BY BROCK SHERIDAN
FEBRUARY 14, 2006—Florida-bred Big Drama, the 2010 Eclipse Award Champion Sprinter and that year’s Sentient Jet Breeders’ Cup Sprint (Grade 1) winner, was foaled at Queen Farm in Ocala, Florida.
Bred and owned by Harold L. Queen, the son of Montbrook out of the Notebook mare Riveting Drama earned $2,746,060 in a stellar career that included 11 wins, four seconds and a third in 19 starts.
“What can you say about a horse like Big Drama,” Harold’s son Mark Queen, who now operates Queen Farm, said. “He almost died when he was a yearling. He had ulcers so bad he had to go the [veterinary] clinic. Then he got bit by a spider [in 2009]—at least that’s what they think happened, we never really knew for sure—and he was off for nine months. We had to treat him in a hyperbolic chamber several times before he had so much success in his 4-year-old year. It took us nine months to get him turned around.”
Trained by David Fawkes, Big Drama won his second start, a six-furlong maiden special weight at Calder Race Course in August of 2008, by seven-and-a-quarter lengths. He then became the sixth horse to sweep the colts and geldings divisions of the Florida Stallion Stakes at Calder, taking the $100,000 Dr. Fager, $150,000 Affirmed and $400,000 In Reality by a combined 11 ½ lengths. He finished his 2-year-old year with a length victory in the Grade 3 Delta Jackpot at a mile-and-a-sixteenth at Delta Downs.
Despite winning five of six races and $860,250, Big Drama lost out as the 2008 Florida-bred champion 2-year-old male to Vineyard Haven, who had won that year’s Three Chimneys Hopeful (G1) at Saratoga Race Course and Champagne Stakes (G1) at Belmont Park.
In his first start as a 3-year-old in March of 2009, Big Drama won Grade 2 Swale at Gulfstream Park, but was disqualified and placed second behind Florida-bred This Ones for Phil. Fifth in the Preakness in May, Big Drama made his next start in June, winning the $250,000 Red Legend Stakes by seven lengths at Charles Town. He was then second to Soul Warrior in the nine-furlong West Virginia Derby (G2) in August before finishing off the board in the Grade 1 King’s Bishop at Saratoga. He was then then sidelined by the spider bite.
Big Drama began his 4-year-old campaign with wins in the $63,000 Ponche in June and Grade 2 Smile Sprint Handicap under the top weight of 121 pounds in July, both going six furlongs at Calder. Fawkes then took him to Saratoga where he finished second while giving four pounds to winner Majestic Perfection in the Grade 1 A.G. Vanderbilt Handicap on August 8 then was second to Here Comes Ben in the seven-furlong Forego (G1) on September 4.
He next posted an authoritative gate-to-wire win the $1,818,000 Breeders’ Cup Sprint at Churchill Downs, winning by a length-and-a-half with regular rider Eibar Coa aboard.
Big Drama returned at age five to win two of three starts including the Grade 3 Mr. Prospector at Gulfstream in January and the $72,000 Whippleton at Calder in September. But he could not repeat his Breeders’ Cup title, finishing seventh in the 2011 Sprint at Churchill Downs.
“He was just a really neat horse to have in the barn,” trainer David Fawkes said in a 2021 article in Bloodhorse. “He was easy to train and did everything right from day one. The older he got the better he got. He went through a brief period where we had to do some minor surgeries on him and he came back great. He won the Breeders’ Cup after that and got the Eclipse Award. When he won the Mr. Prospector, he ran a 120 Beyer number and ran a -3 on the Ragozins. That was unheard of. When he was on, he was on. He was as good a horse as you ever put a saddle on.”
Big Drama retired to stud at HallMarc Stallions in Ocala, Florida in 2012 then moved to Bridlewood Farm in Ocala in 2015. He had stints standing at Stonewall’s Prestige Stallions in Ocala, Oakton Farm Stallions then passed away from stomach complications while at Stormborne Stallions in Citra, Florida in 2021.
“What do you say when you breed, raise, break and race one like Big Drama,” Mark Queen said. “There’s not a better feeling.”
Return to the February 14 issue of Wire to Wire
