by James Platz

Last fall, Stat That generated little interest at the Hoosier Classic sale in Indianapolis. Thursday night (July 13), the son of Check Six commanded the attention of race fans at Harrah’s Hoosier Park Racing & Casino with an impressive win in the opening leg of Indiana Sires Stakes action for freshman colt pacers. Driven by LeWayne Miller, Stat That rocketed home to win by nearly three lengths in 1:51.4 for breeder and owner Derek Lehman.

For Lehman, the victory was particularly sweet. Stat That is the first standardbred he has bred and taken to public auction. Instead of accepting defeat when the colt didn’t sell, he resorted to “Plan B” and kept the horse. A trainer and driver on the northern Indiana trottingbred pony circuit, Lehman experienced a different feeling when his homebred claimed victory in the $68,500 division.

“I’ve broken track records and world records with the ponies,” Lehman said, one day removed from the win. “This was a little different. I’ve never gotten emotional about race pony stuff. Nobody wanted [Stat That]. He was at a public auction, nobody wanted him, and I just decided I would race him myself.”

One of the challenges in the breeding business is selecting a stallion that will be fashionable when your yearling heads to auction. At last year’s Hoosier Classic sale, those consigning offspring from Check Six endured a tough two days. The son of Somebeachsomewhere produced a first crop that didn’t capture the attention of horsepeople in the state, and the second crop suffered thus. Lehman had reasonable expectations in light of the situation and hoped to sell the colt for $10,000. One of his friends bid the pacer in at $9,500, and Stat That returned to Topeka.

“I took him to the sale, and unfortunately the Check Sixes were not a hot item,” Lehman said. “Nobody else bid, so I took him home again, and here we are. In my mind, it was very likely he was coming back home with me. I figured somebody might take a chance on him because he has a Rockin Image dam and he’s a first foal. Only a handful of people looked at him.”

To peruse the pedigree of Stat That, Indiana racing fans will quickly identify the family behind the freshman. The colt’s grandam is Fox Valley Godiva, an Incredible Finale mare that has produced nine winners from 13 foals, most notably the talented pacing mare Valley Electric, an Indiana Sires Stakes champion and winner of $782,854. Ironically, both Lehman and Miller are connected to Fox Valley Godiva.

“My dad actually bought her at the Blooded Horse Sale a while ago,” Miller said. “She was in foal to Iva Miracle I believe, who we ended up selling. We raised a couple of babies out of her. She got old and he couldn’t get her in foal, so he handed her over to Derek’s dad because he specializes in breeding.”

As Lehman explained, his father, Mervin, purchased the mare for $800, and they bred her to Rockin Image, resulting in Rockin Songbird, the next-to-last foal the mare produced. The filly fetched $26,000 at the Hoosier Classic sale as a yearling named Silver Star Fiesta. She went on to win five times and bank just shy of $39,000 before Derek noticed her consigned to the Blooded Horse sale. The mare wouldn’t actually sell there, but he managed to work out a private purchase.

“She was supposed to be in the Blooded Horse sale, but the owner pulled her from the sale because she wanted her to have a good home,” Derek said. “I called her up and gave a price, she took it and I brought the mare home.”

Rockin Songbird was bred to Always A Virgin, producing a foal that only survived two weeks, succumbing to an infection. Bred back to Check Six, Stat That arrived the following spring. Returning home following the sale, Derek sent the colt to Elite’s Training Center in Shipshewana, where they broke the pacer and jogged him for two weeks. Around the second week of November the breeder began jogging him on his own, working with the colt until he sent him on to Miller and his wife, Susan, who is listed as trainer.

“I thought he might be interested because he knows the family,” Derek said. “He said he’d give it a shot.”

Initially, it took some time to work out the kinks on the green 2-year-old.

“We had problems with him early on,” Miller said. “For about the first month or two, he would just run about every training mile. But we just kept at it and kept changing things. We kept working with him. His focus was the main problem.”

In his first qualifying effort at Hoosier Park on June 14, Stat That turned in a 1:58.3 mile, good for second. One week later he again registered a runner-up performance in a qualifier, this time kicking home in :26.4 and completing the circuit in 1:56.2.

“He showed us that he had speed and he never showed us that he got tired in his training miles or when I qualified him,” Miller said. “He always showed that he had more in the tank.”

Stat That made his pari-mutuel debut June 29 in an Indiana-sired mini series event contested over a track rated good but impacted by rain. Miller sat in third with the freshman through the first three quarters before angling out and following favorite Martz Telly, winner in 1:54.2. Stat That held off a hard-charging Sabonis to secure second in 1:55.2.

“I thought the mile that he put in that night, with the track conditions and everything, I thought it was a two-second difference compared to a good track,” the driver said. “The way he left out of the gate, I felt like I could get him in position to be competitive in it.”

Miller texted Derek to tell him the next start would be the opening round of Indiana Sires Stakes, much to the breeder’s surprise. Thursday night, he watched as his homebred dropped into sixth shortly after the gate folded and remained there through fractions of :27.2, :55.2 and 1:23.4. Guiding the third horse along the pylons turning for home, Miller moved out and split Skyway Houdini and Jd’s King James before brushing past Where’s Drogon and Evileye Fleegle on the outside to score the victory. Sent off at 24-1, Stat That closed in :26.4 to break his maiden in style, paying $51.80.

“He was pretty strong at the wire yet,” Miller admitted.

Derek, who watched trackside with friends, did not expect to find himself in the winner’s circle.

“When they turned for home, I was just hoping for a fifth-place check, and pretty soon he was weaving through traffic,” he said. “All I remember is he crossed the finish line first and I couldn’t believe it.”

And the emotion ensued.

The breeder and owner said that he has staked Stat That to the Fox Stake and the Breeders Crown. He knows that Thursday’s win could be the highlight of the season, or it could serve as a launching pad for the colt. Anything is possible this early in the campaign. He’s leaving the decision making to Miller. Right now, he’s just savoring victory with a horse nobody wanted.