2022 Eclipse Award Champion Two-Year-Old Filly
February 7 - Wonder Wheel
This beautiful daughter of Into Mischief is owned and raced by my friend, Len Green. Len has been racing horses for several decades. Len told me that he took his son to the track when he was little boy just as something to do as a family on a Saturday. They had so much fun that they thought they should get into the game. Here we are many years later and Wonder Wheel is their second Breeders' Cup winner. His first was Jaywalk . . . and that is a whole 'nother story but that's when we met.
Wonder Wheel is a very special horse to Len as she was the start of a whole new ownership philosophy and training strategy, and it went very well.
Over the years, I got to know Len and his wife, Lois. She was his rock; she had his back and was his biggest fan and sounding board. Through all of Len's successes, it was Lois that was there cheering him on. Last fall, Lois passed away from cancer. I never knew she was sick; often when Len and I talked, it was on speaker phone with Lois. She was delightful and loved the horses as much as Len. Wonder Wheel had a special significance to both . . . soon, very soon . . . I'll have to ask Len where the name Wonder Wheel came from. Rest assured, there's a story there and I think it has something to do with Len and Lois.
Len is an accountant, and his practice specializes in equine accounting. He also teaches a course on how to be an entrepreneur for Babson College. Len even had me speak to his class online during Covid. Len is a ball of energy and has a great can-do attitude . . . oh, am I supposed to be talking about the horse? Did I mention she's an Into Mischief daughter and an Eclipse Award winner and a Breeders' Cup champion? Yeah, it’s about the horse, but sometimes, it’s about the people, good people.
Wonder Wheel was the brilliant juvenile filly champion of 2022, a sharp bay who put together a sparkling fall campaign for one of racing's most fan friendly partnership groups. She was foaled in 2020, a daughter of the great sire Into Mischief out of the mare Diva Delite. She raced for the partnership of D.J. Stable, Cash is King, and LC Racing, the same group that had owned 2018 Triple Crown winner Justify's rival and earlier classic horses. Mark Casse trained her, and Tyler Gaffalione rode her in the moments that mattered most.
Wonder Wheel rolled through her two year old campaign in 2022 with the look of a filly who knew her way around a racetrack. She captured the Alcibiades Stakes at Keeneland in October, beating top juvenile fillies and stamping herself as the leading contender heading into the championship at Keeneland three weeks later. Mark Casse had her in beautiful form, and the partnership group prepared for a big day at the Breeders' Cup.
The 2022 Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies went exactly to script. Wonder Wheel rallied through the lane under Tyler Gaffalione and rolled home a clear winner over a strong field. The performance was the kind of late kicking finish that turns a good filly into a champion. The win came on her home Keeneland strip, making it even sweeter for the partnership. She had built her championship credentials in the same place she had run her preps, and she did not disappoint when the spotlight shone brightest.
For her brilliant fall, Wonder Wheel was named the 2022 Eclipse Award Champion 2-Year-Old Filly. She came back at age three but never quite recaptured the same magic, finishing well in stakes company without adding another championship. She was eventually retired to begin a broodmare career, where her Into Mischief sire and Breeders' Cup credentials made her a valuable producer. Wonder Wheel is remembered as a smart, classy juvenile champion and as one of the brightest stars Mark Casse has campaigned for the popular partnership group.
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