Breeders' Cup Turf Race Quotes:

Winning trainer Chad Brown (Bricks and Mortar) – “This horse is remarkable. This is the biggest win of my career, and the biggest for my team, for sure. He has a lot of guts. What an awesome horse. We’re so, so fortunate he’s in our barn.

“I have to thank Mike Ryan, my partner, for finding the horses and picking them out. We do this together. Without Mike, we would have never bought this horse.

“It takes a remarkable team of really talented men and women to hold a horse together like this (remain undefeated with five Grade 1 wins). I can’t say enough about the individuals who worked with this horse throughout this campaign. Without them we wouldn’t be here.

“We just went race to race and when we got through each one it was, ‘OK, what are we going to do next? There were a lot of things to decide. A mile and a half, do we run him after the Arlington Million, can I get this horse ready after 13 weeks? I just reached down and talked to Bobby (Frankel). I have to thank him, too. We found the knowledge. I wouldn’t be here right now without Bobby Frankel. He launched me and to get to a training fest like this, you have to go into his textbook and pull out bits and pieces that maybe he used in the past. It certainly helped me today.

Any doubts the horse would win: “ I wasn’t sure until he hit the wire. He needed every inch of the mile and a half. I was worried when he was in between horses. I talked to Irad and he said he was pulling the whole way so he gave him his head and let him get in the clear, and once he saw daylight he just went.”

Winning jockey Irad Ortiz Jr. (Bricks and Mortar) – “This is a special horse.  Hè might be the best I’ve ever ridden. Today, hè was a little keen with me, so we were closer to the pace than normal.  So, I just tried to get him to relax. When I asked him to run, I looked behind me and saw we were clear.  Hè saw that other horse in front of us and hè fought all the way to the wire.  I knew it was very close, but I thought we won it. I’m so happy!” 

Second-place trainer Richard Mandella (United) – “He just needed a chance and he sure came through and gave it his all. It says a lot (about his ability). We knew it was a tough race but I just thought that other quarter of a mile would really help him and we had a little excuse going in our last race so we thought it was worth stepping up and he paid us back. I thought we were going to win there for a minute.”

Second-place jockey Flavien Prat (United) – “He ran huge. We had a good trip. We raced right behind the pace. He made a huge run. I mean I thought I was going to win turning for home. A great horse beat us, but it was an amazing race from my horse.”

Third-place and Sixth-place trainer Aidan O’Brien (Anthony Van Dyck and Mount Everest) – “Both my horses ran well, Sometimes the race goes for you and sometimes it goes against you. He’s (Anthony Van Dyck) a really nice horse and he’ll be a lovely horse next year.”

Third-place jockey Ryan Moore (Anthony Van Dyck) – “It was quite rough out there.”

11th-place Trainer Charlie Appleby (Old Persian (GB)) – “Unfortunately, they’ve not gone the gallop that most of us expected. They went steady fractions and everyone was in a heap, whereas we normally know that they usually, down that backside, would have been starting to get strung out a little bit. They were all stacking up like they were going into that far turn and he got back into that position. To be fair, once they went past us the first time and I saw where we were, well, I thought there just wasn’t going to be anything positive today. And, there we are—unfortunately this is racing and hopefully the horse comes out of it fit and well and we will regroup with him. I'm sure he’ll probably make his way back to Dubai for the Carnival.”