Echo Zulu Takes Battle of Champions in Ballerina

Shaking off pressure from Goodnight Olive, who had beaten Echo Zulu in their only prior meeting in the Breeders' Cup Filly & Mare Sprint (G1) at Keeneland last fall, Echo Zulu powered away from her rival to score a 2 1/2-length victory in the $500,000 Ballerina Handicap (G1) Aug. 26 at Saratoga Race Course. Matareya edged Caramel Swirl in a distant show photo, 6 1/4 lengths behind Goodnight Olive. The winner raced seven furlongs in 1:20.95 under Florent Geroux over a freshly-harrowed track still rated by Equibase as muddy. She paid $3.20 to win as the favorite. Early splits in the race were moderate, :22.45 and :45.23, before becoming quicker-than-par late. After six furlongs in 1:08.72, Echo Zulu ran her final eighth in :12.23. "When you ask her down the lane, you feel she is just changing speed and can go even faster," Geroux said. "It's amazing. She's a true champion." Echo Zulu, the champion 2-year-old filly of 2021 and now 4-year-old daughter of Gun Runner, races for L and N Racing and Winchell Thoroughbreds. Steve Asmussen, the winningest trainer in North American racing history and a Hall of Famer, conditions the filly, who improved to 3-for-3 this year. She won the Honorable Miss Handicap (G2) earlier in the Saratoga meet, earning a 112 Beyer Speed Figure and 111 Equibase Speed Figure. "Obviously her prep race for this race she ran phenomenal. We were expecting a little bit of the same," Ron Winchell of Winchell Thoroughbreds said. "Last year we were trying to get her ready and kind of push her into getting into the Breeders' Cup, and it wasn't like she was 100% fit," he added. "Coming to this year, we had enough time to get her right, and now we are here today where we think she is at her best." As a juvenile, she won a maiden race and the Spinaway Stakes (G1) in 2021 at Saratoga. Her 3-year-old campaign was interrupted when she was scratched by New York stewards in the post parade before the Acorn Stakes (G1) in June 2022 on the advice of a regulatory veterinarian. Her connections regrouped with her and she returned to race in the fall. "The development that she has shown is so much like her father Gun Runner," Asmussen said. "The longer you had him, the faster he was and that's how she's been. As great as she ran in the Honorable Miss and coming out of her first triple-digit Beyer, you're confident it was a prep. She's 4-for-4 here at Saratoga and has another grade 1 win on her resume. Obviously, she's as fast as a horse can go." The trainer won the Ballerina for the second time after his initial success with Lady Tak in 2004. Bred in Kentucky by Betz/J. Betz/Burns/CHNNHK/Magers/CoCo Equine/Ramsby, Echo Zulu was a $300,000 purchase by Winchell from the Betz Thoroughbreds consignment at the 2020 Keeneland September Yearling Sale. She is out of the grade 2-winning Menifee mare Letgomyecho, whose other black-type winners include grade 1 winner Echo Town and grade 3 winner J Boys Echo. She is 9-1-0 in 11 starts with earnings of $2,640,375. Saturday's race provided Echo Zulu with an automatic, paid berth into the Breeders' Cup, hosted this year at Santa Anita Park in Southern California in early November. The Chad Brown-trained Goodnight Olive earned that berth last year before capturing the Breeder's Cup Filly & Mare Sprint and later earning Eclipse Award honors as champion female sprinter for owners First Row Partners and Team Hanley.