Shedaresthedevil Takes Flurry Racing to the Top

Flurry Racing Stables, Qatar Racing, and Big Aut Farms' Shedaresthedevil notched her first top-level score last September in a delayed running of the Longines Kentucky Oaks (G1) at Churchill Downs. The 4-year-old daughter of Daredevil ran again on this year's Oaks Day card April 30 and picked up another top victory in the La Troienne Stakes Presented by TwinSpires.com (G1) for trainer Brad Cox. Co-owner Staton Flurry spoke to BloodHorse MarketWatch about his multiple grade 1-winning filly, some of the young racehorses he looks forward to seeing hit the track, and how the retired Mr. Misunderstood is doing. MarketWatch: Shedaresthedevil won the Kentucky Oaks last year and came back on the same card this year to win the La Troienne. What has the journey been like with her? Staton Flurry: She just loves Churchill so, so much. She's a different animal out there. It's pretty cool. We may be the only horse that'll ever win on a September Oaks Day and a May Oaks Day. It's kind of been a daze the last eight months or so. We knew going into the Oaks we were going to be sitting good. We didn't know we were going to win it, but we knew we'd be competitive. Every time she steps on the track to breeze or to race she puts on a show. She's such a solid horse all the way around. It's just been a blessing and I'm so thankful to (bloodstock agent) Clay (Scherer) for picking her out and really insisting that we buy her and Brad and his crew for the way that we've managed her. We've worked well together and hopefully we can keep on going this year and hopefully next year too. MW: Do you have future plans for her mapped out after this race? SF: Like Brad told me the other day, we'll point toward November and work our way back. We don't really have any set-in-stone plans. Our end goal for this year is the Breeders' Cup (Distaff, G1). We'll just work our way back and see how the cards fall. MW: You're a Hot Springs, Ark., native and your family owns a business around Oaklawn Park. How did you get started in horse racing? SF: We own quite a few of the parking lots around Oaklawn so I've grown up out there all my life. I've been walking across the street back and forth to Oaklawn as long as I can remember and just fell in love with racing early on. I went to (Henderson State University) about 35 minutes away or so from Hot Springs and right before I graduated I bought my first horse and it's been downhill ever since. I think I got about 20 right now. We just had some owners and trainers that parked with us—"hey, you can come over and watch our horses run." But really other than that, no interaction with the horses. I loved it. My mom always kind of said, "hey, we ought to get a horse" and it never materialized until I put my foot down and said "hey, I'm buying a horse, I'm graduating college, I'm buying it." MW: What interested you so much to get started in racing? SF: The competition of it and being here in Hot Springs. This town lives and breathes horse racing. From about December to the first week of May, wherever you go, horsemen are put first. No matter what restaurant or wherever you go, they cater to the horsemen and I always liked that and wanted to be a part of it. Now we're playing a big part of it. MW: Shedaresthedevil was a horse of racing age when you purchased her at the 2019 Keeneland November Breeding Stock Sale. What's your approach to buying racehorses? SF: I've got an excellent bloodstock agent, Clay Scherer. We go over the catalog together, especially at the 2-year-old sales. We'll watch the breeze shows. He's down there, I'm watching replays, and we'll pick out a few. We know the price range we like to be in and we just see what we can get. Yearling sales, last year was the first sale I've gone to yearling-wise. Went up there (to the Keeneland September Yearling Sale), spent a week, and we had our top 10 and kind of narrowed those down to price range that we could afford or we could be in and we got three good ones last year. It's pedigree, performance, all of the above, looks. You never know what's going to be a racehorse or not. MW: Any 2-year-olds coming up you're particularly excited about? SF: I've actually got the ones that we bought last year. We bought Shedaresthedevil's half sister (named Blackheartedgypsy, by Speightster). She should get to Brad within the next month or so, I really like her. Then we've got a Connect colt. We're really high on Connect as a stallion right now. We've actually got two Connect colts, but we bought one that's out of a half sister to Midnight Lute last September and his name's Insolito. Knock on wood, we really, really like him. We bought another Connect colt in March (at the Ocala Breeders' Sales March 2-Year-Olds in Training Sale, named Nineties Country) and we bought a really nice Classic Empire filly last month in April (at the OBS Spring 2-Year-Olds in Training Sale, named Interstatedaydream). MW: Those are both first-crop stallions. What are you seeing from them so far? SF: Connect, everything we've looked at of his has just been super classy, super forward. He looks like he's the real deal in the making. Classic Empire, everything he has thrown has looked the part. Speed-wise, they've been right on target in the breeze sales. Both of those, and I don't have one, but I think Unified's going to be a very nice young stallion too. MW: You mentioned Clay Scherer earlier. Who else is on Team Flurry that helps your operation? SF: Trainer-wise, Brad Cox and his team, Karl Broberg and his assistant Kevin Martin, and I've got a few horses in Louisiana with Ron Faucheux. MW: You also raced the multiple graded stakes-winning gelding Mr. Misunderstood who was retired early this year. Can you give an update on where is he is and what he's up to? SF: He was special. He's the one that put me on the map. I got to see him (during Derby week). (Cherise Gasper) up in Lexington has him and is making him a dressage horse. He looks happy, he's gotten fat, so he's living the good life. It was time. He's completely sound, he just got to the age where he lost interest in running and if they don't want to do it anymore we're not going to force them to do it. He treated us well so he deserves a good second life after the track. (Gasper)'s actually John Ed Anthony's bloodstock agent's (John Gasper) wife. Brad's assistant, Tessa (Bisha) that's up there at Keeneland, she's the one that really hooked us up. I had never met (Gasper) until about a month and half ago here at Oaklawn. She said, "Hey, I'm the one that has Mr. Misunderstood." We've talked and texted before, but met face to face Rebel Day here at Oaklawn. They had Caddo River in the Rebel (G2) and she came up and introduced herself. We were really hoping we could get him to that million mark. I think he was about $30,000 away from it. But we said if he doesn't want to do it anymore, there was no sense running just to collect checks to accomplish that goal. It's not worth it. He's been too good for us. I was happy to see him doing good and he seems to be enjoying what he's doing.