Dave Portnoy's Miss Watermelon Wins At Presque Isle

Go Go Greys finally have a second winner. Dave Portnoy's stable only buys gray horses, and it has been growing fast. Monday it sent Miss Watermelon to Erie, Pennsylvania for a Maiden Special Weight on a weekday card. Before the race even went off, Dave was telling everybody that a Go Go Greys horse showing up on a weekday means business.

Dave Portnoy

@stoolpresidente

Here is thing you gotta know about #GoGoGrey Stables. If we show up at Parx or Presque Isle on a weekday you better believe we ain’t fooling around…

He was right. Miss Watermelon went off as the heavy 2/5 favorite with Gaddiel Martinez riding for trainer Kelsey Danner. She sat just off the leader into the far turn, and when Martinez asked her, she was gone. This was her 5th start. The last one came a few weeks ago at Saratoga, where she seemed to tire late, and she'd had gate issues before that. None of it showed up Monday.

Dave Portnoy

@stoolpresidente

Here is Miss Watermelon winning for fun vs a very salty group of maidens. 🍉🍉🍉🍉🍉🍉🍉🍉🍉🍉🍉🍉🍉

The tape backs up the emojis. The fractions went 22.47, 45.51 and 57.41, and she crossed in 1:09.41 with nobody near her. Dave called it a very salty group of maidens, which is his way of saying she beat a soft field. Fair enough. A 2/5 shot is supposed to win. But Barstool's own recap has the margin at more than 6 lengths, and that's not a horse that barely held on.

There's more to it than one maiden race. Portnoy officially named the stable Go Go Greys in March 2025, and it has grown to close to 40 horses plus 2 broodmares. The first winner was Wondergirl Carly, who took her debut at Parx last October. With Miss Watermelon, the stable is now 2-for-2 in Pennsylvania, which explains why Dave brought up Parx and Presque Isle together.

The big name in the barn is still Lovely Grey. She made it into the Kentucky Oaks field when Bottle of Rouge was scratched with a cough, and that's what moved Dave's hobby from Twitter bits to real racing coverage. Winning races is hard, though, and a stable this size needs its cheaper horses paying off on random weekdays in Erie too.

Next up is Lovely Grey in the Winter Memories Stakes at Belmont Park on Thursday. Miss Watermelon is out of the maiden ranks now, so she'll face tougher allowance fields and won't get to beat up on salty maidens anymore. For now, the gray-horse experiment has another win, and Dave has plenty of watermelon emojis.