Damon’s Mound Favored in Gulfstream Park Sprint; Purse $125K-$150K

Damon’s Mound looms as the morning-line favorite for Gulfstream Park’s Gulfstream Park Sprint on Saturday, Feb. 21, 2026, slated as Race 10 at the Championship Meet and set to carry the highweight of 123 pounds while chasing a seventh stakes victory in his 19th career start. The six-furlong dash features eight starters and sits on the Sunset 6 wager card shared with Santa Anita.

The race purse is listed inconsistently in advance material, with one entry sheet showing $150,000 while BloodHorse lists the Gulfstream Park Sprint as a 6-furlong, $125,000 stakes. Post time and the entry table place the sprint on the Feb. 21 card; the purse discrepancy remains unconfirmed against the official condition book.

Damon’s Mound, a 6-year-old homebred son of Girvin owned by Michele and Cliff Love and trained by Hall of Famer William I. Mott, arrives off back-to-back stakes wins and figures as the class horse. He closed 2025 with a half-length victory in the Bold Ruler Stakes (G3) at Aqueduct and returned to Gulfstream to win the Jan. 17 Sunshine Sprint for Florida-breds by two-and-a-half lengths in 1:09.19 with Junior Alvarado aboard. Gulfstream Park’s press account noted he became the first back-to-back winner of the Sunshine Sprint; BloodHorse calls him a near-millionaire. After the Sunshine Sprint, Alvarado said, “Horses like him don’t come around like this that often. He’s a very classy horse, a very neat horse and he does everything right. I think most of the time, he shows up.”

A morning move and an early scratch shifted betting dynamics during race week. Ftboa reported that an early scratch of Ms. Bucchero deepened Damon's Mound’s favoritism and described him breaking sharply and leading through splits of :22.89 and :45.76 while tracked by 2024 Juvenile Sprint winner Big Paradise. In that report Alvarado said, “I wasn’t mad that the filly got scratched because the less competition, the better sometimes. He was good today. He broke out of there very sharp, put himself on the lead and like Mr. Mott always says, ‘Don’t take away what comes easy.’ He was doing it pretty nicely, so I just stayed with it. When I asked for his best, he was there for me. He ran pretty nice today.”

The listed field and riders for the Gulfstream Park Sprint show a compact eight-horse lineup: PP 1 Great Navigator with Edgar Perez at 120 pounds; PP 2 Jack’s Promise with Rajiv Maragh at 118; PP 3 Ajaayb with Mario Gutierrez at 118; PP 4 Beeline with Tyler Gaffalione at 118; PP 5 Wound Up with Irad Ortiz Jr. at 118; PP 6 Damon’s Mound with Junior Alvarado at 123; PP 7 Rolando with John R. Velazquez at 120; and PP 8 Con Compania with Miguel Angel Vasquez at 120.

Key opposition includes Wound Up, third in the Dec. 27 Mr. Prospector Stakes (G3) at Gulfstream; Con Compania, cutting back to six furlongs after fading to sixth in the Dec. 20 Harlan’s Holiday Stakes behind eventual Pegasus World Cup winner Skippylongstocking; and Beeline, a Hutcheson winner trained by Riley Mott, who said, “He does well down here in Florida, particularly racing at Gulfstream. He has some good form on this racetrack. Hopefully, he has that going for him.” Rolando is listed as a likely longshot after a 4th in the Pelican Stakes (115 figure).

Betting notes show Gulfstream installed Damon's Mound as the 7-5 morning-line favorite, while an updated morning report after scratches pushed his line deeper in some publications to 1-5. Xpressbet profiles him as a Grade 2 and Grade 3 winner with the class edge and suggested a sample wager: “$50 exacta part-wheel DAMON'S MOUND over ROLANDO and CON COMPANIA ($100).” Xpressbet also highlights Bill Mott’s stakes record at the Championship Meet as 8 starts: 4-1-0.

Damon’s Mound projects to control pace from his inside post given his Sunshine Sprint front-running pattern and 2-for-2 record at Gulfstream, a tactical advantage that could determine the outcome of the Sunset 6 carryover and the composition of exotics in this compact 6-furlong sprint. The purse figure and final posted odds should be checked against Gulfstream’s official program before wagering.