Post Time won the 2024 Carter Handicap (G2) and General George Stakes (G3). The 4-year-old horse raced nine times in 2024 with four wins, three seconds and two thirds. He has $975,000 in earnings for the year and $1,227,910 career earnings. He also finished second in the 2024 Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile (G1).

Post Time is owned by Ellen Charles of Hillwood Stable, who named the horse Post Time because of a connection to her grandmother, the former owner of General Foods Marjorie Merriweather Post (1887-1973).

He is a foal of 2020 who was bred in Maryland by Dr. & Mrs. Thomas Bowman, Dr. Brooke Bowman and Milton P. Higgins III. The grey/roan horse is by Frosted and Vielsalm by Fairbanks.

Post Time was purchased by Cary Frommer at the Fasig-Tipton Midlantic Fall Yearling Sale 2021 for $85,000. Mrs. Charles fell in love with the horse and her Hillwood Stable, LLC purchased him from Frommer shortly after the sale. He was trained at the historic Aiken Training Track under the tutelage of Frommer.

Once ready, he was sent to trainer Brittany Russell at Fair Hill Training Center, Elkton, Md., who is his trainer to this day. Assistant trainer Emma Wolfe has been a very important part of his training as his exercise rider and travels with him when he is on the road. Eric Camacho was his original jockey and rode him until he was injured in January 2023. In April of 2023, Post Time went to Fox Hall Equine Rehabilitation Center in Fallston, Md. for Physical Therapy and Aquatread therapy. He spent two months rehabbing there and then went back to Brittany Russell at Fair Hill. His first race back was in September 2023, missing quite a bit of racing as a 3-year-old. Luis Barajas and Emeterio Rodrigues are his grooms.

The Aiken Trained Horse of the Year award, created in 2002, honors local Thoroughbreds who have had an excellent racing season. Nominees must have trained in Aiken County AND must have won at least one graded stakes race during the year OR exceeded $500,000 in career earnings. The Hall of Fame Advisory Board approves the winner.

An induction ceremony will be held on Sunday, March 16, 2025 at 1:30 pm at the Aiken Thoroughbred Racing Hall of Fame. An exhibit about Post Time will be on display. The public is invited to attend the ceremony. The Hall of Fame is located at 135 Dupree Place, Aiken, SC 29801 inside historic Hopelands Gardens.

Past winners include Congaree (2002), Wando (2003), Limehouse (2005), Bob and John (2006), Country Star (2007), Midshipman (2008), Quality Road (2009 & 2010), It’s Tricky (2011), Alpha (2012) Palace Malice (2013 & 2014), Curalina (2015 & 2016), Dickinson (2017), Still Having Fun (2018), Concrete Rose (2019), Madone (2021) and Private Creed (2022 & 2023).

Hillwood Stable’s multiple graded-stakes winning millionaire Post Time, most recently second in the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile (G1) Nov. 2, will race again as a 5-year-old in 2025 with the $3 million Pegasus World Cup (G1) Jan. 25 at Gulfstream Park as a potential season opener.

Bred and based in Maryland and trained by Brittany Russell, Post Time is entered in Saturday’s Cigar Mile (G2) at Aqueduct, where the 4-year-old Frosted colt drew outermost Post 11 in a field that includes Grade 1 winners Senior Buscador, Book’em Danno, Locked and Mullikin.

“He’ll run next year. I’m going to try to figure out what it’s going to look like,” Russell said. “It’s probably a little early to be like, ‘We’re going back to the Breeders’ Cup,’ but looking at the year I’ll probably pause on him somehow at the beginning of the year, back off of him a little bit and then we’ll gear him up for the second part of the year.”

It didn’t take long for Hillwood Stable’s Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile (G1) runner-up Post Time to get back to business upon his return to Maryland.

Laurel Park-based trainer Brittany Russell said the 4-year-old Frosted colt, part of her string at the Fair Hill Training Center in Elkton, Md. that is overseen by assistant and exercise rider Emma Wolfe, arrived Wednesday from Del Mar.

“He got back and he has been raising hell for 24 hours so he had to go gallop [Thursday],” Russell said. “Not that I’ve traveled with loads of good horses, but he travels really well.”

Post Time finished 1 ½ lengths behind upset winner Full Serrano in the Nov. 2 Dirt Mile, his third Grade 1 placing this year to go along with stakes wins in the General George (G3), Polynesian and Jennings at Laurel and Carter (G2) at Aqueduct. He also ran second in the Met Mile (G1) and third in the Whitney (G1), both at Saratoga.

“He’s got a Grade 1 with his name on it somewhere, I just have to figure it out,” Russell said. “The [Dirt Mile] winner ran great. He had a great trip. I’m not saying we didn’t or any excuse like that, but with his running style he’s running late and it’s a short stretch. You feel like maybe if there’s a little more [racetrack] maybe he gets there but, hey, that’s horse racing. We were delighted to be second.”

Never worse than third with nine wins from 14 starts, Maryland’s 2022 champion 2-year-old is under consideration for the Cigar Mile (G2) Dec. 7 at Aqueduct.

