The filly who made a BROCK-SATIONAL IMPRESSION

by Tony Podlaski for Saratoga TODAY

It’s fair to say that trainer George Weaver had a good week as he won four races at Saratoga Race Course, especially with two of those winners representing a prominent Saratoga Springs resident and a Capital Region owner.

While Let’s Go Big Blue picked up his second career victory over the same Saratoga Inner Turf course nearly a year ago for Hall of Fame football coach and Saratoga Springs resident Bill Parcells with his August Dawn Farm, Brocknardini made an impression in her first start, also over the turf, for local owners Thomas Brockley and Daryn Brockley.

Brocknardini raced wellbehind the pace under Saratoga’s current leading jockey Irad Ortiz Jr. before making a strong move at the three-sixteenths pole, then drawing away to a 4¾-length margin.

“You’re always happy to win at Saratoga,” Weaver said as he has won 5-of-19 races at the end of Sunday’s races. “Both horses ran really well. With Brocknardini, I wasn’t expecting to run that well because we wanted to get a race into her. So, for her to jump up there like that, it was obviously a surprise. She did well. Maybe she’s got a good future in her.”

Not only was Weaver surprised with the outcome, Thomas Brockey, a financial advisor and senior portfolio manager for RBC Management Wealth in Albany, was also amazed with the filly’s race.

“Starting a 2-year-old at mile and a sixteenth is a tough haul,” Brockley said. “They are learning; they are green. I was surprised with the way she won the race. When she got to the top of the stretch, Irad drifted her to the outside. Once she found an opening, she took off.” Since coming to Saratoga in June, Brocknardini posted a variety of workouts over both the Oklahoma dirt and turf course, and a couple of those workouts were among the top ones for that morning. At the same time, there were moments in which the filly was challenging, especially from the starting gate.

“[She is] is 2-year-old without any experience who didn’t breeze through the gate for the first couple of times,” Brockley said. “When she came out of the gate, she almost threw the rider. I figured she needed some racing experience, but we knew she had talent.”

The filly displayed that talent by going 11 seconds for the last furlong of a brief workout about a week before Brockley purchased her for $35,000 at the Fasig-Tipton Midlantic Sale on May 22. Along with her ability, he was interested in her for a couple of other reasons.

Brockley was lured by her breeding since her sire is Palace Malace, winner of the 2013 Belmont Stakes and Jim Dandy. Brocknardini’s mother, Broad Stripes, is by Bernardini, who won the Preakness, Jim Dandy, and Travers in 2006.

The other reason is the breeder: Kristen Esler’s ThirtyYear Farm, which is just on the east side of Saratoga Lake.

“Obviously, the back-breeding is something where I’ve had luck,” Brockley said. “[Kristen and I] got to watch the race together. She was really excited in having to bring the horse up on her farm. That’s a good connection with the local breeder, a local owner, and I think George [Weaver] is a local trainer. I’m glad we got a win in our back yard.”

Brocknardini is not the only Brockley-owned horse coming from the Thirty-Year Farm. Esler purchased the farm, formally known as Stepwise Farm, from Dr. Joan Taylor and Dr. Bill Wilmot where Twisted Tom was bred.

Brockley purchased Twisted Tom after the reserved price was not met at both the FasigTipton Yearling Sale at Saratoga and the Fall Kentucky Sale in 2015. Twisted Tom showed some promise by winning his first race off his second career start.

Brockley then sold Twisted Tom to Gary Biszantz, owner of Cobra Farm in Kentucky, and the gelding had a good season as a 3-year-old with victories in the New York Derby, Albany Stakes, and the Empire Classic Stakes.

Like Twisted Tom and Brocknardini, Brockley also likes to name his horses that derive from either his first or last name – and they have been winners: Connect the Brocks, Colonel Tom, Papa Tom B, Brock N Roll, and Brockmoninoff.

“I’ve seen to do better with horses named after me,” Brockley said with a little bit of a chuckle. “Perhaps we will continue that pattern.”

That winning pattern started on Aug. 17, 2002 when Brockley, with the help of the late trainer Dominic Galluscio, claimed Brocco Bob for $20,000 at Saratoga. Just over two weeks after that claim, Brocco Bob set the pace and held off a persistent Cliff Notes by a nose. Based on

Brockley’s position, he thought his horse lost the photo.

“I still remember it,” Brockley said. “Dominic, my family, and I watched the race and saw Cliff Notes coming up on us. It was so close. We were angled. We thought, ‘Secondplace for your first race isn’t bad.’”

“The finish was put up and we weren’t even near the Winner’s circle,” he added. “That was a good start. To say your first horse race on your own as an owner was a win at Saratoga, it’s a great thing to say.”

Over the last 21 years, Brockley has won 80 races at other racetracks that include Belmont, Aqueduct, Finger Lakes, Monmouth Park, and Tampa Bay Downs. He has even had a multiple-winning day at Saratoga on Aug. 24, 2018 when Colonel Tom came away with an allowance victory and Brockmoninoff won the last race.

Now, Brockley may have a future with Brocknardini, who is now being pointed for the P.G. Johnson Stakes over the Saratoga turf course on Aug. 30.

“I’m happily surprised in the position that we are in,” he said. “She is bred for the dirt, but we are not going to change something that she’s good at. She came out of the race really well. We’ll see what happens with her. I think she’ll be back at Saratoga at the end of the month. We’ll run her in the P.G. Johnson and see where she goes from there.”