The winners kept rolling in for MCKINZIE over the weekend when McDude won on debut at Churchill Downs Saturday night.
Trained by John Ortiz for WSS Racing, the colt was first out of the gate in the six-furlong race before entering a three-way duel for the lead down the backstretch. Racing between the other two horses, he left the rest of the field in the dust with those horses over six furlongs behind.
One of the three runners faded as they turned into the stretch, but McDude still had to duel it out until the final furlong when he was the last man standing.
He was able to grab a quick breather before TAPIT’s Preposition closed on him in the final sixteenth and cut the lead down to a head at the line for a Gainesway-sired 1-2 finish.
Bred by Frankfort Park Farm, McDude is out of the stakes placed Janis’s Joy, now the dam of three winners from four to race. This is also the extended family of champion Big Drama and three-time Grade 1 winner Sheer Drama among others.
MCKINZIE now has 10 winners and leads all first crop sires by number of Grade 1 winners, Grade 1 horses, and graded stakes horses thanks to his two Grade 1 performers.