Gone To The Mountain won the Red Cell New Mexico Distance Challenge for the second consecutive year. (Credit: Coady Photography).

Prepped by Wes Giles and ridden by Freddie Martinez, Gone To The Mountain covered the distance in :43.941, posting a 102 speed index and defeating Sheet Burns by 1 ¾ lengths. The homebred 5-year-old stallion by Panther Mountain was winning the stakes for the second consecutive year, and he returned a $2.10 win mutuel, as $23,870 of the $26,777 bet in the win pool was wagered on him. There was no place or show wagering offered.

Gone To The Mountain is one of 13 stakes winners from four crops sired by Panther Mountain, a Grade 1-winning son of Meter Me Gone and the sport’s champion aged stallion in 2003. Now 11, Panther Mountain has sired 243 starters and the earners of more than $4.6 million, including graded stakes winner DMNV Mountable, his top earner. He stands for a $4,000 fee at Lazy E Ranch at Guthrie, Oklahoma.

Gone To The Mountain is one of five winners from six starters foaled by Lindys Bouquet, a winning 15-year-old daughter of the Streakin Six stallion Fast Lindy. The stallion’s half sister, the Royal Shake Em filly Queen Of Shakem, was a finalist in the $113,250 Gillespie County Fair Futurity (G3) in Texas in ’04.

Gone To The Mountain’s second dam, the winning Easily Smashed mare Prides Bouquet, produced Bobbys Royal Crown, a Royal Shake Em colt who won the 2002 Cashem Streaker Classic Stakes at the Hipodromo de las Americas in Mexico City. The stallion’s third dam, Le Bouquet, was a 1983 foal by Super Sound Charge who foaled Bouquet Robin, a filly by Chicks Beduino who was a finalist in the ’94 Heritage Place (G1) and Remington Park (G1) futurities in Oklahoma.

All told, Gone To The Mountain has won 12 of 24 races – including six stakes – and the $27,706 winner’s share of the New Mexico Distance Challenge purse pushed his bankroll to $438,706. The stallion has won his last six races, and his stakes resume includes a victory over champion Snowbound Superstar in last year’s $125,000 Red Cell Distance Challenge Championship (G1) at Los Alamitos, and a win in the 400-yard, $265,459 Hobbs America Futurity (G2) at Zia Park in 2007.

While in training with Giles at Sunland Park, Gone To The Mountain also stood for a $1,750 fee at Fred and Linda Alexander’s A&A Ranch in nearby Anthony, New Mexico. His New Mexico Distance Challenge victory earned the stallion a berth in this year’s Red Cell Distance Challenge Championship, which will be run at Fair Grounds Racecourse in New Orleans on November 14.

High On Cat, the AQHA champion distance horse two years ago, and La Especial Corona completed the order of finish.

Sheet Burns earned $12,254 to increase his earnings to $201,471. Racing for Maclovio Regalado, the 8-year-old black gelding by champion Okey Dokey Dale is a one-time $3,200 claimer who has won last year’s 870-yard, $40,000 Fine Loom Handicap at Ruidoso Downs. He also ran second, three-quarters of a length behind Gone To The Mountain, in the Grade 3, 870-yard Herman Jefferson Stakes at Zia Park, and he was the New Mexico region high-point distance horse.

A homebred 6-year-old gelding by Dome (TB) campaigned by Al J. Renner of Sidney, Montana, High On Cat earned $6,127 to push his bankroll to $181,038. High On Cat is a well-traveled sort, as the gelding has raced at 10 tracks in five different states, including every track in New Mexico. His seven wins in 28 races include an upset 39-1 victory in the 2008 Red Cell Distance Challenge Championship at Evangeline Downs in Louisiana.