Leading Change Denies Napoleon Solo In Travers Stakes

Unbeaten Colt Claims Maiden Group One At Saratoga

Wathnan Racing's Leading Change claimed his first Group One in only his third start. Leading Change ran down Napoleon Solo in the closing stages of the Gr.1 Travers Stakes at Saratoga Race Course to win by a half-length.
"I was confident he would run well," Brad Cox said of Leading Change after the Travers Stakes on 29 August 2026. "This is no knock on the other three-year-olds, but there is just no one to be scared of in this group. I thought my horse was the fastest horse based on what little he had done." Manny Franco, deputising for the injured Irad Ortiz Jr, sent the son of Gun Runner past a game Napoleon Solo close home to win the Travers Stakes by a half-length.

Napoleon Solo went straight to the front from post three and set moderate fractions of :23.66, :47.95 and 1:12.62, with Leading Change tracking in third just off Sea Strike up the backstretch. Around the far turn Sea Strike challenged the pacesetter while Franco held Leading Change back a beat longer, and Napoleon Solo had shaken off that challenge by the eighth pole. Further back, The Puma, Silent Tactic, Ocelli and Emerging Market completed the field.

The Gr.1 Travers Stakes was run over 2000m on a fast dirt track at Saratoga Race Course, worth US$1,250,000, with Leading Change — a 3YO colt trained by Brad Cox and ridden by Manny Franco — collecting US$687,500 for owner Wathnan Racing. Napoleon Solo finished second under John Velazquez, with Golden Tempo third for trainer Cherie DeVaux, beaten a half-length and 1 3/4 lengths respectively.

Collared Near The Wire, By A Head

Golden Tempo was also closing from off the pace at that point, making his first start since finishing the Triple Crown series on 6 June 2026 with a Gr.1 Belmont Stakes win. Leading Change collared Napoleon Solo about 50 yards from the wire, and held off Golden Tempo's late run by 1 3/4 lengths in third.
"Manny did a good job of letting our horse break, go forward and get his legs underneath him and travel at a nice comfortable pace," Cox said of the run. "The horses that were up there first and third down the backside were right at the wire together. Good horses keep going and it was a very good group of horses and we came out on the right end."
"I had the trip that we expected," Franco said. "We wanted to be forward, behind Napoleon Solo and Sea Strike, I just sit on the rail the whole way around. Going to the five-sixteenths, my horse was going forward, and I felt that I got horse under me." It was Franco's third consecutive weekend winning a Group One stakes.

Cox Eyes 2027 Breeders' Cup Classic

Leading Change did not make his first career start until the day after the Triple Crown series concluded, and the Travers was only his third outing — his previous one a win in the Gr.3 Indiana Derby. His unbeaten record now carries a Group One alongside it, a rare trajectory for a horse with so little racing behind him.

Case Clay, racing manager for Wathnan Racing, framed the result around the colt's physical scope rather than a settled profile. "If he was going to win today it was going to be on talent," Clay said. "And, yes, physically, he's a stretchy two-turn, big, good-looking horse that looks like he could have gotten 10 furlongs." Case Clay Thoroughbred Management bought the colt for US$800,000 at the 2024 Keeneland September Yearling Sale.

Leading Change is out of the Congrats mare Starship Warpspeed, making him a half-brother to Gr.1 Kentucky Oaks winner Shedaresthedevil — a page of pedigree that now carries a Travers winner alongside an Oaks winner. The win was Brad Cox's second in the race, following Essential Quality in 2021, extending the trainer's record in one of American racing's oldest fixtures.

"I am proud of him," trainer Chad Summers said of Napoleon Solo's effort. Summers said recognition had been slow to arrive for a colt who had already won the Gr.1 Preakness Stakes and finished second in the Gr.1 Haskell Stakes. "After yesterday, maybe he will finally start to earn some of the respect that I feel he was deserving of."

A Big Run, A Little Shy

Cherie DeVaux, whose Golden Tempo carried the Gr.1 Kentucky Derby and Belmont Stakes form into the race, pointed to a lost stride rather than a lack of effort. "Jose said he had a big run but he just got a little shy when he was coming up between horses, it stopped his momentum a bit," DeVaux said. "But I'm really proud of how he ran and he came back in great shape and that's what's most important."

Golden Tempo's return from a Belmont Stakes win six weeks earlier under a big weight of expectation showed both its cost and its promise: the placing kept his Triple Crown-summer form intact even in defeat, while confirming that the effort of that campaign had not blunted his class. For DeVaux, the placing was as much a statement of soundness as of speed.

Hit Show's Dubai World Cup Echo

Leading Change's win extends a season in which Wathnan Racing, the operation of Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, Emir of Qatar, has built out a genuine American string alongside its Gulf and European interests. The Travers success sits behind the operation's 2025 Gr.1 Dubai World Cup victory with the same trainer's Hit Show, a result that first established the Cox–Wathnan partnership at the highest level on Gulf soil.

Wathnan has stated that it values having its US-based runners compete in races such as the Gr.1 Saudi Cup and the Dubai World Cup, and Cox said discussions about a possible Gr.1 Breeders' Cup Classic bid for Leading Change were already under way. "We're looking at the Breeders' Cup Classic, but it could very well be the 2027 Classic," Cox said, leaving open whether the colt heads there in 2026 or waits a season.

That either timeline keeps Leading Change in the conversation for the sport's biggest global prizes reflects how quickly the picture has shifted. A colt with three career starts now carries a Group One, a leading trainer's faith, and an ownership group already thinking about Gulf-facing targets for the year ahead — a rare position for a horse this lightly raced to occupy.

Run Down In The Final Seventy Yards

The Travers card drew an attendance of 47,659 to Saratoga Race Course. The scale of the crowd matched a field that carried Preakness, Belmont, Haskell and Kentucky Derby form into the same 2000m contest, several of them separated by only fractions of a length at the wire.

Behind the placed runners, Sea Strike had forced the pace before fading, having arrived off an 8 1/4-length romp in the Curlin Stakes (Listed) at the same track, while Kentucky Derby runner-up Renegade and Haskell winner Baby Vino carried Group One credentials into a race that ultimately rewarded the horse doing his best work in the closing strides.

For Napoleon Solo, the run reset the terms of his season — a horse that led throughout and was run down only in the last seventy yards.

The placings confirmed a young colt with three starts now sits among the division's leaders, trained by a two-time Travers winner and owned by an operation already weighing his next assignment on the global stage. Behind them, Golden Tempo, Sea Strike, Renegade and Baby Vino all carried Triple Crown or Haskell form into a Saratoga field that left little separating several horses at the wire, underscoring the depth Wathnan and Cox now face as they weigh a Breeders' Cup Classic bid for their unbeaten colt.

TRAVERS STAKES: NA | Group One Flat | 3yo | Thoroughbred | Dirt | 2000m | US$1,250,000 | Rail Position: NA | Track Condition: Fast | Safety Limit: NA | Track Record: NA | Prize Breakdown: NA

1 Leading Change (T: Brad H. Cox / J: Manuel Franco) | 2 Napoleon Solo (T: Chad Summers / J: John Velazquez) | 3 Golden Tempo (T: Cherie DeVaux / J: Jose Ortiz)