Following Dreaming of Snow’s win on Saturday, December 9, trainer Gerald Bennett and Team EQUIstaff’s owner, Mary Thomas, were interviewed for an article by Mike Henry.
Here is what they had to say about Dreaming of Snow:
Around the oval. Almost 10 months had elapsed since Dreaming of Snow’s previous victory, an upset of 2022 Eclipse Award Champion 2-Year-Old Filly Wonder Wheel here in the Suncoast Stakes. But that didn’t cause trainer Gerald Bennett to lose any confidence in the Florida-bred 3-year-old filly.
“She ran an awesome race today,” Bennett said after the daughter of Jess’s Dream posted a ¾-length victory from Poiema in the fourth race, a $54,500 allowance/optional claiming race for filles and mares, in the “racehorse” 7-furlong time of 1:23.21. “I think she got a little tired at the end, but she showed the kind of awesome speed she has.”
Samy Camacho rode Dreaming of Snow, who won for the fourth time in nine career starts for the partnership of Bennett’s Winning Stables, Inc., and Mary Thomas’s Team Equistaff, LLC. Bennett suggested a stakes race could be next if Dreaming of Snow comes out of today’s race well.
After defeating Wonder Wheel, Bennett tried Dreaming of Snow in the Grade III Florida Oaks on the Oldsmar turf course, but she faded to last after being on the lead approaching the far turn. In her next start, the 7-furlong Florida Cup Stonehedge Farm South Sophomore Fillies on the Tampa Bay Downs main track on March 26, she fell victim to a track-record performance by Munnys Gold, finishing second but in almost a different zip code.
Shortly after that race, a small chip was removed from Dreaming of Snow’s left foreleg, and she didn’t return until Nov. 19 at Gulfstream in a 5 1/2-furlong allowance/optional claiming race. Bennett thought her unfamiliarity with the Tapeta racing surface and her long period of inactivity both contributed to a seventh-place finish, but she was on top of her game today.