Multiple Oaklawn Park stakes winner Ivan Fallunovalot surpassed $1 million in career earnings with his start in Saturday's Grade 3 $400,000 Count Fleet Sprint Handicap for older horses.
Owned by Lewis Mathews, of Bismarck, Ivan Fallunovalot earned $12,000 for his fifth-place finish to push his career total to $1,010,903.
According to the Texas Thoroughbred Association, the state's official breed registry for Thoroughbreds, 1987 sprint champion Groovy and Texas Chrome are the only other Texas-bred millionaires. Groovy's finished with $1,346,956 in career earnings and Texas Chrome made $1,033,262.
Texas Chrome made two starts at Oaklawn, finishing third in the $150,000 Bachelor Stakes for 3-year-old sprinters in 2016 and sixth in the Grade 2 $750,000 Oaklawn Handicap for older horses in 2017.
Ivan Fallunovalot, the 2015 TTA Texas Horse of the Year, has a 17-6-2 record from 32 career starts.
On behalf of Mathews, trainer Tom Howard claimed the 8-year-old Valid Expectations gelding for $25,000 at the 2014 Oaklawn meeting. Under Howard's care, Ivan Fallunovalot developed into a multiple stakes-winning sprinter. Ivan Fallunovalot captured Oaklawn's King Cotton in 2015 and 2016 and ran in the 2015 Grade 1 Breeders' Cup Sprint.
Following Tom Howard's death from cancer on March 10, Ivan Fallunovalot made his final start of the 2018 Oaklawn meeting for the trainer's widow, Kathy, in the Count Fleet.
Ivan Fallunovalot was transferred to trainer Al Stall following Saturday's race.
"I'm so happy he's going to Al Stall," Kathy Howard said. "I'm very happy for Ivan. Al will do him right."
Howard became the trainer of record following her husband's death, but she said she had no desire to continue in that role beyond the Oaklawn meeting. She will remain racing manager for Arkansas owner Frank Fletcher, who also employs Stall and is a long-time friend of Mathews.
Howard said Ghost Rocket, a 3-year-old Ghostzapper colt, was sent to trainer Will VanMeter following his second-place finish in a maiden special weights race Saturday. The Fletcher-owned Ghost Rocket was also with Tom Howard at the time of his death.
Sports on 04/19/2018