Mansetti Delivers King's Plate for American Owners

The King's Plate Stakes is Canada's race, the country's equivalent of the Kentucky Derby (G1) for 3-year-olds foaled in Canada, but on Aug. 16, the historic $725,444 contest belonged to two American owners: Bill and Al Ulwelling. The father-and-son team, active supporters of Canadian racing for the past decade, struck gold Saturday by winning their first Plate with Mansetti, a colt named after their favorite restaurant in their home state of Minnesota. Another Plate runner for the Ulwellings, Faber, finished sixth in the 13-horse race. Two Woodbine locals contributed to their success: trainer Kevin Attard with his preparations of the Collected colt and meet-leading jockey Pietro Moran, who utilized an inside draw to dare the 12 other horses in the field to catch him. None could. Shedding early leader Scorching entering the first turn of the 1 1/4-mile Plate after an opening quarter in :22.93, Moran lulled Mansetti into a slower pace down the backstretch of :47.45 for the half-mile and 1:12.48 before busting open the race with approximately three furlongs to go. Hitting the mile marker in 1:36.78, he cruised home 2 1/2 lengths in front of belatedly rallying Tom's Magic. He was clocked in 2:03.68 for the distance on Woodbine's synthetic Tapeta surface, the slowest time in the Plate since Sir Dudley Digges was timed in 2:04.09 in 2016. "He was just so relaxed, and I just talked him the whole way," said the 20-year-old Moran, who broke from the gate alongside his dad, jockey David Moran, who was aboard eighth-place finisher William T. "And when I chirped at him around the turn, he gave it to me, and I took a peek back down the lane, and I saw no one was coming, and I couldn't stop screaming to the wire." The only graded stakes winner in the field, Mansetti slipped past many bettors, returning $38.70 to win. Distance was a question for Mansetti coming into the Plate, as his longest race had been at 1 1/16 miles when he won his preceding start in the June 28 Marine Stakes (G3) over Scorching. Attard acknowledged having initial doubts about Mansetti over a classic distance. "But this horse really changed from 2 to 3 when he got back to Woodbine this season to start his 3-year-old campaign—he was just acting different," said the reigning Sovereign Award-winning trainer, whose trio of Plate wins have all come since 2022. Favored Notorious Gangster rallied to grab third, ahead of Scorching in fourth. Both the show and runner-up finishers battled traffic in a bunched field, with Tom's Magic facing a near-impossible task while still in 12th after a mile. No Time, seeking to become the 40th filly to win the King's Plate in the race's 166-year history, weakened to ninth after stalking the pace between horses. Mansetti was one of three runners for Attard in the Plate, the others being Dewolf, who ran fifth, and Faber. The winner was bred in Ontario out of the Sky Mesa mare Gidget Girl by Jungle Racing, the equine operation of sports radio talk show host Jim Rome. The Ulwellings purchased the colt in 2024 for $40,000 from Eddie Woods' consignment to the Ocala Breeders' Sales Spring Sale of 2-Year-Olds in Training. He is one of two graded winners this year for Collected, who stood at Airdrie Stud this year for $10,000. The Canadian Triple Crown continues with the Sept. 9 Prince of Wales Stakes at 1 3/16 miles on dirt at Fort Erie before the Sept. 28 Breeders' Stakes at 1 1/2 miles on turf at Woodbine.