KINGSTON, Jamaica - South Florida trainer Jose Pinchin and recently retired Ocala farm owner Bert Pilcher have collaborated on multiple generations of horses for nearly two decades. In all that time, Pinchin has never talked up horses’ talents before their first start — until Florida-bred Atomically, who is slated to compete in the NetJets Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies (Grade 1).
“Jose is not a guy to ever, ever brag about a horse before he runs it,” Pilcher said. “But this filly had breezed one morning, and I had called him. I just casually said, ‘How’s that filly?’ He said, ‘I shouldn’t say this, but I’m going to. She is a runner. She is the best filly you’ve sent me in a long time.’ And he was right.”
Pilcher raised horses on his Shade Tree Farm, property purchased by his father in 1980, until he retired in 2021, and for years ran a training barn as well to start the horses. He sent many to Pinchin to train, and together they have won, by Pilcher’s count, 11 stakes in the Florida Sires Stakes programme.
Pilcher bred many of them, but in Atomically’s case, Pinchin’s wife, Tracy, bred the filly in partnership with Michael Bernard of Jamaica. Pinchin originally hails from Jamaica, where he began his training career. Bernard has been the top owner in Jamaica for the past three years, he said, as well as the second-leading breeder there two years ago.
Pinchin trained Atomically for Tracy and Bernard through her first three starts, all at Gulfstream Park. Third in her debut August 19, Atomically destroyed a maiden field by seven lengths September 2. She followed that with a 6 3/4-length win in the October 1 FTBOA Florida Sire My Dear Girl Stakes.
Within a week, Eclipse Thoroughbred Partners made a deal to buy a half-interest in Atomically, who moved to the stable of Hall of Fame trainer Todd Pletcher. The Pinchins sold their interest in the filly, while Bernard sold part of his interest, keeping half ownership in her. Eclipse and their partner Harry Colburn own the other half.
Pilcher foaled Atomically as well as her dam, the Uncaptured mare Shesunbelievable. Another of his clients, John Penn, bred Shesunbelievable, who went through two Ocala Breeders’ Sales Company (OBS) sales, with Pinchin buying her for US$29,000 at the 2017 October yearling sale.
An OBS sale is where Pinchin and Pilcher first met.
“I bought a filly under his consignment,” Pinchin said. “I went back to the barn and asked him if he would keep her for me, and we’ve been hooked up for 18-20 years.”
Shade Tree bred Three Rules , a 2014 son of Gone Astray, in partnership and raced him solely. Pinchin trained Three Rules to victory in three 2016 Florida Sires Stakes—the Dr Fager, Affirmed, and In Reality. He also saddled Three Rules in that year’s Sentient Jet Breeders’ Cup Juvenile (G1) to a sixth-place finish behind winner Classic Empire.
Bernard, a retired CEO of a tobacco company, lived in Louisville, Kentucky, when Fusaichi Pegasus and Monarchos won the Kentucky Derby (G1) in 2000 and 2001, respectively. He attended the Kentucky Oaks (G1) card one year, fell in love with the game, and has owned horses since 2008.
“In about 2010 I began getting my horses at the OBS sales in Ocala,” Bernard said. “Since that time I have been purchasing horses from Ocala to race in Jamaica as well as the United States. Danbury was my first and most successful horse in the United States.”
Trained by Bill Kaplan, whose charges included 2011 Eclipse Award champion female sprinter Musical Romance, Danbury won the 2016 OBS Sprint Stakes. Bernard’s other runners have included Sunshine N Shadow, who earned US$123,120 while trained by Stanley Gold.
“Sunshine N Shadow is now a stallion in Jamaica,” Bernard said.
Bernard said that about 20-25 per cent of the horses that race in Jamaica are purchased in the US, with the rest primarily Jamaican-breds. Bernard has about 40 horses in Jamaica.
Atomically is the first horse Bernard has bred in the US. She is the first foal from Shesunbelievable, who was unraced.
“She was a really pretty filly,” Pinchin said of Shesunbelievable. “One week before she was to race, she popped her knee. So we actually bred her as a three-year-old.”
Pinchin bred Shesunbelievable to Girvin, winner of the 2017 betfair.com Haskell Invitational Stakes (Grade 1) and a Florida stallion at the time. Girvin has since relocated to Kentucky. The following spring, Atomically was foaled on Pilcher’s farm, and he oversaw her early breaking and training for Pinchin.
“She’s always been a big, strong filly,” Pilcher said. “She was a maiden foal, but she didn’t look like one. She was tough—you could do what you needed to do with her, but you weren’t going to force her to do anything. She always did everything right. As long as you let her know what you liked, she would go for it.”
Pinchin wishes Atomically’s new connections well and will be rooting for her to win the Juvenile Fillies. He and Bernard still own Shesunbelievable, who has a yearling filly by Khozan and is in foal to Uncle Chuck.
