WAR FRONT’s hard knocking son Fort Washington became the first horse in 100 years to win the Dinner Party S. (G3) in back-to-back years when registering his eighth career victory on Saturday.
The 1 1/8-mile turf race saw Fort Washington race a few lengths behind a keen leader in the tightly packed field soon out of the gate. Throughout the early and mid stages of the race, Junior Alvarado kept his mount to the outside of other horses a few lengths off the rail with the experienced runner happy to patiently wait for his cue to show more.
That came as they exited the backstretch with Fort Washington dropping his head and extending his stride to collar the leader by the top of the stretch. Entering the final furlong, A Bourbon For Toby made a run at his lead, but Fort Washington was able to safely stay in front, winning by three quarters of a length.
Trained by Shug McGaughey for Magic Cap Stables, the Grade 1 winning Fort Washington has now finished in the top three in 19 of his 32 starts with six stakes victories. His stakes performances has seen him finish in the top three in 14 stakes overall for over $1.5 million in earnings.
Bred by Joseph Allen and White Birch Farm, Fort Washington is one of three winners from four to race out of the Group 3 placed Azaelia. That mare is a granddaughter of the stakes winning Astorg, who produced stakes winner and Grade 1-placed Asti and two other stakes performers.
In all, there are 20 stakes winners under Fort Washington’s first four dams.
This is the third stakes winner for WAR FRONT this year with the stallion having the highest cumulative percentage of Grade 1 winners, Grade 1 horses, graded stakes winners, graded stakes performers, and stakes winners of any North American stallion.