Thoroughbred Breeders’ Association of New Jersey
Trainer Eddie Owens, Jr., has so many good Jersey-breds that sometimes the toughest part is mixing and matching them when the state-restricted stakes races come up on the racing calendar.
The New Jersey Thoroughbred Festival at Monmouth Park saw Owens push all the right buttons.
Riding Pretty, taking on males for the first time in her 27-race career, held on for a neck victory in the $125,000 Charles Hesse III Handicap, marking the third straight year that Owens has won the race – with three different horses.
“I wasn’t concerned at all about racing her against the boys because her best races are on the dirt around two turns and she has proven herself in the Jersey-bred filly and mare division already,” Owens said of Riding Pretty, who captured the Jersey Girl Handicap on the grass in her last start. “Every time I put the saddle on her and ask her to run she gives me everything she’s got. I can’t ask for more than that.
“To win this race three years in a row with three different horses (Sea Streak in 2024 and Great Navigator in 2023) is a tremendous accomplishment.”
Riding Pretty, a Holly Crest Farm homebred, won for the seventh time in 27 lifetime starts. The winning time for the mile and a sixteenth was 1:46.12.
The victory was hard-earned, with Riding Pretty holding off the furious late charge of Forever Chocolate. It was another 3¼ lengths back to Amatteroftime in third.
“I asked her at the half mile because I had a feeling we were going a little bit slow,” said winning jockey Samuel Marin, who won five races on the card. “I rode her going long (two starts back) on the dirt and they went a little slow and it cost her the race. I thought I had the best horse in the race that day but she didn’t give me that kick at the end. This time I didn’t want to wait too much on her because she didn’t want to be on hold.
“It seems like every time she runs now she gets better.”