seven and a one-fourth length score in an incredible final time of 1:08.76. The filly also made another remarkable achievement by winning the six-furlong race with 112 Beyer speed, the fastest by any horse on this length of race course this year.

This winning performance of Echo Zulu has made the Hall of Fame trainer very happy and boosted his confidence in her. Voicing his regards for Echo Zulu, Asmussen said, “I’m extremely proud of her race. That obviously was an impressive race and that would put a [big] number on it“. The trainer didn’t expect her to win with that margin. On asking whether they will race her against the males, the trainer replied, “I’m definitely not scared to run her against anybody“.

This year in her two starts, the filly won both of them. After her sad loss last year, her comeback is formidable. The trainer had kept that in mind after the race. He said, “We got off track last year chasing the Oaks with a filly that is brilliant to a mile and obviously, we’ll try to get her another Eclipse Award this year. When she goes that fast that easily, it makes you dream of a lot of things“. The filly’s next is worth $500,000 Grade 1 Ballerina Handicap at the Saratoga racecourse on the 26th of next month.

Steven M. Asmussen Hall of Fame trainer

The Hall of Fame trainer Steven M. Asmussen comes from a well-known horse racing family. His parents, Keith and Marilyn, were trainers. Prior to training career, he was a jockey for three years. During that time, he had 63 wins. Steven’s training career started in the year 1986. He had his first win in the same year at Ruidoso Downs in New Mexico with the horse Victory’s Halo. Later on, he struggled and his patient bore fruit after ten years.

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He got his first graded stakes win at Churchill Downs with Valid Expectations by winning the Derby Trial Stakes. From there till now, he had won more than three hundred graded stakes. He had won the Eclipse Awards for the outstanding trainer two times consecutively in 2008 and 2009. His career highlights were winning Preakness Stakes in the year 2007 with Curlin and in 2009 with Rachel Alexandra. He also won the 2016 Belmont Stakes with Creator. Steven has eight Breeders’ Cup race wins under his belt.

The statement made by Hall of Fame trainer about Echo Zulu reflects his confidence in her and with a depth of experience he had his four-year-old filly is one of the contenders for the next race.

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