Churchill Downs Update: Ragtime Returns to Churchill Downs as 8-5 Favorite in $300,000 Chilukki

Nov 12, 2025

Godolphin’s talented 3-year-old filly Ragtime returns to Churchill Downs on Saturday as the 8-5 morning line favorite when she lines up against six rivals entered in the $300,000 Chilukki presented by Resolute Racing (Grade III).

Saturday’s 11-race card kicks off at 1 p.m. (all time Eastern) and also includes the 27th Claiming Crown (Races 4-11) – eight supercharged starter allowance races for North America’s top blue-collar horses. The Chilukki will go as Race 3 at 1:58 p.m.

Trained by Bill Mott, Ragtime has never finished outside the top three positions in the first five starts of her career with three wins, one second and one third. Among her three victories was a 2 ¼-length score in the Sept. 20 Dogwood Stakes presented by Resolute Racing (GII) at Churchill Downs.

“She came back to us about a month ago from our New York string and has been training very well in the morning,” Mott’s veteran local assistant Kenny McCarthy said. “She started her career at Saratoga with blinkers and we’ll put them back on Saturday to help her stay a little more involved early.”

Ragtime is a 3-year-old daughter by Union Rags out of the Godolphin-raced dam Burmilla. Ragtime’s second dam, Nannerl, finished eighth in 1993 Chilukki to Miss Indy Anna (then known as the Churchill Downs Budweiser Breeders’ Cup Handicap).

Junior Alvarado has the call in Saturday’s race and will break from post No. 7.

The Chilukki field from the rail out (with jockey, trainer and morning line odds):

Impel (Florent Geroux, Brad Cox, 9-2)
Shred the Gnar (Luis Saez, Brian Lynch, 5-2)
Literate (Irad Ortiz Jr., Brad Cox, 10-1)
Runaway Diva (Jose Ortiz, Michelle Hemingway, 20-1)
Zadorsky (Joe Ramos, Whit Beckman, 15-1)
One Magic Philly (Tyler Gaffalione, Brendan Walsh, 3-1)
Ragtime (Alvarado, Mott, 8-5)
CLAIMING CROWN NEWS AND NOTES – The Breeders’ Cup is over for another year. The fireworks of $5 million broodmares and $2.2 million weanlings sold at auction have concluded. Now it’s time for the real world for the vast majority of horsemen.

Saturday’s Claiming Crown at Churchill Downs, with $1.1 million in purses spread over eight events, was created to give American racing’s everyday workhorses — and their owners and trainers — a day in the spotlight.

“It’s reality for most people in horse racing,” said trainer Tom Van Berg, who will try to win his third Claiming Crown race with Dance Some Mo in the $200,000 Claiming Crown Jewel. “Most people don’t deal in the $2.2 million weanlings, the $5.6 million broodmares. It’s not feasible for most people.”

The Claiming Crown was created in 1999 by the National Horsemen’s Benevolent and Protective Association (NHBPA) and the Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Association (TOBA). Churchill Downs is the Claiming Crown’s host track for the third time in four years. Registered Kentucky-bred horses will race for an additional $130,000 from the Kentucky Thoroughbred Development Fund, with the per-race supplement ranging from $10,000 to $25,000.

The eight races are conducted under starter-allowance conditions, with race specifications requiring participants to have competed for a certain claiming price or cheaper within a designated time period.

“Only a small percentage of owners and trainers are blessed with having a horse qualify for the Breeders’ Cup or Triple Crown,” echoed NHBPA CEO Eric Hamelback. “But the majority of horsemen have a shot to someday be in the Claiming Crown, providing that big-day experience for their owners. Even trainers with considerable Grade I experience strive to participate in the Claiming Crown.”

Saturday’s card provides one of the best betting cards of the fall, or even the year. The fewest entries for a Claiming Crown race were 10 horses. One race drew a capacity 14, with the stewards giving permission to run three of the races with 14 instead of the usual maximum of 12. Six races drew overflow fields, whether limited to 12 or 14. There are 54 different jockeys and 110 trainers in Saturday’s entries.

First post is 1 p.m., with the Claiming Crown on Races 4-11. The 11-race program also includes the Grade III, $300,000 Chilukki Stakes for fillies and mares at one mile, carded as Race 3.

“For claiming people doing what we’re doing, this is a big deal for us,” said Jeff Hiles, trainer and co-owner of Time for Trouble, an $8,000 claim in 2021 who seeks a record third victory in the $100,000 Iron Horse Kent Stirling Memorial. “It gives the small guy who claims a horse for $8,000, and the horse gets good, a chance to have the shine on them for a little bit. A lot of people don’t have the clientele to go out and buy high-end yearlings and get the breeding. But you can pick one out that has been running, claim it and hopefully the change of scenery helps it. A couple good races in them, they might get their confidence built up and they might turn out like him.”

