Volatile’s T O Elvis ‘King’ Of the Capella Stakes

[Wandering Eyes]

A powerful winner of his three most recent appearances against softer competition, Tomoya Ozasa's T O Elvis (Volatile) made the very most of his first crack at stakes level with a visually stunning, five-length victory in Sunday's G3 Capella Stakes at Nakayama Racecourse.

Perhaps a half-step slowly to begin, the lanky dark bay took up an inside position behind midfield after departing gate four and traveled hard against the steel, with jockey Katsuma Sameshima doing his level best to harness the colt's energy.

Held together for the run into the final 600 metres with Sameshima looking for the gaps to appear, T O Elvis split rivals decisively about six off the inside, descended on the leaders to wrest command with a furlong to race and powered clear to score as the 12-5 favourite.

Three-times listed winner Yamanin Cerchi (Four Wheel Drive) was second ahead of Ecoro Azel (Shancelot) in third. Fourth home was the 4-year-old filly Gabby's Sister (Apollo Kingdom), who defeated Kurojishi Joe (Furioso) in this 12 months ago before going on to run third in the G2 Riyadh Dirt Sprint. T O Elvis could make his next appearance in the same event on Feb. 14 after securing an automatic bid on Sunday. Japanese gallopers have won three of the six runnings of that 1200-metre contest (Copano Kicking, 2021, Dancing Prince, 2022 and Remake, 2024).

T O Elvis is the fifth stakes winner and fourth to score at graded level for his sire (by Medaglia d'Oro) and is one of three to salute from his dam, an eight-times stakes winner and victorious in nine of her 10 trips to the post overall. Stopshoppingdebbie is kin to five other winners out of the MSW Taste the Passion, who serves as the first or second dam of a further five stakes scorers, including her MSW daughters Shampoo (Gulch) and Smarty Deb (Smart Strike), both stakes producers.

The yearling half-sister to T O Elvis, My Pal Al (Golden Pal), sold for $300,000 at this year's Keeneland September Sale and Stopshoppingdebbie was covered by Street Sense and his son Maxfield this season.

Sunday, Nakayama, Japan
CAPELLA S S.-G3, ¥72,830,000, Nakayama, 12-14, 3yo/up, 1200m, 1:08.60, gd.
1–T O ELVIS, 123, c, 3, by Volatile
1st Dam: Stopshoppingdebbie (MSW, $249,728), by Curlin
2nd Dam: Taste the Passion, by Wild Again
3rd Dam: Bisbee, by Believe It
1ST BLACK-TYPE WIN, 1ST GROUP WIN. O-Tomoya Ozasa; B-Jeff & Melissa Prunzik (KY); T-Daisuke Takayanagi; J-Katsuma Sameshima; ¥38,581,000. Lifetime Record: 8-5-0-3, $619,060. *1/2 to Generous Tipper (Street Sense), SW & GISP, $367,945. Werk Nick Rating: A. Click for the eNicks report & 5-cross pedigree or the free Equineline.com catalogue-style pedigree.
2–Yamanin Cerchi (Jpn), 128, c, 3, Four Wheel Drive–Yamanin Petitgateau (Jpn), by Yamanin Seraphim (Jpn). 1ST GROUP BLACK TYPE. O/B-Hajime Doi; T-Naoya Nakamura; J-Mirai Iwata; ¥15,166,000.
3–Ecoro Azel, 123, c, 3, Shancelot–Cicada's Song, by Twirling Candy. 1ST GROUP BLACK TYPE. ($17,000 Ylg '23 FTKOCT; $215,000 2yo '24 OBSMAR). O-Masatoshi Haramura; B-Crawford Farms (KY); T-Hideyuki Mori; J-Taisei Danno; ¥9,583,000.
Margins: 5, 1, 3/4. Odds: 2.20, 3.90, 14.00.
Also Ran: Gabby's Sister (Jpn), Nitto Basil (Jpn), Sunrise Amour (Jpn), Pod Vader (Jpn), Chikappa (Jpn), Jasper Gold, Kurojishi Joe (Jpn), Tagano Mist (Jpn), Candy Drive, Stapes Kaori (Jpn), A Tracks (Jpn), Don Amitie (Jpn), Culture Day (Jpn). Click for the JRA chart and VIDEO.

 

WATCH: T O Elvis (#4) goes whoosh in the Capella S.

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