More Than A Party wins the Open Mind
More Than a Party was bet down to 1-5 in the $57,600 Open Mind Stakes at Monmouth Park on Sunday so it was a shock when Paco Lopez had to snatch her up along the inside nearing the far turn of the six-furlong race for New Jersey-bred fillies and mares. Her momentary traffic troubles meant little, however, as she was so much the best in the field of six that once she recovered, she took the lead along the rail nearing the stretch and Lopez kept her in hand, sitting still as a statue the length of the stretch. The winning margin was two lengths, but it could have been much, much more if Lopez would have twitched. More Than a Party is a 4-year-old daughter of More Than Ready. She was bred and is owned by trainer Eddie Broome and Richard Malouf. She covered six furlongs in the Open Mind in 1:10.16 and paid $2.60.
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“It always makes you nervous when you see your horse check like that, but she seemed to overcome it no problem,” Broome said. “I know Paco didn’t have to ask her to do much. She was just cruising through the stretch.”
The win was the third of the day for Lopez, the leading rider at Monmouth. Pinkout, a 3-year-old, ran well to be second making a sweeping outside move into the stretch, but at this point in her career More Than a Party is more than she can handle. She’s Hot Wired finished third, 3 3/4 lengths behind Pinkout. World Gone Wrong went to the early lead, and More Than a Party took up behind her nearing the far turn. World Gone Wrong set fractions of 21.63 and 44.46 seconds before tiring to finish fifth.
More Than a Party is now 6 for 13 in her career with earnings of $224,660. Broome said he might try her at longer distances at some point. “We may try to stretch her out down the road, but likely on turf,” he said. “She seems to relax much better on the grass. But for now I don’t want to fix what’s not broken, so we’ll just stick with sprinting.