Barbadian Runner better suited for local win this time in Yorktown
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Barbadian Runner achieved a great deal in a busy 3-year-old campaign last year, but a stakes win at Colonial Downs eluded him in two game attempts. The Maryland-bred gelding will have a prime spot at redemption as the 6-5 morning-line favorite in the $100,000 Yorktown on Saturday.
“He’s honest as could be, and hopefully he’ll remain that way from this race,” trainer Henry Walters said. “I don’t see any reason why he shouldn’t.”
When the seven-time stakes winner ran in Virginia last year, he was still tackling shorter distances. Getting away from the lightning-quick Colonial track served him well, and adding distance has helped him keep in touch with early leaders. He remains unbeaten in four starts at the Yorktown’s distance of 1 1/8 miles, most recently stalking to win the $125,000 Deputed Testamony at Laurel Park in June.
“It was a tougher go for him [at Colonial] at the time because he was transitioning into where he wanted some more ground,” Walters said. “I think we look good in here at the mile and an eighth.”
Trainer Todd Pletcher said last-out Grade 1 Metropolitan Handicap runner Vibe will not run at Colonial this weekend.
With a key contender out of the running in the field of seven, Barbadian Runner’s most dangerous rival could also be his most familiar. Adero, a 6-year-old gelding trained by Jamie Ness, took him to the limit in the Deputed Testamony last month and came up a nose short, earning a matching 97 Beyer Speed Figure.
“I’m really excited about the way the horse is progressing,” Ness said. “He ran good the first time around and then we took a shot in the stakes and he ran real well. Now we go again.”
Ness claimed the gelding in May, and though he had not won a race for the better part of a year, the listed stakes winner has clearly regained his old form.
Love Sign
Anakarina will make her first start for new trainer Saffie Joseph Jr. as a dangerous front-runner in the $100,000 Love Sign Stakes on Saturday. Joseph cross-entered the 4-year-old filly in the $150,000 Dashing Beauty on Thursday at Delaware Park, but he ultimately decided to ship to Virginia.
“We haven’t had her long, but we worked her once, and she worked well enough,” Joseph said. “This looks like an opportunity to try to get some black type.”
In 18 career starts for trainer Dallas Stewart, Anakarina spent much of her juvenile and 3-year-old campaigns on the turf, but with steady improvement over the winter, she seems to have found her best form on dirt. The filly entered Joseph’s barn through a private sale earlier this summer and will tackle a familiar six-furlong distance Saturday.
In her last start, at Churchill on June 19, the Vekoma filly flashed her usual early speed and held for a close second in a third-level allowance, earning a career-best 89 Beyer.
Outrageously also cross-entered in the Dashing Beauty at Delaware and will ship to Colonial. The Jordan Blair-trained mare has flown through the ranks in three straight wins at Churchill Downs, notching her most convincing victory in a second-level allowance last month.
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