Admittedly, the Aug. 29 Forego Stakes (G1) became considerably easier when the morning-line favorite and the race's defending winner Book'em Danno was scratched Saturday morning because of a minor injury sustained in his stall.
But it's no secret that a grade 1 race at Saratoga Race Course is never easy, and Hymn and jockey Ricardo Santana Jr. worked hard for their victory while holding off late surges from three rivals to come home a three-quarter-length winner.
There was a dead heat between T Kraft and favorite Senior Officer for runner-up honors. It was another head back to Crazy Mason in fourth. Pacesetter Tip Top Thomas and Bring the Smoke, who was eased, completed the order of finish.
The win in the 7-furlong race was very meaningful to trainer Ron Moquett, who saddled the brilliant Whitmore to victory in the 2018 Forego. Two years later, Whitmore won the Breeders' Cup Sprint (G1) and was named that year's champion male sprinter.
Hymn, a 4-year-old son of McKinzie out of the Paynter mare Salt Bae, is Moquett's first grade 1 winner since Whitmore. He also represented the trainer's first win at the 2026 Saratoga meet after 12 losses.
"That was a wonderful effort. We had a plan, and in this game the plans don't always go as you draw them up, but how cool is it for a plan to actually come together? That's great," Moquett said to a gaggle of reporters.
Hymn is co-owned by his breeder, Dr. Naveed Chowhan's Fleur De Lis Stables, which races the Kentucky-bred gelding with Bret Jones and William Sparks.
Sparks, who has had horses with Moquett for a long time, was at the track to celebrate the victory.
"I bought in on this horse after he broke his maiden," Sparks said. "I'd been following this horse, and I knew he was nice. He broke his maiden; he was kind of green. But we thought a lot of him."
The Forego winner, who pressed the pace set by Tip Top Thomas through fractions of :22.61 and :45.03 over the main track rated as fast, took command just inside the three-sixteenths pole.
He paid $11.40 on a $2 win bet and completed the distance in 1:22.48.
Hymn broke his maiden Feb. 8, 2025, at Oaklawn Park by 4 lengths. The Forego was his 15th start and fifth career win and first in a graded race. Earlier this summer, he won the Frank J. De Francis Memorial Dash Stakes at Laurel Park and was second in the July 25 Alfred G. Vanderbilt Stakes (G2) at Saratoga.
Moquett said he foresaw a big effort like this in the cards for Hymn.
"Well, I called it. It's in print places. I thought he was a beautiful, wonderful horse from Day 1. And I hated having to geld him. And when I did (in March of this year), I said, 'Let's just make him a racehorse and go try to win the Breeders' Cup.'"
The Forego is part of the Breeders' Cup Challenge Series: Win and You're In, which offers an automatic, fees-paid berth to the Oct. 31 Sprint at Keeneland.
Hymn had been offered at the 2023 Keeneland September Yearling Sale, but was a RNA, hammering at $140,000.
Hymn's sire, McKinzie, stood the 2026 breeding season at Gainesway for a stud fee of $75,000.
