Phantom Currency goes gate to wire in Appleton S. (G3)

Goldencents’ Phantom Currency scored a gritty comeback win in Saturday’s $100,000 Appleton S. (G3) on the Gulfstream Park turf course, holding off Wolfie’s Dynaghost by a half-length.

Phantom Currency had been off for 13 months since winning the 2021 Mac Diarmida S. (G2) over this same course. The bay 6-year-old now has a three-race win streak that dates back to January of 2021. His overall record stands at 6-1-0 in 15 starts.

Springing quickly out of gate on the “about” one mile course, Phantom Currency looked to be going quite swiftly in the hand-timed race. Carpenter’s Call was never more than a length behind at any point, with the eventual second-place finisher making a late move but never seriously threatening Phantom Currency and jockey Irad Ortiz, Jr.

“You can’t beat back class,” winning trainer Bryan Lynch said. “He trained awesome coming up to the race. We got some stiff works into him and he stood up to each one better than the next. Turning for home, I could see them riding hard behind him and Irad had asked him. It gave me a helluva good feeling.”

Phantom Currency, who upped his earnings to $374,495, is owned by Jim and Susan Hill and was bred in Kentucky by Sally Thomas and new Dawn Stable, LLC. He sold to his owners for $260,000 at the 2017 Keeneland September Yearling sale.

Pedigree Notes from the TDN

Phantom Currency is one of 15 black-type winners–five graded–for Spendthrift’s Goldencents, a dual Breeders’ Cup winner who will send his fifth crop to the races this year. The winner’s dam, Phantom Rising, was a $200,000 KEESEP yearling, but last sold for $22,000 at KEEJAN in 2016 when picked up by Sally Thomas with Phantom Currency in utero.