Amoss enjoying another strong meet at Fair Grounds

NEW ORLEANS – A little more than halfway through this 81-day Fair Grounds meet, Tom Amoss has moved to a 13-win lead over Larry Jones in the trainers’ standings.

Through Thursday, the 44th day of the meet, Amoss had won 29 of 82 starts and was tied with Jones for the best win rate, 35 percent, among trainers with more than a handful of starts.

“It’s been a pleasant surprise in a lot of ways,” said Amoss, who has won 10 Fair Grounds training titles. “One of the keys to that, the weather has certainly fallen like we’d like it to. When we’ve needed to get off the grass, we were. We’ve been in sync really well this meet. It does come and go.”

Four of the five stakes victories for Amoss at this meet came in races switched from turf to dirt.

Amoss is getting to know the multiple stakes-winning, Louisiana-bred sprinter Heitai, who recently joined the stable when owners Frank and Barbara Rowell transferred him from trainer Karl Broberg. “It can’t be done quickly if a horse is a really quiet, to-himself type” such as Heitai, Amoss said.

Heitai won the Frontier Utilities Turf Sprint on Jan. 24 at Sam Houston in his first start for his new barn. He might run next against Louisiana-breds in the Louisiana Premier Night Sprint on Feb. 7 at Delta Downs, Amoss said.

He said he won’t run Heitai against Delaunay, the stable’s multiple graded stakes-winning sprinter. Since Amoss claimed Delaunay for $40,000 in 2012 at Churchill Downs, he has won 11 stakes races, including the Thanksgiving Handicap and Bonapaw at this meet. An 8-year-old gelding, Delaunay will run next in the Duncan F. Kenner on Feb. 21, Amoss said.

A Louisiana Derby hopeful in the barn is the 3-year-old gelding War Story, who finished second in the Lecomte Stakes in his second start for Amoss. He’s running War Story next in the Grade 2 Risen Star on Feb. 21. War Story joined the stable after Loooch Racing Stables and Christopher Dunn purchased him privately following the gelding’s maiden win in November at Churchill.

In the Grade 3 Lecomte, War Story broke slowly and made a decent late run, finishing 2 1/2 lengths behind the winner, International Star. The race was 20 days after War Story won an optional-claiming race in his debut for Amoss, and the trainer said that the five weeks between the Lecomte and Risen Star provide better spacing.

“The more time between races will give a chance to do things with another horse in company,” Amoss said. “That’ll make him a bit sharper horse than he was last time.”

On Tuesday, War Story, in his first workout since the Lecomte, breezed by himself, running a half-mile in 49.20 seconds.