{"id":244307,"date":"2025-07-07T03:54:10","date_gmt":"2025-07-07T03:54:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/244307\/"},"modified":"2025-07-07T03:54:10","modified_gmt":"2025-07-07T03:54:10","slug":"hespuregold-continues-streak-of-irish-war-cry-wins-at-monmouth-park","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/244307\/","title":{"rendered":"He\u2019spuregold Continues Streak Of Irish War Cry Wins At Monmouth Park"},"content":{"rendered":"

He\u2019spuregold Continues Streak Of Irish War Cry Wins At Monmouth Park<\/a> originally appeared on Paulick Report<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Maybe the best way to capture what He\u2019spuregold did \u2013 yet again \u2013 in Sunday\u2019s Irish War Cry Handicap at Monmouth Park is to reference the third-place finisher in the race.<\/p>\n

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That horse\u2019s name? There Are No Words.<\/p>\n

He\u2019spuregold, given clear run by jockey Paco Lopez wheeling out of the final turn, rallied past three rivals in deep stretch on the way to winning the $86,700 Irish War Cry Handicap for the fifth straight year.<\/p>\n

The race has only been contested seven times.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s really just a nice horse. I can\u2019t say that enough,\u201d said winning trainer Kelly Breen, who also saddled runner-up One Time Willard in the race. \u201cHe\u2019s such a pleasure to be around and he tries so hard. You start to run out of things to say about him.\u201d<\/p>\n

Most of the accomplishments by the 7-year-old son of Australian sire Vancouver can be stated with no embellishment needed: He was named New Jersey\u2019s champion turf horse in 2021, New Jersey\u2019s top older male horse in 2022 and 2023 and Sunday\u2019s win marked his seventh career stakes victory, with six coming against state-breds. He also won last year\u2019s Red Bank Stakes against open company.<\/p>\n

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The winning time for the mile over a firm turf course was 1:36.20.<\/p>\n

Breen, who already has a wall filled with He\u2019spuregold\u2019s achievements in his home, said he was confident his sturdy gelding would get the job done when he came off the final turn and was clear.<\/p>\n

But he had to run down One Time Willard, second by three-quarters of a length, and There Are No Words, who was a head better than Gold Trust in the tight four-horse finish.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen he came off the turn and was clear, even though he had three horses to pass, I think that\u2019s when he runs his best, when he has a clear run,\u201d said Breen. \u201cThe game plan was not to keep him in too tight because I think he accelerates better when he has clear sailing. When he got into the clear I felt confident. Maybe I felt a little more confident than anyone else, but I know this horse.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Lopez said that with the exception of some bumping with One Time Willard going into the first turn he had \u201ca perfect trip,\u201d stalking early leaders Gold Trust and There Are No Words, with I\u2019m On Fire side by side with He\u2019spuregold right behind.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know this horse very well,\u201d said Lopez. \u201cIn the first turn I had a little trouble (with stablemate One Time Willard) and we bumped a little bit, but I was able to keep control.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know one thing, when this horse is feeling good, he\u2019ll give you everything. He can compete with the good horses. You have to be lucky sometimes, sometimes they don\u2019t like the turf much and they don\u2019t try. Today, no rain, hard track, and he was very good today.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe first turn I had a little trouble but after the second turn, I had a perfect trip.\u201d<\/p>\n

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He\u2019spuregold returned $4 to win as the even-money favorite in the field of seven Jersey-bred 3-year-olds and up.<\/p>\n

The victory was his 10th from 32 career starts, his ninth in 28 grass starts and his eighth win in 14 starts at Monmouth Park for owner-breeder John Bowers Jr., who bred the bay gelding from his 2005 Eatontown Handicap (G3) winner Smart N Classy, by Smart Strike.<\/p>\n

The $51,000 winner\u2019s share pushed his career earnings to $687,170.<\/p>\n

Breen said it was too soon to think about when or where He\u2019spuregold would go next.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m going to enjoy this. I\u2019m not going to even think or worry about future plans with him,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

This story was originally reported by Paulick Report<\/a> on Jul 6, 2025, where it first appeared.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"He\u2019spuregold Continues Streak Of Irish War Cry Wins At Monmouth Park originally appeared on Paulick Report. Maybe the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":244308,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4107],"tags":[94846,94844,91464,94845,1071,79,94847,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-244307","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-racing","8":"tag-irish-war-cry","9":"tag-kelly-breen","10":"tag-monmouth-park","11":"tag-paco-lopez","12":"tag-racing","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-time-willard","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114809934022905200","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244307","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=244307"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244307\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/244308"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=244307"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=244307"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=244307"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}