Henny Hughes adds another winner to his growing total

World Champion Sprinter Henny Hughes is adding winners at a regular clip, with number 20 coming on December 26 at Tampa Bay Downs. This is the fifth individual winner in the last month for the freshman sire.

Backers of heavy favorite Wear Red missed Christmas by a day, but the seasonably named filly rewarded them anyway with a victory that stamped her as much the best in the maiden special weight event.

Jockey Cornelio Velasquez kept her tucked in on the rail under a tight hold, where she ran comfortably behind the leaders for six furlongs of the one mile turf race. She waited for an opening around the turn, and despite not finding it until the stretch, she calmly burst away with a commanding turn of foot that left her rivals one and one-half lengths behind at the wire, which easily could have been more.

Bred by owner Sanford R. Robertson and trained by Bill Mott, Wear Red is bred on the same Storm Cat cross that worked before with her dam, Aldebaran Light, by Seattle Slew, when she produced Grade 1 winner Eskendereya. The third foal to race from Aldebaran Light was Balmont, another Grade 1 winner. Also in the family is Cannonade, the third Kentucky Derby winner in the first three generations of Wear Red’s dam.

Among the 19 other winners Henny Hughes is represented by are Stakes horses Fort Hughes (a TDN Rising Star), and Wealthy Aviator. His $700,000 Fasig-Tipton Calder sale topper was the highest priced of any two-year-old sold in 2010 at public auction.