El Epecuen, again the best in the one turn sprint

In top form, powered to a wire-to-wire victory in the Clásico Pablo G. Falero, holding off El Mejor Recuerdo.

El Epecuen remains unbeaten over 1,200 meters / JUAN I. BOZZELLO

Step by step, El Epecuen is asserting himself in the sprint division, healthy and showing the same talent he displayed as a promising youngster. Now, the horse trained by Miguel Cafere dominated the 1,200 meters of the Clásico Pablo F. Falero, the final highlight of the day at the Hipódromo Argentino de Palermo.

Racing under the weight-for-age scale and facing a tough field, the Il Campione colt hugged the rail early, fended off every challenger, and held his advantage in the stretch, defeating the persistent El Mejor Recuerdo (Il Campione) by half a length in one of the day’s standout times: 1:09.91.

Sonreime (Orpen) finished third, four lengths back, ahead of Garufa Mask (Mask) by just a neck, while Despacito(Sabayón) and Mr Neil (Valid Stripes) were well off the pace and lost in the pack.

With Juan Cruz Villagra aboard, El Epecuen has now won three straight, stepping down from a mile to 1,400 meters to take the Handicap Juan B. Udaondo, and then moving to 1,200 meters, a distance over which he remains unbeaten in two starts, having previously captured the Handicap Servicio Veterinario at Palermo.

Looking ahead, a potential target for El Epecuen could be the Clásico Ciudad de La Plata (G2), the marquee sprint for older horses in Argentina—a division that at this point arguably deserves a G1-level contest, which, surprisingly, it currently lacks.