Allowance races spice up card

The lack of a stakes race on a Saturday card in high New Orleans racing season feels odd, but the most the Fair Grounds card this Saturday can offer is a veritable festival of entry-level allowance racing.

Races 4, 5, and 6 all are for first-level allowance horses, though the races are very diverse. The fourth, a turf sprint also open to $50,000 claimers, is for 3-year-olds; the fifth, a dirt route, is for older horses and also is open to $17,500 claimers; and the sixth is a straight first-level turf-route allowance for older horses.

Handicappers perusing the grass races should pay close heed to the local forecast, which calls for rain through late Friday – and that after several rainy New Orleans days this week. Even this year’s quick-draining grass course might prove too wet for use Saturday.

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Turf or dirt, there’s an interesting horse in race 4 – Lookin at Daisy. The quality of racing at Sam Houston is several notches below that at Fair Grounds, and Sam Houston is where Lookin at Daisy won his career debut for trainer Bret Calhoun and owner-breeder Ed Few, but his performance looked well above par for a straight maiden race there.

Showing speed from the start, Lookin at Daisy, bet to 7-5, was challenged into the homestretch by a Steve Asmussen-trained second-time starter named Legitimate Cat, who would come back next out to rally from 12th and win a maiden race. Not only did Lookin at Daisy put Legitimate Cat away at the eighth pole, he drew away at the finish under his own courage and galloped out in front. By Lookin at Lucky and out of a More than Ready mare, Lookin at Daisy has turf to his pedigree should the race stay on, and if not, that works, too.

Race 5, the dirt route for older horses, on paper has too much speed, and that includes 9-5 morning-line favorite Legend Forever as well as the likely second choice, Chapter and Verse. Bettors might settle on Duval as the likeliest closer, but he is a teaser with a long history of close-but-no-cigar late runs, and at a better price, Moon Traveler should be considered.

If race 6 stays on turf, it goes directly through Mutasaawy, who in a turf race at this class level last month beat 10 foes and lost only to Chocolate Ride, who returned to win the Grade 3 Fair Grounds Handicap. The one-mile distance on turf will be on the short side for Mutasaawy, and if the race is switched to dirt, the short stretch run might make it nearly impossible for him to get up in time. The pick for dirt is Galveston Harbor, who won an off-the-turf mile at Fair Grounds earlier in the meet and seems well suited to the race’s configuration.

◗ Principal owner Ron Paolucci said Wednesday that Joe Talamo will ride War Story in the March 28 Louisiana Derby. Kent Desormeaux had been aboard for War Story’s second-place finish Feb. 21 in the Risen Star Stakes, but Desormeaux rides two other 3-year-old dirt-stakes horses, Texas Red and Prospect Park, and Paolucci said he wanted to secure a two-race commitment for his colt and avoid changing riders if War Story makes it to the Kentucky Derby.