Baby Vino powers Lindsay Schultz into Haskell picture

Baby Vino did more than win Monmouth Park’s Pegasus Stakes. He stamped Lindsay Schultz’s name onto the national 3-year-old map with a 10 3/4-length romp that made the 45th running of the race look like a launching pad rather than a final prep. The fast-track mile and a sixteenth in 1:44.36 was the kind of performance that changes a barn’s trajectory overnight, especially with the Grade 1 NYRA Bets Haskell Stakes coming back to the same strip on July 18 with a $1,000,000 purse.

Schultz’s rise has been built the hard way. She started riding horses as a child in Connecticut, studied in the University of Louisville’s equine business program and moved into the Godolphin Flying Start program before learning the trade hands-on with Tom Proctor and then Shug McGaughey. After eight years with Proctor and a year with McGaughey, she launched her own stable with support from owner Marshall Graham, claiming a small group of horses and piecing together a business that mixed horsemanship with management.

That background matters now because Baby Vino’s Pegasus win was not a random flash. Monmouth Park called the Pegasus its final local prep for the Haskell, and the top two finishers earned a free Haskell entry and start fees. In a field of six 3-year-olds that included National Charter, Tricky Business, Star Sweeper, Schoolyardsuperman, Ponder and Dream, and Baby Vino, Schultz’s colt separated himself from the pack and, along with runner-up Schoolyardsuperman, secured Haskell eligibility. That is the kind of result that can move a trainer from promising to relevant in one afternoon.

Baby Vino’s profile only sharpens the appeal. The Kentucky-bred bay colt, foaled April 20, 2023, is by Vino Rosso out of Discreetly Grand by Discreetly Mine. Equibase listed his career earnings at $194,916 after the Pegasus and identified him as a stakes winner, a tidy statistical snapshot of a horse that appears to be climbing as the races get bigger.

Monmouth’s Haskell Preview Day also put the win in a wider context, with Grade 1 winner East Avenue’s return to form in the Salvator Mile sharing the spotlight. But Baby Vino was the clearest arrival story of the afternoon. For Schultz, the question is no longer whether she can win at this level. It is whether this colt has just started a summer campaign that can bother the established names in the Haskell.