Stakes-Winning Mare Angel Gift Retired

(from Santa Anita notes)
Angel Gift, a multiple stakes winner and second to Azeri in the 2002 Clement L. Hirsch Handicap (gr. II), has been retired and will become a broodmare this spring in Kentucky.

Eddie Delahoussaye, who owns Angel Gift in partnership with Rick Strauss and Ro and Ward Williford, said the mare bled while finishing sixth in the Feb. 16 Santa Maria Handicap (gr. I) and also emerged from the race with a minor ankle problem.

"The ankle's no big deal and we could have brought her back, but we thought the best thing was to make her a broodmare," Delahoussaye said.

Trained by Patrick Gallagher, Angel Gift had a 5-5-5 record from 25 starts with earnings of $364,524. A 6-year-old Kentucky-bred by Allen's Prospect, Angel Gift is out of Whiskey's Gift, who is a full sister to multiple grade I winner Strawberry Road. Angel Gift's last two victories came in the 2002 and 2003 runnings of the Golden Poppy Handicap at Bay Meadows.