Attard runners loom large in featured allowances
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ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Trainer Kevin Attard sends out runners in each co-feature on Sunday at Woodbine, including Hammerhead in the seventh race. The allowance, with a $50,000-claiming option for 3-year-olds, is scheduled for a mile on the main turf.
A War Front colt owned by Gold Square, Hammerhead graduated in his third start at 2 over a mile on the inner turf in late October. He went on to run second to the future stakes winner Church and State in allowance company before finishing a close second behind Mi Bago in the Jan. 1 Dania Beach Stakes at Gulfstream.
After missing the board in two graded stakes in the spring in Kentucky for trainer Chad Summers, Hammerhead was reunited with Attard as the favorite in an inner turf route at this level here June 21. Sent off as the favorite, he weakened to third after making a three-wide bid to vie for the lead in midstretch.
Eleven others were entered in the seventh race, including the Mark Casse-trained trio of Walking in Memphis, Captain Junuh, and Aristotle. The Rachel Halden-trained English Actor is making his turf debut, and the son of English Channel is bred for the task at hand.
Attard runs War Painter and American Women in the ninth race, a 1 1/16-mile first-level allowance for females on Tapeta. Victorious in the South Ocean Stakes at 2, War Painter was competitive in a host of restricted stakes during her sophomore campaign last year, the highlight of which was a victory in the Ashbridges Bay in November.
War Painter was favored twice when competing at this level in the spring. She was a lapped-on second traveling 1 1/16 miles off a five-month layoff on May 16 before finishing a flat fourth going 1 1/8 miles June 22.
War Painter worked well with Hammerhead on July 13, covering a half-mile in 47.80 seconds before galloping out five-eighths in 59.60.
American Women tailed off after graduating her second time out on the dirt at Ellis Park last summer. She was transferred to Attard prior to a troubled sixth-place finish in the $100,000 Alywow, a 6 1/2-furlong main turf stakes here June 21.
The former Attard trainee Bolt Enoree is debuting off a $32,000 claim by trainer Julia Carey on June 14, when she finished a faltering fifth on the inner turf. She won her two previous races on the Tapeta, a two-turn allowance in December and a seven-furlong conditioned allowance following a winter break on May 17.
My Girl Sky has been working right along for her first start since Oct. 26, when she capped an abbreviated campaign by running fourth in the Eternal Search Stakes on the inner turf. Trained by Barbara Minshall, the 6-year-old won the 2022 Thunder Bay Stakes when trained by Katerina Vassilieva.
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