Vanderbilt took the lion’s share of the pari-mutuel action in Saturday’s fourth race from Gulfstream Park and jumped as the 4-5 chalk, but New York-bred River Thames proved the fly in the ointment, turning in a flawless debut performance to be named the newest ‘TDN Rising Star’.

The clearest betting alternative to Vanderbilt at odds of 29-10, the $200,000 Fasig-Tipton NY-Bred Sale purchase from Legacy Bloodstock was under a busy ride early from John Velazquez, but had gained a forward position three-wide from third passing the half-mile marker. Pouring in the pressure to the favorite, who cut out fractions of :22.49 and :45.47 while mostly hugging the inside running rail, River Thames–carrying the WinStar colors for the debut–went on the attack four deep at the five-sixteenths, claimed Vanderbilt with relative easy in upper stretch and was ridden out to score by a commanding 4 3/4 lengths. Heavyweights China Horse Club and Siena Farm are also partners on the exciting colt as well.

River Thames was bred by Miguel Ferreira’s CTR Stables.

“We’ve always had high expectations for him,” winning trainer Todd Pletcher said. “We had a little bit of a setback during the summer which delayed his debut, but he’s been training like he’d come out with a good effort to begin. I thought it was a competitive group we were running against today, a good field, and the final time was good. It seemed like he did it the right way.”

-edited from www.thoroughbreddailynews.com