Pharoah’s Wine owners drink up win

FRANKLIN, Ky. (Thursday, Sept. 4, 2025) — Trainer Dale Romans goes back four generations with the 4-year-old filly Pharoah’s Wine. He goes back more than 30 years with her owner-breeders.

It would have been emotional under any circumstances when Pharoah’s Wine closed strongly through the stretch for a 1 1/4-length victory over pacesetting Sparkle Blue in Thursday’s $500,000 The Mint One Dreamer Stakes at Kentucky Downs. Making it more poignant was that the restricted stakes triumph came two months after the death of William Pacella, the principal owner in Pharoah’s Wine and whose family continues to campaign the filly.

The Pacellas own Pharoah’s Wine with longtime partner Frank Shoop and Nancy Delony, the widow of partner Frank Jones Jr., the Louisville entrepreneur and one of the most influential people in Kentucky racing as a horseplayer, owner, breeder, regulator and horsemen’s representative. Jones also was like a second father to Romans.

“It’s an amazing feeling,” said William Pacella’s son Mike, at the race with his brother Tony and Tony’s son Billy. “Our partners Frank (Shoop), Frank Jones and Nancy. The filly put everything together today in a $500,000. My father, who was actually the catalyst behind all of this, passed away a couple of months ago. And it’s very special.”

Said Romans: “All of them here I’ve been with a long time: The Pacellas, Frank Shoop, Nancy. I think the Pacellas are probably my longest-standing clients right now, over 30 years. We’ve had a lot of good horses along the way.”

Jockey Corey Lanerie thought he’d be settling into second in the field of seven older fillies and mares. That went out the window at the break.

“The trip was good. She kind of scared me a little bit when she didn’t break as sharp as I wanted her to,” Lanerie said. “I thought the 3 (Waves of Mischief) would go, and I’d be laying second. But everybody in there are great jockeys and they saw the same thing — and they out-broke me. I just put myself behind Brian (Hernandez, on Vive Veuve, who was second most of the way), I thought he might take me the farthest. The pace wasn’t very fast, I could feel. I just wanted to get out in enough time to be able to get them. I just gave her daylight, and she was the best horse.”

Sparkle Blue, with Tyler Gaffalione in the saddle, finished second by three-quarters of a length over Adrasteia and jockey Jose Ortiz, followed by Grayosh, Watchtower, favored Vive Veuve and Waves of Mischief.

Pharoah’s Wine paid $7.42 to win as the second choice behind Vive Veuve, who took the lead with an eighth-mile to go before weakening, though beaten only 3 1/2 lengths for everything. No time appeared on the official Equibase chart for the stakes, run at a mile and 70 yards for fillies and mares that had not won a stakes in 2025.

The One Dreamer was the Kentucky-bred Pharoah’s Wine’s first stakes victory, though she is graded stakes-placed. For her career, she now is 5-5-2 in 18 starts, earning $847,475 with the $300,350 payday.

Pharoah’s Wine was starting for the third time at Kentucky Downs, having earned her maiden victory over the course and finishing seventh in the Grade 2 Music City last year. Her mom, the graded-stakes winner Sweeping Paddy, also won her first race at Kentucky Downs in 2012. Sweeping Paddy is a full sister to Cherry Wine, the 2016 Preakness Stakes runner-up for Pacella, Delony, Frank Jones and Frank Shoop.

If Pharoah’s Wine’s maternal grandma, C.S. Royce, wasn’t as productive on the track, she became an excellent broodmare. Go back to the fourth generation, with Romans taking over the training in 1998 of Sweeping Story, a two-time stakes-winner who finished third at 57-1 in the 1999 Kentucky Oaks won by the great Silverbulletday.

“They’ve all been nice fillies,” Romans said. “Her mother won here, broke her maiden. She won, broke her maiden here. Liking this racetrack is a big part of it.

“She ran a big race. She’s had a great year. She’s done well all year. She’s had a couple of tough beats. She put it all together today. A $500,000 race is going to be good no matter where you go. This was a good bunch of fillies, and she just ran a great race.”

In six starts this year, Pharoah’s Wine won a pair of lucrative Churchill Downs allowance races before finishing second by a head in Ellis Park’s $250,000 Kentucky Downs Preview Ladies Turf.

Romans said Pharoah’s Wine will be pointed for Keeneland’s Grade 1 First Lady.