Kelly Breen, based in New Jersey and Florida, won the 2011 Belmont Stakes with 24-1 shot Ruler on Ice. He’s been in the Kentucky Derby and the Breeders’ Cup. Now he’s looking forward to trying to get his first Claiming Crown win with Cadet Corps in the $200,000 Jewel and Speed Figures in the $150,000 Canterbury Tom Metzen Memorial.

Breen owns both horses with the Kenwood Racing partnership. If the idea is to get owners excited, mission accomplished.

“We’re going to have 20 people coming,” Breen said. “There are people flying in from the East Coast. My people are making an event of it. They’re going to go out to eat there, spend money. It’s a good vibe for horsemen.”

Referencing the durability of owners as well as the horses, he continued: “One of the races is the Iron Horse. This is the Iron Horse for owners. Your meat and potatoes of horse racing are your claiming horses. Here they are having a special day for it.”

The Claiming Crown is populated with good horses at their level, much as college football players in NAIA or Division-III programs are good, if not as gifted as those in D-I.

“This rewards those people who have paid their dues all year,” said trainer Joe Sharp, who has horses in six Claiming Crown races Saturday, including Gilded Craken and Alternate Reality in the $200,000 Jewel. “It costs the same to feed a claimer as it does a stakes horse. Churchill Downs does a great job hosting the venue. It’s really nice to showcase those horses and those owners. They’re the bread and butter, the backbone of racing Wednesday through Friday.”

Besides Kentucky, horses are coming from Arizona, California, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Maryland, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma and Pennsylvania, with others stopping by Maryland, Virginia, Delaware, Arkansas, West Virginia and Colorado on their way to Churchill Downs.

Just in the $100,000, six-furlong Ready’s Rocket Express, half the field possesses at least 10 career victories, including Sharp Warning (18) and 2024 winner Concrete Glory (16). In fact, Sharp Warning’s 10 wins out of 15 starts for owner-trainer Kayla Warren in 2025 lead North America.

Michael Friedman’s Ohio-based Sadie the Goat brings a six-race win streak (by a combined 34 lengths) into the $100,000 Glass Slipper for fillies and mares at a mile.

Dewaine Loy’s Happy Strike, a $6,000 yearling, has won seven of 14 careers, earning $168,161 as he takes four straight victories at Iowa’s Prairie Meadows into the $200,000 Jewel.

The late-running Risk Manager, one of the favorites in the $175,000 Emerald at 1 1/16 miles on turf, is an 11-time winner and $582,669-earner. The 7-year-old horse has won at least one race in each of his seven years of competition, mostly spent with Mike Maker, the Claiming Crown’s all-time leading trainer.

Brian Hernandez Jr., the 2024 Kentucky Oaks and Derby-winning jockey, is scheduled to resume riding Wednesday after sustaining fractured ribs, a collapsed lung and a lacerated liver in a Sept. 21 spill. He is named on three Claiming Crown horses: 11-time winner Keen Cat in the Rapid Transit for Randy Morse and Alternate Reality (Jewel) and Mercy Warren (among the favorites for the Glass Slipper) for Sharp. (Information in this report was provided by the National Horsemen’s Benevolent and Protective Association.)

CHURCHILL DOWNS AT A GLANCE – The following are Churchill Downs averages, courtesy of Brisnet:

Avg. Win Odds: 5.05-1
Favorite Win: 40%
Favorite In-The-Money: 71%
Exacta: $87.47
Trifecta: $636.29
Superfecta: $4,580.02
Super Hi-5: $4,419.44
Double: $80.73
Pick 3: $637.68
Pick 4: $6,102.33
Pick 5: $25,598.69
Derby City 6 Jackpot: $477,590.98
DOWN THE STRETCH – Wednesday’s Derby City 6 Jackpot has a carryover of $4,852 for the nine-race card. The sequence begins in Race 4. … Through the first 11 days of the Fall Meet, the $3 Late Pick 3 had an average payout of $668. … Through the first two weeks of the five week Fall Meet, jockey Jose Ortiz entered Wednesday with a 14-11 lead in the jockey standings over Tyler Gaffalione with Irad Ortiz Jr. in third with 10 wins. … Brad Cox had a 9-6 lead over Steve Asmussen in the trainer standings with Brendan Walsh in third with five victories. … Godolphin was atop the owners standings with four wins, one more than Asmussen, Calumet Farm, David Jacobson and Novogratz Racing Stables Inc. … Trainer Greg Foley is one win away from 500 career victories at Churchill Downs. Foley has two horses entered Thursday and one on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. …  Training was canceled Tuesday at both Churchill Downs and Trackside Louisville due to freezing temperatures. Both tracks re-opened Wednesday. … Trainer Dale Romans announced his candidacy for U.S. Senate on Wednesday. More information can be found at his website: www.daleromans.com. … For more information about the Churchill Downs Fall Meet, visit www.churchilldowns.com