“With how he’s doing right now it’s kind of hard to really stop on him. I feel like we’ve taken pretty good care to space his races and things like that. It’s up to him. That’s kind of how we’ve gone with him all year,” Russell said. “We got lucky and he handled everything pretty well and he kind of asked for the next step.

“Emma was training him up there [Thursday] morning and she said he was a wild animal,” she added. “So after a race like that and him traveling back home from California, for him to act like that makes me feel pretty good that we can probably think about the Cigar Mile.”

Post Time has two wins – the Polynesian and Jennings – and three seconds in five tries at one mile and has raced twice at Aqueduct, following his Carter victory with a runner-up finish in the May 3 Westchester (G3).

“[The Cigar Mile] is five weeks from his last one and the way he seemed to have traveled home, we’re going to keep that on our radar and certainly consider it,” Russell said. “And if we have to sit and wait, he’ll get whatever he needs. It’s going to be up to him. We’re just going to see how he trains and go from there.”

Post Time became a fan favorite and social media darling during the Breeders’ Cup for his good looks and personality, which regularly sees him active and playful both before and after his morning exercise.

“He’s just entertaining. He’s pure entertainment, and he knows everybody’s looking at him. He loves that,” Russell said. “Besides his quirks in the morning, it was like pretty stress-free. He’s just good, so it was a little bit less of a worry for me. Once Emma survived getting him to the racetrack every day it was fine.”

Already the richest horse the 35-year-old Russell has trained since going out on her own in 2018, Post Time became her first millionaire following the Dirt Mile. He earned $170,000 for second, pushing his bankroll to $1,167,910.

“How about that,” Russell said. “Now I need to get him to $2 million.”

Hillwood Stable’s Maryland-bred and based multiple graded-stakes winner Post Time, dominant in capturing the one-mile Polynesian last month at Laurel Park, will make his next start in the $1 million Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile (G1).

Trainer Brittany Russell confirmed that the 4-year-old Post Time, by two-time Breeders’ Cup Classic (G1) participant and multi-millionaire Grade 1 winner Frosted, is bound for and will train up to the Dirt Mile Nov. 2 at Del Mar, having emerged from his 11 ½-length romp in the Sept. 14 Polynesian in good order.

“We’re heading toward the Dirt Mile. We’re going to take him out there. The Polynesian was the prep,” she said before saddling a fifth straight winner at Laurel with 2-year-old filly first-time starter Gotanothathingcomn ($4.40) in Thursday’s Race 4. She added a second winner, 3-year-old gelding Derbyness ($5.80), also ridden by Jevian Toledo, in Race 8. “We’re all really excited.”

The Polynesian was the sixth stakes win for Post Time, five of them coming at Laurel including his first graded triumph in the Feb. 17 General George (G3), which was the last time he had raced over his home track. He then won the Carter (G2) and was second in the Westchester (G3) at Aqueduct and finished second in the Met Mile (G1) and third in the Whitney (G1) – his two-turn debut – at Saratoga.

“We got him a win. It was great to get him back in the winner’s circle at home,” Russell said. “I think he got enough out of it, which is always a concern when you’re thinking about the next step. There’s still something left in there. From a mental standpoint, I think we did what we wanted to accomplish. He thinks he’s the man. He came out of the race very, very good and that was sort of the goal.”

Post Time returned to the work tab for the first time since the Polynesian Wednesday over a fast main track at the Fair Hill Training Center in Elkton, Md., where Russell’s string is overseen by assistant trainer and exercise rider Emma Wolfe, going four furlongs in 49.60 seconds.

“He’s great. He’s been training pretty aggressively since he ran,” Russell said. “That was a pretty easy race for him so he was back to work quick. I was going to breeze him last week, but we got a lot of rain and I was waiting for a good track. He did it easy, well within himself. It was kind of a great first work back off of the run.”

Post Time has the second-most points on the Dirt Mile points leaderboard with 22, five fewer than Preakness (G1) and Pennsylvania Derby (G1) winner Seize the Grey. National Treasure, Three Technique and Japan-based Crown Pride have all won automatic qualifying races.

Millionaires National Treasure and Skippylongstocking are also among horses pointing to the Dirt Mile. After running second to National Treasure in the Met Mile, Post Time finished ahead of both Skippylongstocking (fifth) and National Treasure (sixth) in the Whitney.

“We’ve been careful in how we’ve raced him. We haven’t overraced him or anything and he seems to be maintaining that level,” Russell said. “I feel like in a sense he needs to take a little bit more of a step up, and I’m hopeful that he can do it on the right day.”

Russell said her husband, champion jockey Sheldon Russell, will retain the call in the Dirt Mile. He has ridden 10 consecutive races on Post Time, who owns nine wins, two seconds, two thirds and $997,910 in purse earnings from 13 career starts.

“My first runner out there, we’re doing it together,” Brittany Russell said. “Even if he wasn’t going to be on him, it’s the team. The fact that he’s ridden him and he’s had so much success on him, it’s great.”