A pair of hometown favorites headline a solid field of six jumpers — which could be whittled down to five — being pointed toward Saturday’s $75,000 Carolina Cup feature chase for novice hurdlers.
The full list of entries for the 89th edition of the Carolina Cup Races presented by MUSC Health at the Springdale Race Course on Saturday, March 30 was to be released Monday afternoon.
Camden trainer Arch Kingsley Jr., who saddles 2023 Eclipse Award for Steeplechase Horse winner Merry Maker, sent in the name of Hudson River Farms’ L’Imperator. Last spring in Camden, the French-bred 6-year-old finished third behind The Hero Next Door in the $30,000 Dale K. Thiel Stakes on the Carolina Cup undercard. Two races later, in a maiden chase at the Iroquois meet in Nashville, L’Imperator broke its maiden before Kingsley returned the one-time runner back to the flat to run in the two-mile Belmont Gold Cup Stakes on Belmont Stakes week.
L’Imperator then won over fences its next time out in a Saratoga allowance chase before finishing fifth in the $175,000 Jonathan Sheppard Stakes (Gr. 1) at the Spa in August racing in open company. L’Imperator also had a runner-up finish behind stablemate Merry Maker, in the Grade I Lonesome Glory Handicap last September at Aqueduct.
Kingsley entered L’Imperator into last Saturday’s James W. Maloney flat race in Aiken
Another Camden trainee, this from the barn of trainer Kate Dalton and her husband/jockey Bernie Dalton, is Abaan. Owned by Eclipse Thoroughbred Partners and Daigneault Thoroughbreds, the 7-year-old exploded onto the jump racing scene last summer and fall after a career on the flat which included a win in the H. Allen Jerkens Stakes and the W.L. McKnight Stakes at Gulfstream Park in 2021 and 2022, respectively, for trainer Todd Pletcher.
After a second-place finish in its chasing debut in a maiden race at Colonial Down last August, the Will Take Charge gelding broke its maiden at second asking in September at Colonial. In its lone start of the fall, Abaan, the grandson of Tapit, won the Foxbrook Champion Hurdle Stakes at Far Hills, N.J., in October.
Two-time defending National Steeplechase Association leading trainer Leslie Young has The Hero Next Door primed for a second straight spring start at Springdale.
Last spring, the now-6-year-old Irish-bred son of Jet Away carried David England to victory in the day’s second race, the $30,000 Dale K. Thiel Maiden Hurdle. Following that victory, The Hero Next Door won an allowance chase in Middleburg, Va., before ending its 2023 campaign with a pair of seconds in the Foxbrook Champion Hurdle Stakes at Far Hills, N.J., and then in the AFLAC Supreme Hurdle Stakes in Callaway Gardens, Ga.
Young is seeking her second consecutive winner in the Camden spring feature after having sent out 2023 champion Caramelised.
From the always dangerous barn of Hall of Fame trainer Jack Fisher, Neoptropic has been in training with its sights set on the $75,000 Camden feature.
A former runner on the flat for trainer James Toner, the 6-year-old Tapit gelding closed its second year as a jumper by winning an allowance chase at Great Meadow (Va.) last October. Owned by uber-successful Bruton Street-US, Neotropic broke its maiden over hurdles with a score in the 2022 NSA finale meet in Charleston before closing 2023 with a win, a second and a third from four starts.
Trainer/jockey Tom Garner is expected to send Parliament Hill into Saturday’s feature hurdle. The 6-year-old Sir Percy (GB) gelding has one career start in the United States — a fifth in last fall’s Zeke Ferguson Stakes at Great Meadow (Va.) last fall. Before that, Parliament Hill made 14 starts in Great Britain and Ireland with three scores over hurdles before coming to Garner’s care.
Ricky Hendriks nominated Irish-bred Soviet Pimpernel as part of the Cup field, but it ran third in last Saturday’s $35,000 Imperial Cup in Aiken. A three-time winner in Ireland, the 9-year-old gelding was third in the Appleton Stakes at Far Hills, N.J., in 2022. Soviet Pimpernel is looking for its first win in this country after having had four starts including a pair of stakes chases in 2023.
