Horse Racing
The Bank of America Racing Challenge Championship night is November 8 at Evangeline Downs in Opelousas, Louisiana. It will feature six championship races with some of the best horses in the country battling it out for titles in their respective divisions.
One of the stars to watch for is Vital Winner, who will run in the Red Cell Distance Challenge Championship (G1).
Vital Winner will be making his first start in Louisiana, but fortunately he is one of those horses who doesn’t have to bring his racetrack with him. That’s a good thing, too, because the 4-year-old gelding by Easy Winning Jet has logged some miles on a van.
During a 25-race career in which he has started at 11 tracks in five different states, Vital Winner has won 12 times and has earned $231,977. He started the year with a five-race win streak that included the July 5, $19,440 Red Cell Northwest Distance Challenge at Les Bois Park in Idaho. Earlier this year, Vital Winner was enrolled in the Bank of America Racing Challenge program for $20,000 by his owners, longtime friends Charles Wright of San Angelo, Texas, and Debra Gotovac. Bradley Bolen is the gelding’s trainer.
“We were lucky in how we got Vital Winner,” recalled Gotovac, a resident of Midland, Texas. “Brad is friends with Duane Hartsell, who trained the horse but was getting out of the business. Duane had a lot of horses he wanted to sell. At the time, I was looking at buying a Thoroughbred.
“My deal with the Thoroughbred fell through right about the time Brad had approached Charlie about buying Vital Winner,” she added. “Charlie was looking for a partner on Vital Winner, and when he contacted me I agreed to it. It was Brad’s connection with Duane Hartsell that made our ownership of this horse happen.”
Wright has a long involvement in Quarter Horse racing. His father, Fred Wright, bred Ducky Fred, a Grade 2-winning gelding by 1988 world champion Merganser who earned $366,172 and won seven stakes in 1993-2001. Also, his homebred Okey Dokey Dale filly Wicked Wendi ran second in the July 13 Merial West/Southwest Distaff Challenge (G3) at Arapahoe Park.
Since Vital Winner began his career in 2006, his itinerary has taken him to tracks in Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Colorado and Idaho. Before he was tried at the longer distances of 550 and 870 yards, the gelding enjoyed some success at the shorter ones.
After qualifying to the 400-yard Sunland Park Winter Futurity (G2) at age 2 and placing in the 400-yard Mile High (G2) and Hobbs America (G2) derbies at 3, Vital Winner ran second at odds of 40-1 behind eventual champion aged horse Ketel Won in the 440-yard, $186,460 Zia Park Championship (G1).
Vital Winner’s seven starts this season have been at distances ranging from 550 to 870 yards, and he has been on the board for all of them.
“We had a plan before the season started,” Gotovac said. “Last year, he really kicked it in during the last 40 yards of his shorter races, so we were confident that he could run farther. We started him at 550, then we gradually moved him up to the 870 distance at Manor Downs.”
Vital Winner won the Red Cell Northwest Distance Challenge by three lengths in :43.999, and his speed index was a career-best 118.
“Our plan was to pace him out to get him to 870,” she added. “We were willing to take him up to Boise for that Challenge race because the timing was right. We have a lot of confidence in this horse. We know that anything can happen in a horse race, but we felt like he had the potential to come up with a big win in that race.”
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