By: Blood Horse

Photo Credit : SV Photography

https://www.bloodhorse.com/horse-racing/articles/238404/longshot-admiralty-pier-prevails-in-tampa-bay-stakes

The $150,000 Tampa Bay Stakes (G3T) surely was a grade 1 event in terms of excitement.

It featured a wild stretch battle that saw three horses hit the wire inches apart, a stewards’ inquiry and foul claim before the result stood, and a 21-1 winner who showed great determination on the front end. To cap it all off, have a bizarre post-race incident at Tampa Bay Downs in which the winning jockey was tossed from his mount after it was spooked by a flock of birds.

Who could ask for more, especially if you liked a gelding who only lost by a length in last year’s much more sedate running of the Tampa Bay?

When the smoke cleared in the Feb. 8 contest, it was Hoolie Racing Stable and Bruce Lunsford’s Admiralty Pier ($44) who emerged as the star of the show, prevailing by a nose for trainer Barbara Minshall to notch his first graded stakes win.

“He ran this race last year and then had a little bit of time off, some minor stuff. We started running him a little bit shorter and it didn’t work out. I think he’s been running in high-class competition and he showed a lot of determination today. It was nervous waiting (on the objection), and I’m so glad (jockey Samy Camacho) is OK because he rode him great,” Minshall said.

Admiralty Pier was a close fifth in last year’s Tampa Bay Stakes and that effort came on the heels of a January 2019 allowance optional claimer victory at Tampa Bay Downs. After that victory, the English Channel  gelding made five of his next six starts in graded stakes—four of them at Woodbine —and could fare no better than fifth in the black-type tests.

That led to Minshall taking him to Tampa Bay for a Dec. 29 allowance optional claimer that was scheduled for turf. It was moved to the main track, but that didn’t faze Admiralty Pier, who prevailed by two lengths.

It also had him on his toes for a much tougher assignment Saturday in an evenly matched field of eight.

Camacho put Admiralty Pier on the lead through an opening half in :24.29 while dueling with Real Story.

Turning for home, the action intensified with Admiralty Pier in front along the inside, Real Story outside of him, and Halladay charging into contention three-wide. With about three-sixteenths left, Live Oak Plantation’s favored March to the Arch went after a hole between Admiralty Pier and Real Story that tightened as he reached it. Real Story took the worst of the contact and was checked, finishing last.

Meanwhile, Devamani, in his first start for trainer Chad Brown, swung outside all of them and started gobbling up ground.

In the final yards, as March to the Arch moved over to the rail, and Halladay dropped back, the wild three-horse scramble to the wire saw Admiralty Pier hang on between horses by about an inch over Devamani. Devamani was a head in front of March to the Arch, a homebred trained by Mark Casse.

Aside from the stewards’ inquiry, jockey Tyler Gaffalione on March to the Arch claimed foul on the winner, but it was disallowed.

Final time for the 1 1/16 miles was 1:41.96 on firm turf.

The victory was the fifth in 18 starts for Admiralty Pier, who has earned $271,583. Bred by Calumet Farm, the lone foal out of the Kitten’s Joy  mare Full Steam Ahead was bought by Lunsford for $100,000 from the Bluegrass Thoroughbred Services consignment at The Saratoga Sale, Fasig-Tipton’s select yearlings sale in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., in 2016.