Unbridled Beast unleashed in Gus Grissom

SHELBYVILLE, Ind. (Sept. 16, 2020) – Unbridled Beast won his fourth straight race and his second straight stakes in the 20th running of the $75,000 Gus Grissom Stakes Wed. Sept. 16 at Indiana Grand. The thee-year-old grey gelding is now four for five in 2020 and five for seven lifetime.

Unbridled Beast and Rodney Prescott began from post six in the nine-horse lineup and was joined by a flurry of horses leaving the starting gate. However, no one seemed to want control of the front end, giving Solitaire Game and Rocco Bowen the nod as the early pace setters. Down the backstretch, Prescott was content to sit patiently on the outside behind the leader, just waiting for the right moment to strike.

Around the turn, horses were fanning three and four-wide with hopes of getting into position for the stretch drive, but once they straightened up, Prescott asked Unbridled Beast to unleash some speed, and he responded, striding out to a five-length advantage at the wire. Operation Stevie and Emmanuel Esquivel rallied from the back of the pack to finish second followed by Stop Hammertime and DeShawn Parker, who closed well for third.

“More or less, this race was pretty close to how I thought it would play out early on, because there were a few in there that had speed,” said Prescott. “This little horse relaxes so well, I wasn’t worried. It was his first time tackling older horses , so it was a pretty big step up for him. He’s gotten better each time I rode him this year. When I called on him, he kicked in.”

Owned by Trainer Randy Matthews and Mike Neafus, Unbridled Beast increased his career bankroll to more than $159,000. The sophomore Indiana sired son of Unbridled Express was bred by Matthews and his wife Karen, forming the partnership with Neafus, a fire and water restoration company owner in New Albany, Ind., when the colt was a yearling.

“I had trained a horse, Here Comes Doc, for Mike (Neafus) in the past,” said Matthews. “I had two yearlings and I let him pick which one he wanted, and he chose this grey colt. I thought the other one was better, but that colt actually died. This colt’s mom is now 26 and still at our farm. This is the last foal she had. I’ll have to take her a carrot cake after this win.”

When the partnership formed, the only thing left was to get the colt broke and give him a name. Matthews sent him to Steve Fosdick to have him broke, and soon, both goals were accomplished.

“Steve Fosdick’s crew broke him for me, and he bucked every one of them off,” said Matthews. “When they called, they said, ‘this colt is a beast,’ and Mike sort of took it from there and added the Unbridled. He’s great to be around now and as gentle as can be. You never know he’s in the barn. But he’s not the type of horse you can correct. If you try to get on him, he doesn’t like that. He is a horse you definitely can’t man handle.”

As for future plans of Unbridled Beast, he will now get a break.

“That’s the nice thing about the Indiana program is these horses get the whole winter off to rest,” added Matthews. “He’s been racing hard here lately so we’ll take him back to the farm and give him a few weeks off and try to bring him back for the stakes at the end of the meet. There is a grass stakes in October that we may look at, because he’s bred to race on the grass, but more than likely, we’ll wait for the one at the end of the meet.”

Photos by Coady Photography