Page 126 - December 2020

RACING NEWS
Dulce Sin Tacha’s winning connections include owners/breeders Bob & Jerry Gaston, trainer Heath Taylor and jockey Rodrigo Vallejo.
124 SPEEDHORSE December 2020
three at 400 yards, and finished second by a neck to Eye Work For You in the quarter-mile $200,000 All American Juvenile Stakes.
“We’re real proud of the horse,” said Gaston, who with wife Jerry also bred Perrys Double Down, the Mr Jess Perry gelding that for Stinebaugh Equine Enterprises won the previous race on Lone Star’s closing night pro- gram, the $393,210 Texas Classic Derby-G1. “We’re glad we kept this one.”
The Gastons have bred some nice ones, includ- ing Champion Double Down Special, an earner of $1,211,934, as well as 20 stakes winners, 95 winners and the earners of more than $8.3 million.
Dulce Sin Tacha is the second stakes winner by Champion and freshman sire Jess Good Candy.
Dulce Sin Tacha is the third generation of his family bred by the Gastons. The colt is out of winner Prissy Sin Tacha, who ran third in Tres Friends’s 2015 Texas Classic Futurity victory. Dulce Sin Tacha’s second dam is the winning mare Miss Sin Tacha, who was third in the 2008 Heritage Place Futurity-G1. Bred in partnership with Janet VanBebber, Miss Sin Tacha is out
of Sin Tacha, the unraced Thoroughbred, who produced World Champion Streakin Sin Tacha.
“This colt, ‘Dulce,’ is very calm,” Bob
said. “Now, his mama is by Tempting Dash, and they’re known to be a little bit fractious. ‘Prissy’ could run, but she broke my heart every time we ran her, because she would find a way to goof up and get beat. She’s still a little bit that way. She’ll get irritated and rear up and
start kicking. But her babies are as calm as a cucumber – so far, anyway.”
Prissy San Tacha has a yearling colt by Apollitical Jess, who was sold at the Ruidoso Select Yearling Sale, which was moved to the Lazy E Arena in Guthrie, Oklahoma, because of the pandemic.
“Dulce Sin Tacha is a dream to train, especially for a stud colt,” Taylor said. “He’s a big, long-strided colt. He’s so strong, but also so attentive, so focused, never nickers, never squeals, never hollers at a filly. He’s been out- standing, right from the get-go.”
Taylor had a request.
“I’d like to dedicate the race to some people who were really instrumental to getting us where we are,” he said. “Murry Craddock hauled all my horses for 20 years, and he got killed in an accident west of Fort Worth last summer. And Johnnie Long, who took care of the mares at my farm and had ponied my horses for 20 years, had to quit because of cancer. And I’d also like to take my hat off to Jerry Gaston, who is a big key behind all this.”
Dulce Sin Tacha has rewarded the Gastons with their own score in the Texas Classic Futurity. The couple also bred Champion Bodacious Dash, who won the Futurity in 2010, and Valiant Lil Lady, who won in 2012.
Plans are for Dulce Sin Tacha to go to Ruidoso for the Grade 1 derbies and back to Lone Star for the Texas Classic Derby.
Richard Chamberlain, Speedhorse
Dustin Orona Photography