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HIGHER GOALS SET FOR CHAMPION SPIT CURL DIVA
Champion Aged Horse and Champion Aged Mare Spit Curl Diva will be bred Corona Cartel before she returns to the track.
Coady PhotographyOKLAHOMA CITY, OK—JANUARY 22, 2011—After an astounding 2010 campaign, champion Spit Curl Diva is expected to return to action later this spring at Remington Park. Her connections are raising the bar for her as she continues to succeed in the world of American Quarter Horse racing.
Spit Curl Diva, a 5-year-old Oklahoma-bred mare, won eight of 10 races last year, six of them stakes events. She also set three Remington Park track records at three different distances, earned $257,383 for the year and was voted American Quarter Horse Association Champion Aged Horse and Champion Aged Mare while also being honored with the title of Supreme Racehorse.
A follow-up in 2011 will require another tremendous year befitting a champion.
“We are looking at a different path with her this year,” noted David Brown, Spit Curl Diva’s jockey who works closely with her trainer, his wife Jody. “After Remington Park, we will probably try a couple of the AQHA Challenge races around the country, going for the Championship instead of the Distaff series.”
Spit Curl Diva was purchased privately after her 3-year-old year by the Lepic-Morgan Partnership of Iowa City, Iowa, from Elbert Brown of Seminole, Okla. She won eight races and had earned well over $400,000 at that time.
Brown was involved with her as trainer prior to the sale and then resumed his career as a jockey afterward. He believes she is capable of another huge year, possibly larger in status than what she achieved in 2010.
“She can have another great season but it will be really hard to match what she did last year,” Brown said. “She matured and grew up last year and really began liking what she is doing.”
While always talented, Spit Curl Diva enjoyed a breakout 4-year-old campaign with small changes that enabled her to excel and achieve victory at the longer Quarter Horse distances of 400 and 440 yards. Those measures had eluded her as a younger horse.
“We made a change in her blinkers to where she could see more and altered her training schedule to where she could build more endurance for the longer races,” Brown said.
Spit Curl Diva has always been a standout in events under 400 yards, witnessed by the three Remington Park track records at 250, 300 and 350 yards a year ago. She managed to get over her personal barrier and win at 400 yards and beyond after her record-setting season in Oklahoma City. Superb in leaving the starting gate, Spit Curl Diva won three stakes races at 400 yards, including the $125,000 Merial Distaff Championship at Fair Grounds in New Orleans in November. Prior to that, she won the $100,000 Refrigerator Handicap at Lone Star Park in Grand Prairie, Texas.
At 440-yards, the Refrigerator gave her a berth into the prestigious $750,000 Champion of Champions. The top race for older Quarter Horses in America, also at 440 yards, the December race at Los Alamitos in southern California did not turn out as well as the majority of her attempts last year.
“She had a slight foot bruise that she was able to overcome and run through to win the Distaff Championship at Fair Grounds,” Brown noted. “We worked on that and she handled everything in training while leading up to the Champion of Champions but between the bruise and the top quality field she faced, it was too much.”
Spit Curl Diva finished ninth of 10 in the Champion of Champions, won by Apollitical Jess who would go on to be voted the World Champion Quarter Horse for 2010.
Aside from trying to return to the Champion of Champions by earning another qualifying berth to the race, Spit Curl Diva is within reach of earning a million dollars for her career. Moving into 2011, she has accumulated $710,938.
“That is a big goal, one that we would like to have. She will probably have to go into some bigger races with higher purses in order to get there,” Brown said.
Among the races on her agenda during the upcoming season, Spit Curl Diva may load the gate in any Oklahoma-bred stakes event for which she is eligible, including the $100,000 Sooner State Stakes on April 30. She could also test the likes of the $250,000 Remington Park Championship on May 28.
A daughter of Spit Curl Jess from the Some Dasher mare Some Kind Diva, Spit Curl Diva’s season opener may have to wait, possibly until April. She is scheduled to be bred to top stallion Corona Cartel prior to her return to the track.
“She’s working on her broodmare career right now,” Brown said. “We’re hoping to have a couple of Corona Cartel embryos from her. If everything goes well, we would like to get her back in race training by the end of February or early March. We will probably only start her a couple of times this season at Remington Park. It depends on how she is training. There are a lot of options for her.”
Anything close to the success of a year ago would once again line Spit Curl Diva up for the yearly AQHA Champion Awards. The honors she received for 2010 were very both gratifying and somewhat surprising to her connections according to Brown.
“Getting two awards was the biggest thing. We really thought she deserved the award for Older Mare. You never know how voting is going to go from across the country but we couldn’t see her not winning that one. When she won the overall Champion Aged Horse that was special. That was one we had not counted on.”
Regardless of what she accomplishes this year, Spit Curl Diva has already provided a tremendous awareness for the Browns and their livelihood.
“It always helps your career and business when you have a great horse like Spit Curl Diva. Other people see what you’re doing and then will give you a chance to work with more good horses.”
The 2011 Remington Park American Quarter Horse & Mixed-breed Season begins March 4 and continues thru Memorial Day, May 30.
Remington Park will race on Friday, Saturday and Sunday for the first two weekends of the season; March 4-6 and March 11-13. Thursday racing will join the weekly schedule on St. Patrick’s Day, March 17.
The first race will normally take place at 6pm with the exception of Sundays. A special 1:30pm first race is scheduled every Sunday as regular afternoon racing returns to the Quarter Horse season for the first time since 2004.
Open daily at 10am for casino gaming and simulcast racing, Remington Park also features Henry Hudson’s on the first floor, which opens for lunch at 11am. Admission, general parking and valet parking are always free at Remington Park.
Remington Park is Oklahoma City’s only Racetrack & Casino, located at the junction of Interstates 35 & 44, in the heart of the Oklahoma City Adventure District. For more information, reservations and group bookings please call 405-424-1000, 866-456-9880 or visit remingtonpark.com.