After running a quiet second in his initial dirt start in the Jan. 3 Smarty Jones Stakes, Silent Tactic announced his Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve credentials with a hard-charging, widening victory in the $1 million Southwest Stakes Feb. 6 at Oaklawn Park.

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Though overshadowed by others entering the 1 1/16-mile race — including his Mark Casse-trained and John Oxley-owned stablemate Strategic Risk, who had beaten him in the Smarty Jones — he closed with authority in the Southwest, blowing past nine horses in the stretch while giving every appearance of a horse very likely to relish the classic Kentucky Derby distance of 1 1/4 miles.

Fanned out wide Friday into the stretch by Cristian Torres, he finished full of run to take command inside the sixteenth pole on his way to a 3 1/4-length victory over runner-up Soldier N Diplomat, who had taken a brief lead between calls in midstretch after stalking the pace.

Oxley’s Silent Tactic, who in victory became the first stakes winner for second-crop sire Tacitus, clocked 1 1/16 miles in 1:44.85. He paid $26 to win.

Torres celebrated by standing up in the irons as Silent Tactic completed his final strides to the finish line.

“I knew there was going to be a lot of pace in the race, so I was not worried about being close or wherever I was going to be,” Torres said in an in-house interview. “I just broke and let him be wherever he wants to be, and he responded at the quarter pole. He showed up.”

The Bob Baffert-trained Southern California invader Buetane, who chased pacesetter D’code, the 2.30-1 favorite, through quarter-mile fractions of :23.52, :47.52, and 1:12.81, was third, followed by Rancho Santa Fe in fourth.

Disappointing for Oxley and Casse, Strategic Risk came under a drive on the second turn and weakened to 10th.

Torres aboard victorious Silent Tactic (Coady Media)

The Southwest, the richest race to date on the 2026 Road to the Kentucky Derby, offered qualifying points on a 20-10-6-4-2 basis to its top five finishers, provided they are Triple Crown nominees. Officials at Churchill Downs, where the May 2 Kentucky Derby is contested, use qualifying points to promote the race and as a preference system when the first leg of the Triple Crown draws more than its maximum field size of 20 horses.

Silent Tactic is now atop the Kentucky Derby leaderboard with 25 points, a total that includes 5 points he picked up in the Smarty Jones.

The Southwest, originally carded for Jan. 31, was postponed because of subfreezing temperatures in Arkansas that left the dirt track frozen for more than a week. The weather was significantly better Friday, with high temperatures in the 70s.

Casse speculated that the lost training time may have compromised Strategic Risk, saying it can impact some horses and not others.

“I wonder if it affected him a little bit, but it sure made Silent Tactic really good,” he told FOX Sports.

Silent Tactic, purchased last year by bloodstock agent Justin Casse for $500,000 from the Thorostock consignment to the Ocala Breeders’ Sales Spring Sale of 2-Year-Olds in Training, was bred in Kentucky out of the Gun Runner mare Magical Sign. He notched his second career victory in the Southwest after scoring on debut Oct. 10 as a 2-year-old at Woodbine on its all-weather Tapeta surface. He later ran second in the Nov. 2 Grey Stakes there before his runner-up finish in the Smarty Jones.

He earned $495,000 by taking the Southwest, bringing his career earnings to $594,422.

Tacitus, who won the Wood Memorial Stakes in 2019 before continuing that year to run third in the Kentucky Derby and second in the Belmont Stakes, stands at Taylor Made Stallions in Central Kentucky for $5,000.

Three participants of the Southwest have gone on to win the Derby: Lil E. Tee (1992), Smarty Jones (2004), and Mystik Dan (2024). Smarty Jones and Mystik Dan won both races, while Lil E. Tee ran third in the Southwest.

Casse did not immediately commit to running Silent Tactic back in the March 1 $1 million Rebel Stakes, the next leg in Oaklawn’s stakes series for 3-year-olds. That 1 1/16-mile race precedes the $1.5 million Arkansas Derby at 1 1/8 miles March 28.

“We’ll figure it out, but we’re not leaving Oaklawn,” he said.

Search Party Finds Daylight, Takes Martha Washington

Casse and Torres had earlier high-level stakes success Friday at Oaklawn when Tracy Farmer’s Search Party shook free of traffic on the second turn before surging to outkick late-running Newtown Pike by a neck in the $300,000 Martha Washington Stakes for 3-year-old fillies.

The victorious daughter of Gun Runner, who stalked the pace inside in third for the first half-mile before falling to fifth when stuck behind horses on the second turn, tipped out three wide to find a clear path in the stretch on her way to completing 1 1/16 miles in 1:45.56.

She was one of four winners on the card for the Hall of Fame trainer, who is enjoying a banner Oaklawn Park meet.