Not This Time’s Disco Time was impressive when improving his record to 5-for-5, winning the $200,000 Dwyer Stakes, a one-turn mile for sophomores, at Aqueduct on Saturday.
Trained by Brad Cox, the Juddmonte homebred pressed the early pace under Florent Geroux. He took command with five-sixteenths to go, drew clear in the lane, and scored as much the best, defeating Crudo by 9 ¾ lengths. His final time for the eye-catching victory was 1:33.86.
“An amazing horse. The sky is the limit for him,” Geroux said. “He ran a very fast speed figure last time off the layoff, so the connections gave him plenty of time to recover from that effort. Today, he was back with a bang again—a very exciting horse for the future.”
Three-year-old Disco Time is out of the Grade 2-placed Jump Start mare Disco Chick, who banked $735,250 through a 42-10-14-6 ledger. Disco Time captured the St. Louis Derby at Fairmount Park in his previous outing and won the Lecomte S. (G3) at Fairgrounds in January. All told, the colt has banked $551,960 in winning all five career starts.
“Very impressive,” said Dustin Dugas, Belmont Park-based assistant to Cox. “Florent knows the horse very well and he timed everything really well. He didn’t let Tip Top Thomas get away. They were rolling. When he asked him to go, he went and there was nothing left to guess about. They were going quickly but the way he was sitting outside of him, Florent said he was comfortable the entire way. He was very confident in his horse and the horse looked very confident in himself,” added Dugas.
Balboa wins James F. Lewis III Stakes
Also on Saturday, Not This Time’s 2-year-old colt Balboa was a 5 ¼-length winner of the $100,000 James F. Lewis III S. at Laurel. Owned by SF Racing, Starlight Racing, Madaket Stables, Diane Basher, Determined Sales, Golconda Stable, Waves Edge Capital, and Catherine Donovan, Balboa is trained by Brittany Russell. Albaugh Family Stables bred the precocious youngster in Kentucky out of the War Front mare Tap of War. He was an $875,000 graduate of the 2024 Keeneland September Sale.
